Outline of issues involving search and seizure—First Amendment issues

Outline of issues involving search and seizure—First Amendment issues

It may also be argued that certain searches and seizures of computer systems, programs, and data constitute violations of the First Amendment. In one case,FN47 the defendant was accused of publishing a telephone company credit card with the intent that it be used to defraud the telephone company. The evidence against the defendant consisted of the fact that a message on a bulletin board that he or she ran contained a credit card number that could have been used to defraud the telephone company. The defense argued that the bulletin board was a publication medium similar to books and deserved special protection from seizure because seizure of the computer system was the equivalent of the seizure of a printing press. The issue was not litigated, but in effect conceded by the prosecution's decision to dismiss the case in the absence of any proof as to criminal intent on the part of the defendant.