ISPs must respond to warrants to identify subscribers

A California court ruled recently that an ISP must respond to warrants demanding the identification of its subscribers.

In criminal hacking case, the court held that the police could force an ISP (in that case, Time Warner) to give the identity and address of a Time Warner subscriber based on a IP (Internet Protocol) address.

The police subsequently searched the defendant's home and found evidence of the defendant hacking into a public school's computer network. The defendant claimed that he had a privacy expectation for his information with Time Warner.

"A subscriber has no expectation of privacy in the subscriber information he supplies to his Internet provider. Therefore, his challenge to a warrant requiring his Internet provider to identify him through his Internet Protocol (IP) number has no merit." wrote the court in People vs. Stipo.  The appellate court found no expectation of privacy in the defendant's subscriber information.

This case has some interesting implications, not only for criminal cases, but civil cases as well since a civil subpoena could also be used to find out identifying information as well.