As state laws limiting abortion kick in after the ruling, technology trade representatives told Reuters they fear police will obtain warrants for customers' search history, geolocation and other information indicating plans to terminate a pregnancy. Prosecutors could access the same via a subpoena, too.
"It is very likely that there’s going to be requests made to those tech companies for information related to search histories, to websites visited," said Cynthia Conti-Cook, a technology fellow at the Ford Foundation. Technology has long gathered - and at times revealed - sensitive pregnancy-related information about consumers. In 2015, abortion opponents targeted ads https://www.mass.gov/news/ag-reaches-settlement-with-advertising-company-prohibiting-geofencing-around-massachusetts-healthcare-facilities saying"Pregnancy Help" and"You Have Choices" to individuals entering reproductive health clinics, using so-called geofencing technology to identify smartphones in the area.
While suspects unwittingly can hand over their phones and volunteer information used to prosecute them, investigators may well turn to tech companies in the absence of strong leads or evidence. In United States v. Chatrie, for example, police obtained a warrant https://www.nacdl.org/Content/United-States-v-Chatrie,-No-3-19-cr-130- for Google location data that led them to Okello Chatrie in an investigation of a 2019 bank robbery.