Every day, companies collect health information from customers and analyze it for commercial purposes. This poses a significant threat to privacy, particularly as the Fourth Amendment protection of this deeply personal information is limited. Generally, law enforcement officers do not need probable cause and a warrant to access these private health information databases; only a subpoena is required, and sometimes nothing at all. The Fourth Amendment protections for health information may, however, have changed after the Supreme Court's 2018 decision in Carpenter v. United States, which held that the Fourth Amendment protects people from warrantless searches of historical cell-site location information possessed by their cell phone providers. The Court explained that, because of the nature of historical cell-site location information, individuals retain a reasonable expectation of privacy despite the information being in the possession of a third party. In reaching its holding, the Supreme Court considered the type of data, the uniqueness of cell-site location information, the impact of technological advancement on privacy, the voluntariness of the disclosure, and the property rights associated with the records. Many of these factors could support heightened Fourth Amendment protection for health information. This Article argues that Carpenter v. United States provides additional protections for future searches of health information in private databases.

中文翻译：

---

Carpenter v. United States 后的健康信息第四修正案保护：数据库中的恶魔

每天，公司都会从客户那里收集健康信息，并出于商业目的对其进行分析。这对隐私构成了重大威胁，特别是在第四修正案对这种深度个人信息的保护有限的情况下。一般来说，执法人员不需要正当理由和搜查令即可访问这些私人健康信息数据库；只需要传票，有时根本不需要。然而，在最高法院 2018 年的判决之后，第四修正案对健康信息的保护可能发生了变化卡彭特诉美国，它认为第四修正案保护人们免于对其手机提供商拥有的历史手机站点位置信息进行无根据的搜索。法院解释说，由于历史蜂窝站点位置信息的性质，尽管信息由第三方拥有，个人仍保留对隐私的合理期望。最高法院在作出裁决时，考虑了数据的类型、基站位置信息的独特性、技术进步对隐私的影响、披露的自愿性以及与记录相关的财产权。其中许多因素可以支持第四修正案加强对健康信息的保护。本文认为卡彭特诉美国为将来在私人数据库中搜索健康信息提供额外的保护。