Just the Facts on ‘Geofencing’
27th October 2023
As worshippers gathered at the Calvary Chapel in 2020, they were being watched from above.
Satellites were locking in on cellphones owned by members of the nondenominational Protestant church in San Jose, California. Their location eventually worked its way to a private company, which then sold the information to the government of Santa Clara County.
This data, along with observations from enforcement officers on the ground, was used to levy heavy fines against the church for violating COVID-19 restrictions regarding public gatherings.
“Every Sunday,” Calvary’s assistant pastor, Carson Atherly, would later testify, the officers “would serve me a notice of violation during or after church service.”
Calvary is suing the county for its use of location data, a controversial tool increasingly deployed by governments at all levels—notably in relation to the U.S. Capitol riot on Jan. 6, 2021. While enabling law enforcement to more easily identify potential offenders, the practice, called “geofencing,” has also emerged as a cutting-edge privacy issue, raising constitutional issues involving warrantless searches and, with Calvary Chapel, religious liberty.