FBI is buying location data to track US citizens, director confirms

FBI Director Kash Patel confirmed to lawmakers that the agency has resumed purchasing Americans' location data from commercial data brokers to aid federal investigations, marking the first such confirmation since 2023. Senator Ron Wyden called the practice an "outrageous end-run around the Fourth Amendment," as government agencies bypass the warrant process by buying commercially available data originally derived from phone apps and advertising technologies. Wyden and other lawmakers have introduced the bipartisan Government Surveillance Reform Act, which would require court-authorized warrants before federal agencies can purchase Americans' data from brokers.