If the linked article has a paywall, you can access this archived version instead: https://archive.ph/zyhax
The court orders show the government telling Google to provide the names, addresses, telephone numbers and user activity for all Google account users who accessed the YouTube videos between January 1 and January 8, 2023. The government also wanted the IP addresses of non-Google account owners who viewed the videos.
“This is the latest chapter in a disturbing trend where we see government agencies increasingly transforming search warrants into digital dragnets. It’s unconstitutional, it’s terrifying and it’s happening every day,” said Albert Fox-Cahn, executive director at the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project. “No one should fear a knock at the door from police simply because of what the YouTube algorithm serves up. I’m horrified that the courts are allowing this.” He said the orders were “just as chilling” as geofence warrants, where Google has been ordered to provide data on all users in the vicinity of a crime.
I’m not going to make any statement about the morality or legality of this, i’m just going to point out if they used this data to persecute people who still watch Vaush after he accidentally outed himself as a literal pedophile, the FBI will save themselves a fuck ton of work going ahead.
spoiler
This is a joke btw, I know for a fact that’s not the kind of person they’re going to go after with this sort of thing.