California Governor Jerry Brown has approved a digital privacy bill that protects people from government access to private electronic communications without a warrant.

The new law, backed by a number of tech companies and civil liberties groups, requires a judge to approve such access to a person’s private information, including data from personal electronic devices, email, digital documents, text messages and location information.

The state houses the headquarters of a number of technology companies, including Google, Apple, Facebook and Twitter, some of whom are seeing a jump in requests from state and federal law enforcement agencies for information on their customers.

California Electronic Privacy Act (CalECPA, SB 178) was passed in September by the state assembly after the senate passed it in June. The bill was co-sponsored by the American Civil Liberties Union of California, Electronic Frontier Foundation and California Newspaper Publishers Association.

Read the Full Article: Source – PC World
Browsing Privacy: (PC World) – New California law requires warrants for access to private communications

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