A bill that would help target crimes committed using social media or other advanced technology has made it through a Wisconsin Assembly committee.
The bill would give Wisconsin law enforcement officials more tools to target cybercrimes under a bipartisan bill by adopting updated federal legal definitions of certain investigative techniques to account for modern social media communications.
State Senator Andre Jaque of De Pere, who helped introduce the bill, says “Investigators and prosecutors are struggling with enforceability and applicability of warrants under the current state law that allow what are called ‘pen registers’ to trace phone lines but not social media activity.”
The bill would mirror federal law by expanding the definition of pen registers to include a device or process that records or decodes dialing, routing, addressing, or signaling information transmitted by telephone or another electronic communication device.
Jaque says “These updates will provide clarity to ensure that the public safety officials may lawfully employ the latest techniques to investigate cybercrimes.”
The bill now heads to the Wisconsin Senate Floor and must pass the State Assembly before Governor Evers can sign it.
