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"With the issuance of this police, the Department of Justice reaffirms its commitment to hold itself to the highest standards as it performs its critical work to protect public safety," added Deputy Attorney General Sally Quillian Yates in a statement. "This new policy ensures our protocols for this technology are consistent, well-managed and respectful to individuals' privacy and civil liberties."Of course, as the Verge notes, none of this newfound respect for privacy applies to local police departments around the country, many of which have purchased such devices in recent years—though it's also notoriously difficult to get these departments to admit that they've bought the devices.To enhance privacy protections, the new policy establishes a set of required practices with respect to the treatment of information collected through the use of cell-site simulators. This includes data handling requirements and an agency-level implementation of an auditing program to ensure that data is deleted consistent with this policy. For example, when the equipment is used to locate a known cellular device, all data must be deleted as soon as that device is located, and no less than once daily.
Additionally, the policy makes clear that cell-site simulators may not be used to collect the contents of any communication in the course of criminal investigations. This means data contained on the phone itself, such as emails, texts, contact lists and images, may not be collected using this technology.