Courts and the Investigation Process There are many aspects to investigations as they pertain to courts and upholding the law. An investigation is systematic inquiry to determine the facts surrounding an event or situation to determine who, what, where, when, how, and why an event or incident occurred that might be of particular interest to the courts. In the modern age, mainly due to anti-terrorism enforcement, US lawmakers and courts have changed the scope of police surveillance authority. As a result, a new privacy paradigm has emerged where police power to gather information in criminal investigations has expanded (Bloss, 2009).

Since the world has become more globalized in regards to crime and terrorism, this has transformed how public safety threats are perceived. Furthermore, the advancement of digital communication technology has provided a medium in which electronic records of communications are kept and can be accessed...

This changes the dynamic in which investigations can occur in a digital age as well as opens many privacy concerns. Through constitutional doctrine and statute, Americans have been given an 'expectation of privacy' that limits government surveillance and search authority and the Fourth Amendment is considered one of the primary legal gatekeepers of these liberties; to control police violation of the Amendment's provisions, U.S. courts created a unique sanction for dealing with improper searches (Bloss, 2009).
Courts have devised a specific test to measure the legality of police surveillance and search in relation to personal privacy; known as the 'balancing of competing interests' test, it allows the courts to interpret the constitutionality of police surveillance and search methods and the test can be applied in a variety of cases and has become the preferred court standard in surveillance and privacy…