The Latest: Justices hear case about privacy in digital age

The Latest on Supreme Court argument over digital-age privacy (all times local):

11:30 a.m.

The Supreme Court is signaling it could impose limits on the government's ability to track Americans' movements through collection of their cellphone information.

The justices heard 80 minutes of arguments Wednesday in a case about privacy in the digital age.

Chief Justice John Roberts and the court's four liberal justices indicated they could extend the Constitution's protection against unreasonable searches to police collection of cellphone tower information that has become an important tool in the investigation of crimes.

In the case before the court, investigators acquired 127 days of cellphone tower information without a search warrant that allowed them to place Timothy Carpenter in the vicinity of a string of robberies of Radio Shack and T-Mobile stores.

___

3:30 a.m.

The Supreme Court is taking up a case about privacy rights that could limit the government's ability to track Americans' movements in the digital age.

The justices are hearing an appeal Wednesday from Timothy Carpenter. He was sentenced to 116 years in prison after being convicted of robbing electronics stores in Michigan and Ohio. Records from cellphone towers near the stores helped place Carpenter in the vicinity of the crimes.

The big issue is whether police must get a search warrant to look at the records. Rights groups and technology experts are among those who have joined Carpenter in arguing it's too easy for authorities to use the records to learn intimate details of someone's life.

The Supreme Court in recent years has acknowledged technology's effects on Americans' privacy.