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Cato Daily podcast for Wednesday, May 26, 2021. I'm Caleb Brown.

Odds are good that you've given away lots of data about yourself on various apps on your smartphone.

So you wouldn't have a problem if the government bought that data, would you?

Cato's Julian Sanchez and Patrick Eddington detail some of the problems

with the government merely purchasing data about Americans.

The three of us know that the government really shouldn't be spying on Americans, people

with certain constitutional rights, a warrant and yet we have become aware on several

occasions that the feds have been simply purchasing this data that Americans give away freely to fast food apps like

McDonald's and Pop Eyes and any number of other other things and my thought is well you know good on you guys for just

paying for the data that we're just given away but how ought we to think about

the government making use of this data that's freely available that, you know,

publications like the New York Times have purchased to show us a picture of something occurring out in public.

How should we think about the government purchasing that data

and making use of it?

You know, one thing I think that's worth noting

is that the federal statute governing electronic surveillance for

...