SECTION 1.
The Legislature finds and declares all of the following:(a) The right of privacy is fundamental in a free and civilized society.
(b) The number of Californians utilizing and carrying portable electronic devices is growing at a rapidly increasing rate. These devices are capable of and encourage the storing of an almost limitless amount of personal and private information. Commonly linked to the Internet, these devices are used to access personal and business information and databases that reside in computers and servers located anywhere in the world. Users of portable electronic devices have a reasonable and justifiable
expectation of privacy in the information these devices contain and can access through the Internet.
(c) The California Supreme Court, in People v. Diaz, 51 Cal.4th 84 (2011), held that the information in these devices may be subject to search incident to an arrest without a warrant or other judicial supervision.
(d) The intrusion on the information privacy and freedom of communication of any person arrested is of such enormity that it must require arresting officers to obtain a warrant to search the information contained in or accessed through an arrested person’s portable electronic device, such as a cellular telephone.
(e) It is the intent of the Legislature in enacting Section 1542.5 of the Penal Code to reject as a matter of California statutory law the rule under the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution announced by the California Supreme Court in People v. Diaz. The Legislature finds that once in the exclusive control of the police, cellular telephones do not ordinarily pose a threat to officer safety. The Legislature declares that concerns about destruction of evidence on a cellular telephone can ordinarily be addressed through simple evidence preservation methods and prompt application to a magistrate for a search warrant and, therefore, do not justify a blanket exception to the warrant requirement. Moreover, good forensic evidence practice supports the use of search warrants to obtain information contained in a cellular telephone seized incident to arrest. Except as otherwise stated in this section, it is not the intent of the Legislature to curtail law enforcement reliance on
established exceptions to the warrant requirement.
(f) It is the intent of the Legislature, through the enactment of Section 1542.5 of the Penal Code, to implement the provisions of Sections 1 and 13 of Article 1 of the California Constitution.