Law Enforcement Data Warrants

Technically it's Google's data, so all they have to do is ask. If Google says no, then they get a warrant.

False. The access requires entering a warrant. The authorities can't just access your data arbitrarily. Please cite sources or stop spreading FUD.

Source that they are required to hand over data without a warrant? Genuinely asking

You left out half a sentence. "Anything you store there is searchable" if the US government has a court order for your data. This has always been the case. Other governments have similar systems for processing data obtained via legal requests, under different names.

> I’m not a lawyer, but at least in the United States at the minimum probable cause and a warrant should be required prior to their use per the 4th Amendment…You do realize that FAANG are collecting user data and are more than happy to supply it to the government, don't you ? /s

I'm not sure I should point this out, but there are organisations (Microsoft, Apple, maybe Google) that have obvious access to this information. It could be subpoenaed from them.

It depends on whether a search warrant was obtained. Given the article notes how similar it is to what data you can get from a search warrant, it may be the case that a court gave them a thumbs up.

Can't law enforcement now just ask Google or Facebook or whoever for the information they need without needing your password (or future token)?

This shouldn't surprise anyone. If a company collects info about some user and the government comes to them with a legitimate warrant they have to handover the information about that user (or risk going to jail/other action by the court) . There is a reason other companies like signal go out of their way to collect as little as possible.

because apple, google, facebook already comply with this. they have built ways for the government to access their data. any company with an important enough set of information is going to get this request and you can’t say no