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11 Va. J. Crim. L. [i] (2025)

handle is hein.journals/virjcr11 and id is 1 raw text is: VIRGINIA JOURNAL OF CRIMINAL LAW VOL. 11 2025 No. 1 FINDING SNOWDEN'S AMERICA AT THE END OF THE SILK ROAD: PRIVACY AND CRIMEFIGHTING IN THE WORLD OF CRYPTOCURRENCY Michael Nisper* In the span of less than six months in 2013, the United States experienced two of the most consequential events in the nascent history of cybercrime and data privacy. Edward Snowden's flight to Hong Kong and the subsequent publishing of documents by The Guardian detailing an NSA mass surveillance program, as well as the arrest of Silk Roadfounder Ross Ulbricht later that year, launched America's relationship with crimefighting andprivacy into the Internet Age. In the years thatfollowed, a new form of decentralized digital currency called cryptocurrencies would come to the fore, affording users anonymity online and off for any and all transactions made with these coins. One of the oldest and mostprominent of these cryptocurrencies, called Bitcoin, developed by Satoshi Nakamoto, wouldgrow to be used tofacilitate numerous types of criminal activity across the web, forcing law enforcement andprosecutors to confront a new frontier in the pursuitforjustice: the cryptocrime. As law enforcement began to investigate andprosecute cryptocriminals such as Ulbricht in the late 2010's, the principles of modern data privacy promoted by Edward Snowden became threatened by a criminaljustice regime unable to adapt its practices to respect a concept of privacy rights that only years earlier had looked much narrower. It was at this time that the Supreme Court established what can serve as afoundationfor a constitutional right to data privacy in its ruling in Carpenter v. United States. By examining the Carpenter ruling through the lens of a Snowden Doctrine view of data privacy, the constitutional right to privacy can be better protected in an ever-evolving digital landscape from law enforcement overreach. * Michael Nisper is a data privacy attorney based in New York City and a 2024 graduate of the Georgetown University Law Center. This article benefitted tremendously from the insights provided by Joshua Bilisko, James Bernstein, Dr. Elizabeth Nisper, and the author's parents, Jon and Kristine Nisper. Their suggestions and thoughtful conversations on these topics greatly improved this piece. The views expressed in this article are the author's alone, and do not reflect the viewpoint, policy, or position of any employer, firm, or educational institution. Responsibility for all errors remains with the author.