Sen. Patrick Leahy (leahy.senate.gov)

On Thursday the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA), sponsored by Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy, was unanimously passed by the Senate Judiciary Committee. The ECPA has actually been around since 1986; the new version has been updated for the 21st Century. Now law enforcement will be required to have a search warrant if they want a peek at emails, private messages and data that's been uploaded to the cloud.

As The Next Web reports, the ACLU is pretty happy the new version of the act has come this far:

“This is an important gain for privacy,” Chris Calabrese, legislative counsel for the ACLU, said in a statement. “We are very happy that the committee voted that all electronic content like emails, photos and other communications held by companies like Google and Facebook should be protected with a search warrant. We believe law enforcement should use the same standard to search your inbox that they do to search your home.”

We've embedded Senator Leahy's version of the ECPA below. The ACLU may be pleased with it, but there are still elements in the new legislation that may give privacy activists pause, like provisions on page 12 that allow "emergency acquisition" of electronic data without a warrant for several reasons, including "an immediate threat to national security."

Some in law enforcement could use the term "immediate threat" as a pretty broad brush.

Passage through a Senate committee is just one positive step ahead for the revised ECPA--the legislation still must go through the rest of the Senate as well as the House, and could see a good deal of revision along the way.

"How many times have I told you? Always call from an outside line!"

Those of you with a history of sketchy dealings lurking in your Facebook messages and/or Gmail archives are one step closer to search-and-seizure protection.

Last week, Senator Patrick Leahy introduced an amendment that would require the cops to show up with a warrant if they want access to personal data stored in the cloud. And earlier today, reports The Hill, that amendment was officially adopted by the Senate Judiciary Committee.

But don't open up a Gchat conversation with your weed dealer just yet.

The committee's adoption is an important hurdle, but the amendment has a long way to go before figuring into any Law and Order: SVU episodes. The change isn't contained within its own legislation. It's tucked into a House bill regarding video privacy. The Senate Judiciary Committee just approved including the amendment within the bill, and now it has to approve that bill before it can even be debated on the floor by the full Senate, much less be adopted.

So maybe just stick to using disposable cell phones and payphones for all your shady shit.