WASHINGTON - May 21, 2009 - Have a wi-fi router? If you do - and it uses an unlicensed frequency - you could be subject to a warrantless search of your home.

Federal Communications Commission guidelines stipulate that the agency can enter property when it suspects radio frequency energy is being abused. The provision, which was originally intended to aid the monitoring of unlicensed radio and TV stations, now has a broader range of application as more consumers join the wi-fi ranks.

“Anything using RF energy - we have the right to inspect it to make sure it is not causing interference,” FCC spokesman David Fiske told Wired for an article Thursday. The FCC spokesman said the scope included wi-fi routers.

“The FCC claims it derives its warrantless search power from the Communications Act of 1934, though the constitutionality of the claim has gone untested in the courts,” Wired’s Ryan Singer wrote. “That’s largely because the FCC had little to do with average citizens for most of the last 75 years, when home transmitters were largely reserved to ham-radio operators and CB-radio aficionados. But in 2009, nearly every household in the United States has multiple devices that use radio waves and fall under the FCC’s purview, making the commission’s claimed authority ripe for a court challenge.”

The Electronic Frontier foundation, an online privacy group, called the FCC’s interpretation a “major stretch.”

“It is a major stretch beyond case law to assert that authority with respect to a private home, which is at the heart of the Fourth Amendment’s protection against unreasonable search and seizure,” Electronic Frontier Foundation lawyer Lee Tien was quoted as saying. “When it is a private home and when you are talking about an overpowered wi-fi antenna - the idea they could just go in is honestly quite bizarre.”

“The rules came to attention this month when an FCC agent investigating a pirate radio station in Boulder, Colorado, left a copy of a 2005 FCC inspection policy on the door of a residence hosting the unlicensed 100-watt transmitter,” writes Singer.

“Whether you operate an amateur station or any other radio device, your authorization from the Commission comes with the obligation to allow inspection,” the statement said.

Ed. Note: You might consider placing a sign outside your land: “Notice to FCC employees: trespass at your own risk. Violators will be shot. Survivors will be shot again!"