Whether you’re a US citizen or not, the US government considers it within its right to examine every last byte of every digital device you own, with no probable cause, for whatever reason they feel like.
The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution protects us against unreasonable government searches and seizures. This generally means the government has to show a court probable cause that a crime has been committed and get a warrant before it can search a location or item in which you have a reasonable expectation of privacy. But searches at places where people enter or leave the United States may be considered “reasonable” simply because they happen at the border or an international airport.
Several federal courts have considered whether the government needs any suspicion of criminal activity to search a traveler’s laptop at the U.S. border. Unfortunately, so far they have decided that the answer is no.1 Congress has also weighed several bills to protect travelers from suspicionless searches at the border, but none has yet passed.2
For now, a border agent has the legal authority to search your electronic devices at the border even if she has no reason to think that you’ve done anything wrong.
Whether you’re a US citizen or not, the US government considers it within its right to examine every last byte of every digital device you own, with no probable cause, for whatever reason they feel like.
The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution protects us against unreasonable government searches and seizures. This generally means the government has to show a court probable cause that a crime has been committed and get a warrant before it can search a location or item in which you have a reasonable expectation of privacy. But searches at places where people enter or leave the United States may be considered “reasonable” simply because they happen at the border or an international airport.
Several federal courts have considered whether the government needs any suspicion of criminal activity to search a traveler’s laptop at the U.S. border. Unfortunately, so far they have decided that the answer is no.1 Congress has also weighed several bills to protect travelers from suspicionless searches at the border, but none has yet passed.2
For now, a border agent has the legal authority to search your electronic devices at the border even if she has no reason to think that you’ve done anything wrong.
This is not an abstract question.
For now, the government searches only a small percentage of international travelers’ electronic devices. According to documents obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union through the Freedom of Information Act, more than 6,500 people traveling to and from the United States had their electronic devices searched at the border between October 2008 and June 2010, an average of more than 300 border searches of electronic devices a month. Almost half of those travelers were U.S. citizens.15 This means that these searches are a regular occurrence, but one that most travelers will never encounter given the number of travelers who cross the border each month.
This is something I’ve idly wondered about from time to time. I have a USB thumbdrive where I keep my encrypted password database; if they want a copy of that, they can’t really do anything with it, but can they compel me to reveal the passphrase to it? Could I suddenly find myself barred from entering the US or even arrested just because I didn’t want them to have wide-open access to every digital service in my life? The article isn’t really clear about that part. (Edit: Oh it does go more into the legal issues after all the techie bits.)
The easy solution is simply not to take it with me and just download it from home after I arrive, but I could easily forget I have a copy somewhere.
An immigration official can deny you entry to the US without giving a reason and you have no recourse to any kind of appeal. You can refuse to hand over your passwords but if you are in front of a guy who’s having a bad day or who enjoys the almost unlimited power he has over you then expect a very hard time for the next few hours and a permanent mark on your file that might make it impossible to ever enter the US again.
I’d be curious to see discussions on compelling someone to decrypt their drive. My understanding is this: looking at every byte of data is Constitutional because it is “reasonable” in terms of the search and seizure clause. But self-incrimination (aka giving up your key) is covered by a different Amendment which does not say “if reasonable”. I’m not convinced that on the surface the two are inexorably linked in how they are applied. Even when some asshole judge tries to force someone to give up their key, the best he can do (so I’ve heard) is hold the person in contempt; but he still can’t force self-incrimination.
So if there’s any discussion on that I’d like to see it. Honest question.
This is especially stupid, because anyone who knows anything and has files they do not want the government to see because they are actually dangerous will just throw themselves a hail mary by encrypting it and accessing it using a series of intertubes.
I bought a copy of Avalon Hill’s MBT from Michael Dean over at Fine Games, not so much to play, but to collect. But, goddamn, that game was complex for a board game. Seriously, insanely complex.
I’d also love to have a collection of Avalon Hill games, but I’d have no one around here to play them. I think that’s the problem with wargames. They had to move to the PC, to reduce all those die rolls into microseconds, and also give you the ability to compete against people far, far away.
I really think that any serious wargame designer today should really be looking at the iPad. It seems like such a no brainer. Let the CPU handle all the rules and dice rolling. But you have a flat surface that’s perfect for displaying map info, and a ridiculously simple interface (touch). Not to mention you have a user base that’s growing by tens of millions every three months. You don’t even need to make it 3D, like console game publishers demand. Keep it in glorious, simple 2D, with NATO icons and everything. And you just have to make one version and support that; no worrying about all the traditional PC issues like drivers and compatibility.
I’d kill to have something like Flashpoint Germany on the iPad, and there’s no technical reason an iPad couldn’t run games like that, but there’s nothing even like it. Search for “wargames” on the App Store and you get this colorful, cartoony, that’s-so-not-a-real-wargame shit.
So nobody breaks the law, most of the things the Wired article recommends you do will get you into a lot of trouble if found out, and they will ask you, and if you don’t tell them, they will penalize you because if they look at your computer for more than ten minutes they will figure out what you did.
My advice to everyone here is, before you travel, change your wallpaper to Goatse.cx, and record yourself doing boring things completely nude, like unclogging a vaccuum, painting minatures with an erection, and emptying the dishwasher. Make three films, title them; “Pirate Assassin Heroin Mission 1, 2, & 3. (Encrypt Instructions Throughout.)”
Customs officials can literally dismantle your vehicle piece by piece, leaving it in a pile to be removed and repaired on your own dime. They can confiscate stuff pretty much on a whim. They can strip and cavity search you and ask you whatever questions they want and on top of that deny you entry forever because they don’t like that you have unattached earlobes…
And you are worried they have unlimited power to look at your hard drive?
This is why there is Truecrypt. No sign of anything being encrypted.
Although I’m sure the border guards are ALL upright guys who would never take your laptop into a room while they attached their personal USB flash drives, looking for personal pictures, files, etc.
It’s all Bush, I tell you! He’s ruining the country! ;)
As far as downloading data later, even if encrypted, it can be seized at a digital international border as well. It is just harder to find you and ask for your key then.
And Flowers, I don’t think that advice will work nearly as well for a female. The goatse part maybe …
Its bad enough I don’t go through the new xray machines (for medical not political or modesty issues), that alone gets you one close look, more if they are having a bad day.
While personal privacy is interesting, the interactions between corporate (and in many countries state-owned corporations) and border customs does become even more interesting.
Oh come on people, there are so many easy ways to fool the people.
I crossed the border between Iran and Iraq in 2001 and the people there advised me to simply zip my files into a password protected file and then change to extension to .dll and dump it in the system32 folder. They didn’t check my laptop but I’m pretty sure that even if they did they wouldn’t be able to find anything.
There are countless other ways to simply fool the people at the border:
*Put the files in a TrueCrupt container. Split the container into 10 or 100 files and bind each one to a .JPG picture of yourself/family/dog. They’ll never know as long as the file size is small enough.
*Use a Hex Editor to remove one or two unique characters and you’ve temporarily corrupted the file.
*Use Truecypts’ hidden drive option to open a fake container when asked to open the file.
There are countless ways to fool the people at the border.
You can even combine them if you’re real paranoia:
Image that I want to take Sprite.MDB(100mb) with me as I travel but I don’t want to upload it to the internet because I’m don’t want to risk some random user downloading it.
Rar the file and password protect it.
Open a Hexeditor and remove 5 random characters from the first 10 lines. Write these down somewhere do you can add it back later.
Create a TrueCypt container and use a keyfile and a password to protect it. Dump some random pictures in this container.
Create a hidden container inside the normal container and use a keyfile and a password to protect it. Put the .rar in this container.
Split the container in 100 files and bind each one to a picture of your family/dog/self. For maximum security bind all the even numbered files to MP3’s and all the odd numbered files to .jpg’s
There’s absolutely no way someone is going to find your file this way unless you give them reason to.
I’m travelling to the US in april for the first time in my life and besides the euro exchange rate getting worse by the day this whole border security stuff makes me more and more nervous. I don’t want to wake up in Gitmo or something :(
Don’t goto the US. Problem solved. Seriously, it’s almost like going to Iran.
Between their biometric database bullshit and this bullshit and not to mention entire state going rapidly onto corrupt regime full of fascism ever since 9/11 (Department of Homeland Security, NDAA, so on) I don’t think I’d ever wish to cross that border.
Even if I got a big time job offer from some big time game publisher or something like that, it’d still be a problem of considerate weight.
Compared to America, Canada looks like Happy Happy Place right now.
