Slashdot Mirror
Laptops Searched and Confiscated at U.S. Border
An anonymous reader writes, "According to an article in the New York Times, the Association of Corporate Travel Executives is asking the U.S. government for more detailed guidelines on when and why a laptop gets confiscated at the U.S. border, which, anecdotally, is happening more often. The story includes a report from a business traveler who had her laptop confiscated over a year ago and has yet to have it returned." According to the article, a knowledgeable lawyer said: "[Border guards] don't need probable cause to perform... searches under the current law. They can do it without suspicion or without really revealing their motivations." And an ACTE exective is quoted, "Potentially, this is going to have a real effect on how international business is conducted."
This is why you should encrypt your hard drive. The French and Israeli intelligence services have been stealing laptops from hotels and airports for years. They take them, image them, then return them to the owner without them knowing that they were taken at all.
Security 1 Constitution 0
I wonder if you refuse to give them your login or if they find you are using whole drive encryption that this will automatically get your laptop seized. How is a border agent supposed to distinguish between trying to protect his or her private data versus someone trying to use encryption to to hide something. I'm glad I don't have to decide....
Next stop Google: Search = whole disk encryption
It's getting so I don't want to travel to Europe anymore. They're getting waay too uptight.