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Examining the Search and Seizure of Electronics at Airports
Angus McKraken brings us a Washington Post story about how travelers are seeking more well-defined policies and rules about the search and seizure of electronic devices by U.S. Customs officials. The EFF has already taken legal action over similar concerns. We recently discussed the related issue of requiring people to disclose their passwords in order to search their private data. From the Post:
"Maria Udy, a marketing executive with a global travel management firm in Bethesda, said her company laptop was seized by a federal agent as she was flying from Dulles International Airport to London in December 2006. Udy, a British citizen, said the agent told her he had 'a security concern' with her. 'I was basically given the option of handing over my laptop or not getting on that flight,' she said. 'I was assured that my laptop would be given back to me in 10 or 15 days,' said Udy, who continues to fly into and out of the United States. She said the federal agent copied her log-on and password, and asked her to show him a recent document and how she gains access to Microsoft Word. She was asked to pull up her e-mail but could not because of lack of Internet access. With ACTE's help, she pressed for relief. More than a year later, Udy has received neither her laptop nor an explanation."
I was going to say, I thought the rules were perfectly clear: You are searched like crazy if you're coming from the Middle East, North Africa, or South Asia, or your name is Mohammed or Hussein, or you look vaguely Muslim.
Of course, DHS can't actually say those rules, so instead they give out some bull about "random selection".
I am officially gone from
This can also be done with a normal PC and OSx86. My install will not boot into Mac OS without the install DVD in the drive. I do my work in Mac, put the DVD in my checked bag, then get on the plane. It'll boot straight into Windows without the disc, and since Windows can't read HFS+ it doesn't see the Mac partition.
OSx86 FTW
The procedure is this: they take your laptop and you don't get it back.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
UK international development minister Shahid Malik, was detained on the way back from a series of meetings in Washington on combatting terrorism. You really couldn't make this stuff up if you tried. ( http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/west_yorkshire/7066944.stm )
"It doesn't cost enough, and it makes too much sense."
Heres a good article from the IEEE Computer Society entitled "Setting Boundaries at Borders: Reconciling Laptop Searches and Privacy." The article discusses United States v. Arnold Federal and other precedent. Arnold, a federal district court opinion on a motion to suppress evidence, appears to have come out the right way. To add my own 2 cents, why would the fear of contraband be more intense at the border when the speed of information transfer on the internet has made such concerns all but irrelevant?
Why have 1 person driving a backhoe when you could employ 20 with shovels?
These same invasive procedures have been in place in Israel for years. If you're "Flagged" by Airport security, they confiscate your Laptop, Phone, and Camera, and proceed to copy all of the media. It's invasive and unjustified - Just an excuse to feed their intelligence machine.
I guess that's just the cost of "democracy" in the Middle East.
So long as it's under $10,000 US you're ok. If it's over 10k, you just have to declare it - fill out a form stating what business you're in, why you're carrying so much cash/cheques/bearer bonds etc, and exactly what you plan on doing with it/them, where you will be staying, etc. Then you get asked a couple questions by the customs officer, and that's it.
If you DON'T declare it and they find out, then kiss it goodbye. You broke the law, so they take the money.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
As the article states and the TSA has noted on their blog, the searches and confiscations are being conducted by U.S. Customs and Border Protection, not the Transportation Security Administration.
(Not that that makes it right, but it helps to identify the correct culprit when complaining to the powers that be or even when just spreading the story.)
Duly noted. I get upset about the senseless loss of life.
However, since the start of the war, there have been numerous reports that the Administration misled the American people by inflating the threat. Here is a quote from one such source. Administration officials systematically misrepresented the threat from Iraq's WMD and ballistic missile programs, beyond the intelligence failures noted above, by:
- Treating nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons as a single "WMD threat."
- The conflation of three distinct threats, very different in the danger they pose, distorted the cost/benefit analysis of the war. (p. 52)
- Insisting without evidence--yet treating as a given truth--that Saddam Hussein would give whatever WMD he possessed to terrorists. (p. 52)
- Routinely dropping caveats, probabilities, and expressions of uncertainty present in intelligence assessments from public statements. (p. 53)
- Misrepresenting inspectors' findings in ways that turned threats from minor to dire. (p. 53)
Here are a bunch of other reports as well.Clinton didn't do anything about terrorist attacks while he was in office:
I realize "facts" are the antithesis of the 'pub agenda, but your spin is so weak...
1) the February 26, 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center
Four followers of the Egyptian cleric Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman were captured, convicted of the World Trade Center bombing in March 1994, and sentenced to 240 years in prison each. The purported mastermind of the plot, Ramzi Ahmed Yousef, was captured in 1995, convicted of the bombing in November 1997, and also sentenced to 240 years in prison. One additional suspect fled the U.S. and is believed to be living in Baghdad.
2) the Khobar Towers attack
the U.S. investigation was hampered by the refusal of Saudi officials to allow the FBI to question suspects. On 21 June 2001, just before the American statute of limitations would have expired, a federal grand jury in Alexandria, Virginia, indicted thirteen Saudis and an unidentified Lebanese chemist for the Khobar Towers bombing. The suspects remain in Saudi custody, beyond the reach of the American justice system. (Saudi Arabia has no extradition treaty with the U.S.)
3) the August 7, 1998 bombing of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania
Four participants with ties to Osama bin Laden were captured, convicted in U.S. federal court, and sentenced to life in prison without parole in October 2001. Fourteen other suspects indicted in the case remain at large, and three more are fighting extradition in London.
4) and the October 12, 2000, attack on the USS Cole.
No suspects have yet been arrested or indicted. The investigation has been hampered by the refusal of Yemini officials to allow FBI agents access to Yemeni nationals and other suspects in custody in Yemen.
But, let's be clear: By December 21 the CIA had made a "preliminary judgment" that "al Qaeda appeared to have supported the attack," with no "definitive conclusion."
In other words, with only days left in office, Clinton still didn't know who was responsible for the attack. It was left to the next bumbling president to follow through. And, as of yet, he has not. Also, under U.S. law, an attack against a military target does not meet the legal definition of terrorism.
Bush, on the other hand, did react.
Yes, he attacked a country that really wasn't involved and then attacked another country later that had even less to do with the attack. So, really, not the best points to be making. Oh, and where's Osama? Gee, Dubya made damn sure to clean up daddy's messes, but hasn't really done anything positive for his own country.
at least when civilians are killed by the US military it is by accident and not on purpose unlike the cowards who attack the US.
Oh, that's ok then. I'm sure all of those orphaned children over there will see it that way and maybe they WILL see us as liberators?!
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