Senate Hearing On Laptop Seizures At US Border

suitablegirl writes "As we have discussed, Customs and Border Patrol is allowed to seize and download data from laptops or electronic devices of Americans returning from abroad. At a Senate hearing tomorrow, privacy advocates and industry groups will urge the lawmakers to take action to protect the data and privacy of Americans not guilty of anything besides wanting to go home."

Comments

About time.

[PitViper401]

That policy is insane, I don't need them seeing all my files. And I don't just mean the music. I mean files I created, by myself, that I just feel are mine to show to whom I want.

Re:About time.

[TubeSteak]

That policy is insane, Yes

I don't need them seeing all my files. And I don't just mean the music. I mean files I created, by myself, that I just feel are mine to show to whom I want. Not your choice.
If you take it or send it through the border, they can inspect it.
This is not new. It predates The War on [noun/adjective/adverb/other]
End of discussion.

The issue here is not whether they can inspect your documents, but whether they can keep a copy of your electronic files. FTFA:

"Opening my suitcase at the border is not the same as opening my laptop and making a permanent record of everything in it," he said. The difference is that one search is transitory in nature, while copying your hard drive is not.

Electronics do not and should not have any protection above and beyond a paper document.
That said, electronics should also not be treated any differently than a paper document.

Again, the issues are:
A) Should the government make a copy of electronic files crossing the border
B) If they do, how will that data be handled

Re:About time.

[linzeal]

This only punishes people who are not technically savvy enough to encrypt their documents or store them in a USB key drive.

Re:About time.

[PCMeister]

While it's about time, I hope something substantial comes out of this hearing, and not some bullshit ' non-binding resolution '; as in suggesting that the Border Patrol honor the oath they took to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States". There has to be valid probable cause before having to be subjected to such search and seizures (ie. 4th Amendment anyone!?!)

As a refresher, additional information can be found here.

4th Amendment: "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

Fortunately, I haven't been subjected to such seizures, but I've read enough horror stories from frequent travelers to warrant such a response.

Good luck to us all...

Re:About time.

[techno-vampire]

Electronics do not and should not have any protection above and beyond a paper document. That said, electronics should also not be treated any differently than a paper document.

Exactly. If they're not allowed to make copies of any paper documents you have so that they can inspect them later, they shouldn't be allowed to do that to your hard disk either.

Re:About time.

[speedtux]

A child pornographer could make the same statement.

So? In order for border inspection of files to be an effective means against child pornography, we'd have to outlaw encryption and stop cross-border Internet traffic. And even then, we'd still be left with the fact that border agents simply are not qualified to make determinations about obscenity or pornography, child or otherwise.

Not implying anything,

I am, however, implying something: I think bringing up the "child pornography" argument is moronic. A bunch of ineffective and unproven policies like this are not going to help our children, but they are going to harm our democracy and cost us dearly in terms of tourism and business.

Re:About time.

[EnglishSteve]

MentalImage.Erase()

Re:About time.

[MrNaz]

"cost us dearly in terms of tourism and business."

To say nothing of freedom and justice.

Re:About time.

[Amy Grace]

Yeah, but creating child pornography is illegal even if one does not encrypt them when they're stored on ones' laptop. Writing policy papers on my city's harm-reduction drug strategy isn't illegal, although it's not something I want to pop up every time I try to enter the US.

I don't like the implication that because bad people like privacy so they don't get caught doing bad things, everyone who likes their privacy is doing bad things. There's a name for that particular fallacy, I think, but I don't remember. It's really quite similar to the argument that law-abiding citizens shouldn't mind the ever-present CCTV surveillance of public areas, since it will only affect criminals.

Re:About time.

[Antique Geekmeister]

I'd give quite a lot to see the guard who tries to search Richard Stallman. The man is famous for not bathing, and you could probably hide an OLPC laptop in that beard.

Re:About time.

[speedtux]

If you can catch dumb criminals, why shouldn't you ?

Because it means giving up a lot of liberties and accepting a lot of risk for law-abiding citizens in exchange for essentially no improvement in the safety of children.

In terms of risk, ask yourself: are you really sure that none of the images in your browser cache might be interpreted as child pornography? Remember, you need not even have seen or clicked on the image: browsers can prefetch images for you, and Javascript can load images behind your back. And it doesn't have to be actual child pornography, it merely has to look like it.

I think attitudes like yours are dangerous.

Re:About time.

[Muad'Dave]

Ever read this?

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Re:About time.

[aproposofwhat]

stagonometry

Encrypted information hidden in the shape of antlers?

Excellent idea - especially for those damn Scandinavian terrorists bringing their Lapp tops complete with reindeer antlers into the country :o)

Re:About time.

[theonetruekeebler]

The border patrol has been known to force-feed powerful laxatives to pregnant women and shackle them to a hospital bed for two days while they watch them shit into a bucket. And that just for the War on Drugs. Now that there's a War on Terror run by a government that's willing to torture, do you really think hiding something up your ass will do a bit of good?

Re:Countermeasure

[Concerned Onlooker]

You know, they will be searching you. You don't want to give them any ideas.

Re:Can we be a little more inclusive?

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

All nice and dandy, but please remember that the rest of us filthy foreigners who are coming for a friendly visit aren't directly guilty of anything in particular either.

There's a good reason why international tourism in the US is plummeting when a low US dollar means it should be increasing.

Oh well, I guess the US economy is strong enough to withstand $94 Billion in lost spending.... oh wait!

Re:Can we be a little more inclusive?

[Frogbert]

I completely trashed any plans I had for ever visiting the US when I heard from my friends that not only were they fingerprinted when they flew into the US, they also had their retinas photographed.

One wasn't even staying in the US, he just had to change planes so he could continue onto Mexico.

Fuck that for a joke.

Re:Can we be a little more inclusive?

[bane2571]

You see, that right there is why I don't get how these searches pass any common sense test. I could stop at any one of a hundred internet cafes on one side of the border, Gmail the "illegal" file to myself, delete it off my laptop, cross the border and go to another internet cafe and download it, deleting everything up to and including the Gmail account itself. If I was suspicious of Gmail's data retention policies there are hundreds of other ways to interweb some data.

It's like DRM, Inconveniencing innocent people in a big while doing little to nothing to stop whatever problem is trying to be stopped.

Re:Can we be a little more inclusive?

[thesupraman]

Wrong, it is not uncommmon and a transfer to be marched off the plane, asked to collect bags, then processed back through 'security checks' along with full documentation checks, records, etc and then held until transfer in a 'secure holding location'.

Of course this is not consistently done, apparently terrorists only use certain airports..

That is why I dont even transfer through the US these days if I can avoid it - their loss, less business for their carriers.

Some would argue that I could have evil terrorist items in my luggage allowing me to take over the plane or something, but hell, I just flew in over the US, so had all the opportunity in the world then...

Does it feel good to treat the rest of the world as though they are criminals?

Re:Can we be a little more inclusive?

[Cantaro]

Nice try. On the occasion of deciding which flight to book from Ireland to Argentina, I called American Airlines and was informed that, in order to fly from one international destination to another on a flight that stops at a US airport, one has to change terminals, as arrival and departure will just about always be on different terminals. That, however, means leaving the international area, going through both Immigration and Customs, be photographed and fingerprinted like a criminal, potentially have the luggage searched, and the wife having to apply for a US visitor visa beforehand because Argentina fell out of the Visa Waiver Program a few years back when Argentina's currency collapsed. All the hassle for a few hours in the US? Sorry, mate. Too many reasons to choose Iberia and fly through Madrid instead of through Chicago with AA.

Blatant site pimping..

[rixster_uk]

Ladies and Gents - I am trying to collect incidents of security staff abuse (mainly at airports) in the vane hope that perhaps we can identify consistent transgressors of their authority and perhaps even send a message to the airlines that we are no longer going to give them our hard earned buckaroos if they don't put their (albeit indirectly employed) staff in line. I believe we can make a difference (as tacky as that sounds)

If you have a story, please either put it on the site or email it to me at admin@scareports.com . The site address is http://www.scareports.com/ . I apologise now for the rawness (I'm trialling django technology as well).