Challenge To US Government Over Seized Laptops

angry tapir writes "The policy of random laptop searches and seizures by US government agents at border crossings is under attack again: The American Civil Liberties Union is working with the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers to find lawyers whose laptops or other electronic devices were searched at US points of entry and exit. The groups argue that the practice of suspicionless laptop searches violates fundamental rights of freedom of speech and protection against unreasonable seizures and searches."

Comments

Re:Border crossing and the fourth

[Golddess]

Considering the ease with which you can send information without having it physically stored on the laptop, any search that goes beyond determining that the device is, in fact, just a laptop is just a waste of taxpayer money.

Re:Border crossing and the fourth

[corbettw]

Historically, that's been true. But the reason for that is to prevent contraband from coming into the country. With the advent of the Internet, anyone can download anything from anywhere. So searching laptops at the border isn't going to have any effect, whatsoever, on the flow of contraband digital items (pirated software, kiddie porn, whatever). It might (and has) nabbed a few individuals, but it certainly hasn't had an appreciable effect on the wider practice of these things.

Given that, is it worth the sacrifice to human rights to keep doing it? That's the question that needs to be answer, IMNSHO.

Re:Policy document

[jittles]

Looks to me like the document says they can choose to search for any reason and they may or may not have to disclose that search to you and even if they disclose that search they may or may not have to let you watch that search.

Every single privacy protection in that document had an escape clause that allows them to circumvent that protection in the interest of national security, or some other loophole. That policy document doesn't make me feel any better about the matter.

Re:You don't have those rights at border crossings

[Darth Sdlavrot]

The US Government is constrained by the Constitution.

The 4th Amendment to the US Constitution doesn't say "...except at border crossings."

If you want to argue that a search at the border might not be unreasonable, that's a different argument, but per se, the US Government does not have any special right to conduct searches at the border.

My rights, as a US Citizen, WRT the US Government, extend around the world. They aren't suspended just because I'm at a border crossing.

IANAL, obviously.

Re:Lawyers aren't diplomats

[cbhacking]

No, but you've entirely missed the point. The idea here is that lawyers represent a group of individuals who routinely carry sensitive data and stand to take substantial financial harm if it is seized ("without good reason" being implied here). As an added bonus, lawyers typically have money to fight things like this.

Basically, lawyers have a lot to lose if unreasonable laptop seizures continue, and they have the resources to fight it. There's no implication that they would try to get an exception for lawyers specifically, which seems to be what you thought the GP was talking about; rather the point is that the ACLU needs people who will fight this case for the sake of everybody, and lawyers can do that.

Re:You don't have those rights at border crossings

[Darth Sdlavrot]

Do you honestly expect us to believe that you don't have backup copies of your work on a USB drive or on a file server somewhere where you could download it, should such a need arise?

Sure, it'd be an expensive nuisance to replace it if your laptop is one of the microscopically small percentage that are seized; but if that's where the only copy of your life's work resides, then you're a fool in more ways than one.

Re:Policy document

[IndustrialComplex]

The officer searching you probably searches thousands of people a day. It's not like he's going to go through your data files and memorize all the important business/legal documents and then report them to your competitors. The policy document indicates that all electronic searches take place in your presence and with a supervisor present.

Allow me to introduce you to the basis for the majority of my privacy opinions: "Lack of feasibility to infringe on a large scale does not make the initial power just."

Or in simple terms: "Just because they can't now, doesn't mean they won't later."

What you have is a herd mentality that follows the same logic as, "That wolf can't eat all the sheep". If I give ONE person in the country the authority to execute unwarranted searches at their whim, simply because they cannot search EVERYONE does not make the authority I granted just.

ALWAYS consider the way in which a power may be abused, because eventually, it will be.

Thirty years ago if you suggested that the government could monitor and process all of the phone conversations in the United States simultaneously it wouldn't have been possible. However, with conversations being digitized and the development of new technology, it is becoming possible, and in 20-30 years? Just because they can't now, doesn't mean they won't later.

Re:You don't have those rights at border crossings

[TheRaven64]

The US Government is constrained by the Constitution.

The US Government, like any other government, is constrained by what its citizens are willing to allow it to do and what they are able to prevent it from doing. The constitution is a document detailing what the founders of the country thought the citizens ought to permit the government to do. The will of the citizens can be expressed through elections, through the courts, and through passive or violent rebellion. The first two options are not available in a large proportion of the world, and it is important to use them actively and responsibly in the parts, such as the USA, where they are.

Re:You don't have those rights at border crossings

[donaggie03]

(what's all that BS about?)

all I'm saying is that in the real world, your ideals and values mean NOTHING. when some gov official is raping your rights, you have NOTHING you can do about it.

nothing.

this is the powerless that we all feel as being part of the modern world.

nothing you can do about it, either. nothing.

sorry to break it to you but MANY things in this world are really really wrong and nothing you can do about it. your youthful ideals won't help you. just accept it. life has MANY things like this that you cannot fight or win.

do I like this? HELL NO. but I live in the real world.

Maybe we could, I don't know, sue the border agents and the executive branch of our government, so that MAYBE the judicial branch will strike down these acts, or at least limit them, as unconstitutional and give us some case law on the matter. You know, kinda exactly like what the ACLU is trying to do here.

Nah, that's just too hard! We should all just resign ourselves to accept the inalienable and indisputable fact that the federal government is in absolute control and there is nothing we can ever do. That definitely sounds better. /sarcasm

Re:The government *does* have the right !!

[donaggie03]

Obviously, if you leave one country, but haven't entered the next country, you are in the Borderlands. We should all enter the Borderlands and set up a government there. You know, that 100 sq ft area considered "not past customs". But wait . . if we try to do something like that, the other governments would say that it is their land, and they have jurisdiction there . .. so that land really is part of that government . . . so the constitution should apply . . .

Re:You don't have those rights at border crossings

[QuoteMstr]

As George Bernard Shaw famously and pithily put it:

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.