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Federal Judge Limits DHS Laptop Border Searches
Declan McCullogh is reporting at CNET that a federal district court judge has rebuked the Department of Homeland Security, "which had claimed it can seize a traveler's laptop and search it six months later without warrant." As described in the article, DHS policies have been stacked against travelers entering the US, including citizens returning from abroad: "There's no requirement that they be returned to their owners after even six months or a year has passed, though supervisory approval is required if they're held for more than 15 days. The complete contents of a hard drive or memory card can be perused at length for evidence of lawbreaking of any kind, even if it's underpaying taxes or not paying parking tickets." This ruling does not address immediate searches at the border, but says that DHS cannot hold computers for indefinite searching, as in the case to hand, concerning a US citizen returning from a trip to Korea, whose laptop was seized and held for months before a search was even conducted on it.
DHS to Judge: Enjoy your time on the no-fly list, sucker!
Linux, you magnificent bastard, I read the fucking manual!
Rights?! Rights?! This is Soviet America you don't need Rights so move on already!
Sig?! Sig?! We don't need no stinking sig!!
I worry about the mentality of this nation.
There's an app for that - on the iPad!
Sorry officer no - this isn't a laptop - only pedophiles use those - like THAT GUY OVER THERE - GETIM! (then slinks away)
A computer engineer I worked with was going through the border and was apparently not allowed to have burned CDs of software on him. He just so happened to have a very stable version of XP he didn't want to get rid of. Solution: Stick it in the CD drive, put the battery somewhere and they won't take the time to check the drive.
After all the speed at which your nice 3k laptop becomes a paperweight via obsolescence means that a 1 year warrant-less censure effectively fines you what 1k or so without any charge.
I'm glad to see that the law is finally curtailing some of these absurd laws. For the last bunch of years a bunch of draconian policies have been deemed legal "because we say so". It's about fucking time the courts started bitch-slapping these down.
America has become absurd, and many people simply won't go there while it's like this.
I think every country should start doing exactly the same things to all US citizens. Let's see how long it takes before Americans start to complain about being fingerprinted, cavity searched, and arbitrarily detained.
I like most Americans, but your fucking government is out of control.
A country has ALWAYS had the right to fully inspect or seize ANYTHING coming in across its border!
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And that includes laptops. The rules haven't suddenly changed. You just noticed that you don't like the rules. And EVERY country has this right (whether or not they can enforce it is another matter).
Customs officials ALWAYS had the right to search your bags. Now you have this magical Bag of Holding, your laptop, that can hold a God awful lot of things. They still get to search it. It is still just a bag, magical or not.
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It worked that way in medieval China. It worked that way in Imperial Spain. It worked that way in Colonial America. And it works that way now.
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This ruling doe snot fundamentally change that. It merely says you have to seize the laptop outright as contraband, hold the laptop for a reasonable amount of time (e.g., immediately, 15 days, etc.) to search for contraband, or let the laptop go.
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Again this is nothing new. Every country does this.[FN1]
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[FN1]
The EU is an odd case because they can't decide whether they want to be a bunch of small countries or a single big country. While I am guessing that customs stops no longer occur at interior country borders (e.g., France/Germany, much like intra-state borders NY/PA), the customs searchs still occur at the exterior country borders (i.e., from non-EU/EU, US to EU).
It still scares me to see how badly the Bush administration has damaged democracy and the American constitution. It will take years, but this is another step away from the proto-fascist path that our country had started down when the far right-wing neocons came to power.
They are still out there. The Supreme Court has been loaded with ideologues and until one of them leaves the bench we are stuck with a judicial system that has been gamed for the sake of the wealthy and well-connected who care nothing for our country's laws and traditions.
Best regards.
Once they seize it is there any way that it can still talk to the outside world or record video and audio to be viewed later? I could see someone getting a laptop seized on purpose just to see what happens to it while it is in custody. Even if they only pop out the hard drive and don't boot the laptop itself you could have a 2nd hidden video/audio recorder also inside watching them.
Those damned activist judges! Oh wait...
This space available.
Well, if it's genetic, then there's nothing we can do.
RIP America
July 4, 1776 - September 11, 2001
And after the power runs out then what?
The complete contents of a hard drive or memory card can be perused at length for evidence of lawbreaking of any kind, even if it's underpaying taxes or not paying parking tickets.
Holy balls, Batman! The DHS is like the CIA, FBI, ATF, and IRS all in one! What's that? You don't even need an associates degree to join? Great Scott!
PortableApps.com = move your digital life onto removable media, able to run on any PC.
microSDHC = 1-16GB storage on a sub-fingernail-sized removable media.
Unless they're gonna go thru all the lint in everyone's pockets, they can have the notebook.
Can we get a "-1 Wrong" moderation option?
It's not clear to me whether I can take my real laptop now or a throw away laptop with no information stored on it. Granted my really REALLY important data is stored on a redundantly backed up 1TB NAS with no way to access it from the outside.
Fourth amendment, its the fourth one.
What he meant was, after the massive corporate bailouts, the only thing left in the Treasury is some spare change.
Thank God!
As opposed to a central corporate string-pulling government economy...
...we are SO lucky the newly elected government fixed the corporate string-pulling of government before some terrible disaster or environmental catastrophe took place!
-- Terry
Julian__Assange@wikilieaks.org, you have already won an all-expense-paid vacation to anywhere within US legal jurisdiction.
Please call us at your earliest convenience to receive your prize!
Peace and love,
US Dept. of State
in a 5-4 decision...
No one without a college education can vote, or perhaps require a high school diploma at the least.
Result: college diplomas (or whatever is sufficient for voting privileges) would be issued en masse to selected groups at the whim of politicians. For example, the "citizenship test" qualifying immigrants for citizenship might be classed as a suitable diploma, so that immigrants could vote.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
What worries me is the statement "underpaying taxes or not paying parking tickets.". - withholding these things may cause your stuff to be removed from you for years since impeachment can be called upon if you are a US visitor (and probably otherwise..). - And so much else ..
Laptops (and other devices) should be limited to phyiscal search. It is completely reasonable to search a laptop or a cellphone in order to verify that the laptop's battery compartment does not contain a bomb, or that a cellphone is not a dummy phone hollowed out to contain a package of heroin. It is NOT reasonable to go digging inside the filesystem of the laptop looking for porn, pirated software, movies, etc. just as it is NOT reasonable to check the cellphone's address book for "known criminal contacts". Meatspace analogy. Let's say you're crossing the border with a thick notebook in your hand. It is reasonable to perform a physical search of the book (flippping through the pages, turning it upside down) in order to verify that the book isn't hollowed out to hold a firearm or that there isn't a packet of heroin hidden between the pages. It is NOT reasonable to go through the book reading every page.
Parent comment should logically have been moderated "Funny", somehow it was instead moderated "Insightful".
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
Your western european economies (exception Germany, they grok both manufacturing and agriculture as being necessary for a robust economy) are in as bad a shape as anyone else's. .Your cradle to grave welfare state is economically unsustainable, it is based on the same voodoo economic junk science that American's enjoy...that you can trash real wealth production by offshoring your manufacturing and just keep issuing credit and accumulating debt and promising the moon, sun, stars and several small planetoids to your population for votes. This only can work for a short time historically speaking, and both Europe and the USA are entering a period of rapid economic decline because of it.
You got *screwed*, faked out and-hate to say it-and brainwashed into believing those conmen, and it is going to be a rough row to hoe once the full ramifications sink in that you actually have to work hard and produce wealth BEFORE you can spend it. And in a global economy where the bulk of the manufacturing is being done at cents on the fiat dollar-or whatever currency you use-this rapid economic loss will hit so fast you'll want the number of that truck that ran you over. There are no more accounting tricks left for these government liars to use. You are going down same as the USA is.
So, enjoy being smug now, you won't be enjoying things within a few years, the handwriting is on the wall. In fact, it isn't handwriting, it is huge lit up neon signs saying this.
And before the expected indignant knee jerk response, you *are* aware that most of the European central banks got bailed out by US dollars, right? You know this? But..they are keeping it a secret as much as they can, because their/your entire system is based on lies and poofery and complete bullcrap, that it is even remotely possible to work little and receive all these benefits forever. This is why the banker gangsters are resisting the audit the Fed bill, and why the other day when Rep Grayson was grilling Bernanke he "doesn't recall" which European banks received billions. And the media in the US isn't pushing this because they do NOT want the US still working taxpayer to know that Europe got bailed out. They are trying to avoid "social unrest", because it is already bad enough with the obvious as hell central planning and incompetence moves with the past few administrations, including this latest megadisaster you Europeans seem so fond of. It's SHOW BUSINESS man, get over it, it is mostly lies, it's a scam,he's a scam, a machine politician bought and paid for who can follow lines.
Oh, your media isn't reporting this stuff, you didn't know this, just sitting smug thinking your unsustainable welfare state would continue forever and ever? You didn't know that you got bailed out or your economy would already be collapsed? Gee, what a coincidence that the media that shills the government party line sort of forgot to mention it.
If you want to see who understands real economics and how geopolitics and high level corruption and greed and playing politics for votes can wreak havoc on things, look to what the older Germans are doing right now for a major clue on what they see coming..because they've seen it before.
But no country has the ability to inspect just anything crossing its borders, if "anything" includes information. Even China can't handle it, and they tried a lot harder than everyone else. I can ssh to Europe right now, and probably arrange something in east Asia, and Big Brother will need a lot good luck inspecting my packets, or even learning of a reason to inspect them.
Because this cannot be effectively done even .0001% of the time, whatever DHS is doing at the border with hard disks essentially serves no purpose. It isn't a serious effort to improve security, intercept contraband, or whatever. It's just pure waste and hostility to citizens.
Checking someone's laptop case for plutonium or heroin is one thing -- it can be done (and quickly!) and there are probably even good reasons to do it. Checking it for kiddie porn is just a joke, and also selective enforcement 100% of the time.
Congress ought to just write it into the statutes the empower DHS, customs, etc: no searching for evil bits. That'll save us money and save the people a lot of headaches, all with no downside.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Taking a laptop seems moot, a terrorist group is not going to have someone carry incriminating evidence on a laptop coming into the country. Much safer (and easier) to send an encrypted email or simply use ftp inside an SSL Tunnel.
Perhaps I've been watching too much 24 and I am over estimating the sophistication of terrorist groups, but it seems the only people this is inconveniencing are average law abiding citizens.
Hurray for security theater.
JFK held the bombers back because last minute intel had it that Castro was wise to the invasion and had already dispersed his fighters, meaning the bombers would have been sitting ducks. The plan was to catch them on the ground at the airfields and destroy them there. That the spooks went ahead with the invasion, then got creamed, was their doing, not JFKs. I know this because I used to know one of those bomber pilots. He said that was the smartest of all possible tactical moves. If you lose the "surprise" part of a surprise invasion, it is better to call it off.
Carter may have been sorta goofy on a lot of things, but if we had stuck to his energy goals and policies, it would be a lot different and better (and cleaner) world by now with regards to at least that issue.
The rest, I agree with you...meh. LBJ..hey, let's elect the texas oil mafia! grumble... Noxon put us on the road to economic ruin when he started bribing off China with our manufacturing, in order to play them off against the USSR. Dumb. He was an alky, typical stupid alky move, along with trusting that idiot kissinger and surrounding himself with doofuses like cheney and rumsfeld. Ford, meh, JFK whack coverup king. Carter I mentioned. Reagan, believed his own nonsense. Bush one, hey, let's elect the corrupt head of the secret police! stoopid...klinton...geez, you could see slimey grease dripping off of him, but like reagan, photogenic and a good talker, very good at the smooth fakeout. Bush the lesser..hey, let's elect the idiot son of the secret police chief! OMG...Ike I just don't remember all that much, some, but not enough to have a good handle on him. His retirement speech is a classic though and I absolutely do remember watching it live.
Heck, I'd settle for a reboot instead of a rewrite, where the Constitution is put back in place as the actual legal foundation for anything in this country's legislation.
As things currently stand, there's so much awful unconstitutional cruft floating around that will likely never be cleared away... and then new laws are written and new case law decided based on this unconstitutional cruft. Meh. Idjimit (or corrupt) congress members can draft and even pass horribly written, prima facie unconstitutional legislation, and unless it's challenged and taken to court and judged unconstitutional, it stands. Herein lies the rub.
So how about we just clear house, clean out the cruft, and get back to basics. And make sure any knucklehead in public office actually understands and follows through on those various oaths to protect and uphold the Constitution.
Cheers,
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
This is a distressingly common misperception. Try reading the actual text of the Amendments -- look closely, for there is no mention of location.
These Amendments apply to "the people" and to "person[s]". These apply no matter where you are.
You tread very dangerous ground indeed if you start arguing that not being within the borders of the country means you are no longer "of the people" and no longer a "person".
Cheers,
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
Dig a big ditch.
Bulldoze DHS emploiyees into big ditch.
Fill big ditch with kerosene and vaseline ... with the DHS employees.
Ignite!
Yea, it will stink.
But the Nazis wiill be dead.
Dead Nazis ... Good Nazis. DHS = Nazi.
Fake liberal not real ones.
Any of the other Democrats running would have been better than Obama.
HillaryCare anyone? How about the midnight call on the red phone? Let's not forget the one who cheated on his wife while she had breast cancer then lied about it.
I've completely lost all hope that the American public is able to pick any type of decent leader.
Same here, but my decent leader is probably different than yours.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Get thee hence to a remedial politics class
Both of you need to go back to school, neither Kucinich nor Obama are even close to being liberal.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
of thin air;
You're right, government gave corporations the power they enjoy. So to make themselves bigger corporations made government bigger. Thomas Jefferson wrote his warning about corporations, "I hope we shall... crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country." But now instead of bidding defiance to government corporations now get politicians to write laws favoring them.
Government, in that sense, is an attempt to curb the threat of centralized power by trying to have a single entity, which is at least nominally controllable, and can all other such entities - corporations - in check.
At least here in the USA, states grant most corporate charters not the federal government, and the last tyme I checked there were 50 states.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
>>>Obama hasn't instituted the killing of people politically opposed to him
I don't recall Lenin doing that either, after the old dictatorship had been toppled, a new government had been instituted and peace achieved.
Lenin achieved peace? And he didn't have those politically opposed to him killed? AHAH! He did neither. By decree Lenin established the Cheka (secret police), the precursor to the KGB. The Cheka was run by Felix Dzerzhinsky who was widely known as a large scale human rights violator. He routinely used torture and summary executions and conducted the Red Terror.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Obama didn't put that in there, the Senate and House of Representatives did, can't hit Obama for that.
What, you mean congress overruled Obama's veto of the health care bill? No they didn't he signed it, so he is responsible for forcing those who do not want to pay for health insurance to pay anyway.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Given that health insurance companies want someone earning $30,000 to pay $15,000 a year for health care is the real problem. What's worse is that the person earning $100,000+ a earn pays less than $5,000 for even better coverage.
Democrats refused to talk about there being no free market in health insurance too. And the new law doesn't change that.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
It's one thing to overuse "think of the children" to support ridiculous censorship laws, but it's quite another to actually suggest we deny chemo to a kid who could benefit from it and survive because Mom and Dad don't have deep enough pockets.
Did anyone actually say don't think of the children? Shriners Hospitals for Children and St. Jude Children's Research Hospital actually treat children free of charge. Imagine that. Oh but those aren't real, children are left to fend for themselves or die.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Spell "USSA" with SS in runes. The USA is in ruins.
United Soviet Socialist of America? That doesn't scan well at all.
Damn those activist judges, they're at it again subverting the Executive Branch.
If someone is passing you on the right, you are an asshole for driving in the wrong lane.
They can easily take a drive image so that they could search it at their 'leisure' but holding on to citizen's private property? why? Of course, the whole process is unconstitutional but unless some courts strike it down it will keep happening. DHS please, wake up, take a backup of the laptop and return it to its owner.
Hard to say. Grover Cleveland was good. Possibly Warren Harding?
The economy WOULDN'T have improved without Obama
Proof it.
The main reason the economy collapsed was because of the troubles in the housing mortgage market, and guess when that started... During Clinton's term of office.
The Invisible Hand of the Free Market is what punches workers in the nuts.
Better that than command and control markets. What kicked workers balls, and breasts, the Soviet Union? Government. In NAZI Germany? Government. In China, government. In Zimbabwe? Robert Mugabe, ie government. When has a free market kicked anyone's balls or teats? Never, no free market exists.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?