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US-Born NASA Scientist Detained At The Border Until He Unlocked His Phone (theverge.com)
Sidd Bikkannavar works at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. After racing solar-powered cars in Chile, he had trouble returning to America.
mspohr quote The Verge:
Bikkannavar says he was detained by U.S. Customs and Border Patrol and pressured to give the Customs and Border Protection agents his phone and access PIN. Since the phone was issued by NASA, it may have contained sensitive material that wasn't supposed to be shared. Bikkannavar's phone was returned to him after it was searched by CBP, but he doesn't know exactly what information officials might have taken from the device...
The officer also presented Bikkannavar with a document titled "Inspection of Electronic Devices" and explained that CBP had authority to search his phone. Bikkannavar did not want to hand over the device, because it was given to him by JPL and is technically NASA property. He even showed the officer the JPL barcode on the back of phone. Nonetheless, CBP asked for the phone and the access PIN. "I was cautiously telling him I wasn't allowed to give it out, because I didn't want to seem like I was not cooperating," says Bikkannavar. "I told him I'm not really allowed to give the passcode; I have to protect access. But he insisted they had the authority to search it."
While border agents have the right to search devices, The Verge reports that travelers aren't legally required to unlock their phones, "although agents can detain them for significant periods of time if they do not." They also report that Bikkannavar "was not allowed to leave until he gave CBP his PIN," adding that the cybersecurity team at JPL "was not happy about the breach."
The officer also presented Bikkannavar with a document titled "Inspection of Electronic Devices" and explained that CBP had authority to search his phone. Bikkannavar did not want to hand over the device, because it was given to him by JPL and is technically NASA property. He even showed the officer the JPL barcode on the back of phone. Nonetheless, CBP asked for the phone and the access PIN. "I was cautiously telling him I wasn't allowed to give it out, because I didn't want to seem like I was not cooperating," says Bikkannavar. "I told him I'm not really allowed to give the passcode; I have to protect access. But he insisted they had the authority to search it."
While border agents have the right to search devices, The Verge reports that travelers aren't legally required to unlock their phones, "although agents can detain them for significant periods of time if they do not." They also report that Bikkannavar "was not allowed to leave until he gave CBP his PIN," adding that the cybersecurity team at JPL "was not happy about the breach."
I'm not prepared to give up my (and everyone else's) 4th Amendment Rights on the off-chance that we might maybe catch a dirtbag. The cost of making that collar is just too high.
"Tell me doctor, with all of your defenses, are there any provisions for an attack by killer bees?"
Democrat and republican alike, you voted for this. Now live with it! Until you vote them out, shut. the. fuck. UP!
Thank you that is all...
I'm not prepared to give up my (and everyone else's) 4th Amendment Rights on the off-chance that we might maybe catch a dirtbag. The cost of making that collar is just too high.
Sigh. Border search exception.
I'm white and not born inside the US, and not US citizen. But I've been stopped and searched inside the US. So have many other friends and family. So from my experience, I know these searches exist and it seems critiques are as or more racist than the government ;)
what can be asked for when moving in and out of the USA.
Having diplomatic immunity from another country is really the only way around that...
If been from the USA was legally special, everyone from the USA would demand rights not to be searched..
So Congress made sure everyone entering the USA would face equal, fair questions and searches.
If a person would like not to be searched, find a way to get full diplomatic immunity...
i.e. persons and property can be examined. No probable cause, no warrant, no "suspicion" protection to stop every search request.
You can be searched, asked questions, have to show a device is what it should be.
Until federal courts or Congress sets new laws or comments on the need for "suspicion" of criminal activity all searches are legal.
Copies of your data are fine too. e.g. a camera can have its digital files looked at or recovered if deleted.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
That doesn't make any sense at all. You don't get a secret service escort just because you have a security clearance. I was a radar repairer in the Army and had a TS clearance, frequently travelled with classified radar schematics. They didn't dispatch the damn secret service just to escort me from one post to another. That's not how it works. Where in the world would you even get that bizarre idea?
But you don't have any 4th Amendment Rights at an airport. Searches and seizures at an airport are not subject to any requirement of reasonable suspicion, probable cause, or warrant. It's called the Border Search Exception ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... ), it has been in effect since the 1970s (or earlier?), and pretty much every related case was ruled in favor of the government.
For visitors, this is true. But for citizens it gets to be a lot more difficult. It's well understood that as a citizen, they cannot for any reason refuse you entry to the country. They can arrest you the second you enter, but they can't refuse citizens entry. After all, where will they send you if they don't allow you entry? And once they arrest you, all standard constitutional rights are now active. Your warrant claim is only tested for foreigners.
Technically CPB agents may need reasonable suspicion to stop you and probable cause to search you, but in practice they routinely exceed their authority, and they usually aren't challenged when they do. People just acquiesce to get it over with. That's a problem because if it remains customary long enough the courts will inevitably tend to view it more positively.
Additionally, the "Border Zone" in which CPB operates is within a hundred miles of the US border including coastlines. This means cities like Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne, Sacramento and Portland are "border cities". Two thirds of Americans live where they can be stopped and searched by CPB. The ACLU has a convenient map of the "border zone" on their website.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Back when airport screeners were contractors they had the right to make that mistake and get a funny story out of it, but government employees can't legally ask you to turn that laptop on in public. The question itself was enough to get that guy arrested. When I was in civil service with DoD, I would travel without any government electronics if possible, because despite the laws, the TSA was a liability. Traveling internationally, forget about it, I don't think I was allowed to bring anything that had ever been in my lab with me. This NASA guy was on a personal trip to Chile with a phone with sensitive info on it... that's just stupid on his part. Get another phone for the trip.
I used to do development and testing for explosives detectors. Nitro-toluenes are very, very hard to get off your skin and clothes. I was pulled aside for random searching and swabbed for explosives. So I come up positive for DNT residue. I thought this was great, because I wasn't sure the machines they were using at the time would pick up the very small amount of residue from somone who used appropriate lab attire (in-field positive test!). I then told them that the reading wasn't likely a false positive and that I worked with explosives. Maybe I should have led with my Navy ID and an explanation that I was a scientist in the civil service, but they did NOT like that I admitted to having explosives residue on me.
Some more up to date advice:
https://www.wired.com/2017/02/...
Pretty much everyone human is leftist. Even Republicans.
The US uses its own (wrong) definitions that confuse the rest of the world.
All men created equal, it says.
If by 'it' you mean the Declaration of Independence, then you'd be correct. The Constitution, however, does not contain these words.
The "US citizens" thing is also based on erroneous case law. The 4th does not say anything about citizens, it applies to foreign nationals too.
As a matter of law, because he is not the owner, he cannot grant permission to search. Since he divulged his access, he and the TSA agent can be prosecuted under the CFAA.
IANAL.
That being said, anyone carrying anything they wish to keep confidential within 200 miles of a boarder, or while not in your own home effectively has no rights at all. Not as a matter of law, but as a simple matter of fact. Not just 4th amendments rights either. The police shoot dead unarmed people at least two times a week on average. As a simple matter of statistics, you are 300 times (times, not percent) more likely to be killed by a police officer than you are by a terrorist.
You people supporting these actions are insane.
Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.
The only benefit that US citizenship has in this situation that they can't put you on the next flight back to where you came from. But they can still give you the special search treatment.
That isn't remotely true, you don't even get a fun badge or anything with security credentials
There is no border search exception in the constitution. There is, however, an explicit set of prerequisites that must be met to search a citizen for sure, and probably any person as well, though in this case that doesn't even come into it.
Before anyone starts yelling "but the courts", the courts gave themselves the power to make law that violates the constitution; the constitution did not. So they are acting illegally when they sanction such laws; congress is acting illegally when it makes such laws; border agents are acting illegally when they enforce such laws.
As soon as someone says "there are exceptions to the constitution", you know they are making an incorrect argument. There is no such thing. The moment you accept that there are, it becomes merely advisory, and you then are advocating for a pure oligarchy. The only ambiguity in the constitution arises when one part is in conflict with another part; in that case, questions do arise with regard to which part holds sway; but in the case of search and seizure, there is no ambiguity. At all. This is an explicit limit on government.
For those who have never read the constitution, it supplies the flexibility required to authorize such things in article five, which explains how the amendment process works. Not in article three, which defines the authority of the Supreme Court, and which contains not one word about the Supreme Court being able to alter the constitution according to their current whims.
Travel / tourism to US is plummeting.
The size of the effect varies by source:
6.5% - http://www.reuters.com/article...
17% - http://time.com/money/4662727/...
25% - https://www.theguardian.com/tr...
50% - http://ttgnordic.com/interest-...
I am European.
I have been to United States tens of times, both on company budget and on my own.
I won't come back, unless pressed really hard by my employer.
Why should I?
The world is full of wonderful places.
Why should I choose a country which is openly hostile to visitors?
Yes, you can say that, but it doesn't matter what you, or me, or anyone else here who isn't on the SCOTUS think. The Supreme Court of the United States is the ultimate arbiter of what is and what is not constitutional. Once they say it is, it is, until they come back later and say it isn't. This is part of the basis for the debate between the strict constitution types and the living document types.
You've clearly never actually read a security agreement document. At least for civilians, any threat of harm to one's self or family is sufficient cause to relinquish the classified material to whomever is making the threat.
Personally, the thought of having to spend more time with a Wyatt-Earp-Syndrome border guard thug meets my threshold of "harm" . Just state that you're giving up the materials unwillingly under threat, and at least in theory you're in the clear.
https://app.box.com/WitthoftResume Code: https://github.com/cellocgw
"There are special cases where 4th and 5th Amendment protections do not apply, and the border is one of those"
The "special cases border" is also a moving target and now extends 100 miles inland from the physical border.
https://www.aclu.org/other/con...
So if you live in Seattle, San Francisco, ALL of Florida, 2/3rds of New England, New York, Charleston, Augusta, Washington, DC & Philly - among many other places where up to 200 million Americans live, you're a "special case" at any time.
Pain is merely failure leaving the body