What To Do If the Laptop Ban Goes Global (backchannel.com)

"The U.S. is reportedly seriously considering a greatly expanded ban on laptops in airplane cabins," writes Slashdot reader mirandakatz -- sharing some advice from Dan Gillmor. If the government still allows laptops to be checked in with luggage, "the priority will be to discourage tampering and mitigate the risks associated with theft," he writes, envisioning that "If I have to check mine, I'll pack it in bubble wrap and tape, and do some other things to make it evident if someone has tampered with the machine." But of course there's other precautions: [W]e can travel with bare-bones operating system setups, with as little personal or business data as possible (preferably none at all) on the laptop's internal disk drive. When we arrive and get back online, we can work mostly in browsers and retrieve what we need from cloud storage for the specific applications that have to run "locally" on the PC... You might also get a Chromebook for international travel. Chromebooks run Google's Chrome operating system and keep pretty much all data in Google's cloud. So you could carry a bare Chromebook through a border, go online, and retrieve the information you need. You have to completely trust Google with this method...

[The article also suggests encrypting the hard disk -- along with your phone -- or carrying an external drive.] I use the Ubuntu operating system, and this simplifies creating a special travel setup. In preparation for international hassles, I've put a copy of my OS and essential data files on an encrypted USB thumb drive, which holds 256 gigabytes of data... If I've forgotten to load some specific files, and I have them backed up in the cloud, I can always go there.
Because of all the additional security procedures, he utlimately predicts higher ticket prices, fewer business travellers, and, according to Bruce Schneier, "a new category of 'trusted travelers' who are allowed to carry their electronics onto planes."

Comments

Theft and Damage

[Anonymous Coward]

Honestly, who the heck trusts that their laptop would not be seriously damaged or stolen if they check it in their baggage? I've had things that were MUCH LESS fragile than a laptop completely destroyed in checked baggage.

Re:Theft and Damage

[jfdavis668]

I check my laptop in my baggage every time I fly overseas. I'm not interested in working on the flight. Never had a problem with it. You do have to properly pack it. I have a case specifically made to pack it into your luggage for protection. You can't just throw it on top and close the bag and expect it to survive.

Avoid travel or leave laptop at home

[religionofpeas]

My plan is to avoid travel by plane as much as I can. And if I really have to travel, then I'm going to leave my laptop at home. I don't trust the baggage handlers not to steal it, so checking in is not an option.

Re:Avoid travel or leave laptop at home

[shmlco]

Also, stuff like this is just going to push development of autonomous vehicles and their use for business travel and vacation travel even faster.

Won't help for really long-distance or overseas travel, of course, but for regional travel why not bypass all of the airport/airline/TSA BS?

Get in your car the night before, tell it to take you to some other city, then take a nap and wake up when you get there. No lines, no security, and no having to get to the airport two hours ahead of time "just in case"... only to find your flight's been delayed two hours.

Re:Avoid travel or leave laptop at home

[Hognoxious]

The TSA could run it using the ones they've stolen.

Obviously it would require some record keeping in case someone actually gets their own machine back and makes a fuss, not that anything would happen because even cardboard cops are part of the ingroup..

Re:Avoid travel or leave laptop at home

[PolygamousRanchKid]

Sounds like an opportunity for some enterprising company to offer laptop rentals at airports.

Some airline is already experimenting with providing laptop loaners for free to business and first class passengers.

Of course, most corporate IT Security folks would rightly ban that for their employees. Given the amount of industrial and personal espionage performed by the NSA, CIA and their pals . . . most folks should just stay away from this anyway.

Hmmm . . . maybe airlines need to offer more options for passengers willing to pay more for tickets? Like, Muslims are banned, but laptops are allowed (the Trump policy) . . . ? No screaming babies or fat folks blubbering over to your side of the seat . . . ?

Banning laptops is not going to "fly well." Business folks, who make more profits for the airlines will cut back on flying. A monthly intercontinental trip will become a quarterly one. When their profits are hurt, the airlines will shit-can the laptop ban.

Re:Avoid travel or leave laptop at home

[Anonymous Coward]

My plan is to avoid travel by plane as much as I can.

This is the only possible response. I'd like to say that the US can't possibly be that stupid as it will seriously hurt business, but since 2001 the US has proven that there's no levels of stupid that it won't try.

It's not just laptops--it's anything bigger than a cell phone. Sure, it's possible to work with a cell phone under certain fairly limited circumstances, but it's ridiculous to have to as well. There's no way I'd travel for business or even personal reasons if I can't have a notebook with me.

Checking it is ridiculous. They don't want you locking luggage except with useless locks, so that's right out. That, and letting a notebook out of your control on a trip like that is just asking for law enforcement to tamper with it. Sure, it's already pretty much a requirement to keep anything you don't want them seeing encrypted on a server you access from your destination and not on your notebook, but controlling the base hardware is an absolute must because when you decrypt it you have to trust the platform.

No, the only possible response to this is to hit businesses where it hurts in response. Cut out international travel completely and since governments are corrupt and controlled by business let THEM take care of repealing this or preventing it from going into place at all. It's the only way.

The reason given makes absolutely no sense

[Anonymous Coward]

If the explanation about a risk from laptops were the real reason for the ban, then the obvious solution would be to remove all of the Li-ion batteries from the laptops and to ban ALL electronics including iPhone 8+ and Samsung 8+ which do not have removable batteries and yet which are dangerous enough according to EgyptAir Flight 804 in 2016.

But that solution is not being used. Therefore, the real reason cannot be about protecting the planes. The real reason is more likely something to do with wanting to have unattended access to laptops by officials during the baggage security screening process.

Re:The reason given makes absolutely no sense

[DrXym]

That is a sensible solution and one that would stop mobile / tablet / laptop manufacturers from sealing in batteries. A double win.

Re:Do it the old fashioned way...

[Vermonter]

Encrypting your dead tree notebook must have taken forever

We could do all that shit

[fustakrakich]

Or we could elect a different class of politicians instead of following blind tribalism. Sorry, but all this is self inflicted, and every chance they have, the voters only make it worse.

Re:We could do all that shit

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not entirely convinced that a different administration would have done things differently on this one thing.

Every administration is afraid of getting the next big terror attack pinned on them. Politicians are motivated by fear as well as voters.

I'm pretty sure this is why Obama ended up continuing or even expanding surveillance despite his earlier criticism of it. It's not that he suddenly loved surveillance, it's that once he was the one who'd be left holding the bag if something bad happened, his priorities shifted way over in the direction of security at the expense of liberties.

Ready to send your private data somewhere ?

[what about]

How do you know what OS / backdoor is on that laptop/device ?
It is already a huge burden to have a minimum level of privacy on "random" devices.
A device that is specifically given to foreign visitors is surely going to be snooped upon.

So far, the USB computer on a stick is still the best bet.

Re:just take the PC

[AHuxley]

The security services usually have that smart TV loaded with some extras in most nations. Mic, camera or just looking for the data connection.
That smart TV is the perfect way to see what a guest does, what data they look at, images, movies.. or to turn on a mic/camera if they have guests to talk to their fellow workers on the same trip.

Re:We don't need laptops anymore

[Anonymous Coward]

And when I need to work at a client, I need their docking station, with complementary keylogger.

And when I need to work around without stopping at a hotel I need to take with me the docking station (lol)

No, laptops are not going anywhere. The only reason the sales are down is because we are hitting the "good enough" target with 4-5 year products, a 3 year laptop is not crap anymore.

Not to mention the absurdity of trying to work on a mobile operating system. You want me to work on android? ios? it's a joke, right?

Re:Useless suggestions

[dgatwood]

That's why, as someone else already mentioned, the right workaround (ignoring the huge inconvenience of not being able to work during the flight itself) would be to buy a gun (even a starter pistol) and store it (properly declared and unloaded) in a checked lockbox along with your laptop.

Of course, if everyone who owned a laptop did this, the TSA would probably implode from the extra workload of handling that many hand inspections, but that's not my problem; that's something for the total newbie TSA people who naïvely proposed a no-laptops-onboard policy to solve.