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What could happen if you refuse to unlock your phone at the US border?

arstechnica.com

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Re: What could happen if you refuse to unlock your phone at the US border?

#91

Post by knz »

MichaelGG wrote: post #50
toddmorey wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel any parent with a teenager who's tried to monitor her Facebook account can see where this is headed. This policy is incredibly ignorant of how online communities work and where communication is going. The only thing I can see happening is terrorism-minded individuals actually creating and maintaining clean Facebook profiles as a smokescreen. That's an easy win and great distraction as communication moves to no…

This isn't to catch terrorism. Though they'll probably get a few idiot "extremists", this will mostly stop people coming in under false pretenses. It's bizarre how people don't think ahead to their border crossing and are willing to admit they are going to live with their SO, or work as a nanny -- while under a tourism visa. It'll be very effective at this. Most people aren't going to establish a plausible social med…

Living with your SO under a tourism visa isn't a crime as long as you leave before your visa expires...

And is it the role of CPB to prevent under the table employment? Surely there are better ways to address that issue if it's a concern. Building walls and inspecting social media seems like a political smoke screen for avoiding more effective enforcement measures - requiring farmers/factories/roofing companies to prove their labour is legally allowed to work in the US etc. Or we could acknowledge the reality of immigration (we need workers if we can't afford to pay Americans an adequate wage to pick fields etc).

Re: What could happen if you refuse to unlock your phone at the US border?

#92

Post by jrochkind1 »

ronnier wrote: post #9

> 4,444 cellphones and 320 other electronic devices were inspected in 2015 And recently I'm hearing about this -- it largely went ignored during the previous administration but now it's a major concern, articles on HN, my Facebook feed, Reddit, ...

I had read about it on HN multiple times during the Obama administration too. As well as heard about it from the ACLU and EFF, as well as other places.

A HN post from 2014, with 258 upvotes, linking to an ACLU notice from 2014. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6993995

That's just the first HN post I found, there were multiple other front-page HN posts over the past few years.

An EFF alert from 2013: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/08/unjustified-detention-...

A Mother Jones article from 2014: http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/06/how-fourth-amend...

The Committee to Protect Journalists in 2014: https://cpj.org/blog/2014/10/for-journalists-coming-into-us-...

If you're trying to make the point that there are _some_ people that are Democratic Party partisans and ignore civil and human rights violations from Democrats -- yes, there are, I agree, and it can be infuriating. But it's not everyone, it's not the ACLU, it's not the EFF, and it's not even representative of what stories got posted to and upvoted on HN during the Obama administration. Many of us have been paying attention to this issue unhappily for years.

I am hoping the upsurge in resistance to Trump means that more people have been activated to oppose much the same things when a future Democratic or "more reasonable" Republican administration tries them too.

Re: What could happen if you refuse to unlock your phone at the US border?

#93

Post by tom_mellior »

leesalminen wrote: post #54
Raphmedia wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yet another reason never to enter the USA.

There's a show on Netflix that follows the Australian immigration cops. They go hard and frequently examine text messages, email, social, etc. for non resident entrants. If you think this is just the US, you are mistaken.

> They go hard and frequently examine text messages, email, social, etc. for non resident entrants.

Interesting. Do they ever find anything that's actually incriminating?

Re: What could happen if you refuse to unlock your phone at the US border?

#94

Post by bflesch »

danbruc wrote: post #85

How is this not in violation of international law, especially the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights [1] article 17, which would apply to US citizens as well as non-US citizens? No one shall be subjected to arbitrary or unlawful interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to unlawful attacks on his honour and reputation. Maybe even article 9 if the law does not clearly establi…

If software identifies you as potential criminal or terrorist at the border, the following search is not "arbitrary" by any means. The state should not be transparent about the exact reasons why you were chosen (e.g. the social media post or phone call), apart from pointing out the law based on which they are acting.

Re: What could happen if you refuse to unlock your phone at the US border?

#95

Post by bogomipz »

>"Ars spoke with several legal experts, and contacted CBP itself (which did not provide anything beyond previously-published policies)."

In other words the CBP were completely unhelpful and simply referred them to published legalese online rather than clarifying that legalese. It really feels like the culture of DHS and CBP views the people they are supposed to serving as adversaries.

Re: What could happen if you refuse to unlock your phone at the US border?

#97

Post by mikeash »

bflesch wrote: post #81

In a world where thousands of people annually travel to some "freedom fighter" camps in order to get combat training, I very much agree that it is necessary to intensively screen travelers who return to their country of origin once they fit a certain heuristic. As one single returnee who is not caught might actually cause dozens or hundreds of citizen deaths, there shouldn't be a screening exception for smartphones o…

Why limit it to international travel? People can learn how to kill without leaving the country. We need random checkpoints set up on major highways (and occasionally on minor roads, just to ensure you can't reliably bypass them) to stop and search people to ensure they aren't up to anything nefarious.

Actually, it needs to go ever further. You can get up to a lot of trouble without even leaving your home. The police should conduct random searches of people's dwellings in order to combat this.

A lot of bad stuff is handled online, so of course we also need to search people's online activity as it happens. Since encryption gets in the way of this, we need to outlaw it, or at least mandate key escrow so the security services can observe the traffic.

Re: What could happen if you refuse to unlock your phone at the US border?

#98

Post by purple-again »

tornadoboy55 wrote: post #59
itshoptx wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would respectfully have to disagree with you concerning social media. - I've been in IT 20 years and have no social media - I meet my friends in person, since they're all local, save 2, and we prefer to talk or text - I've never had a potential employer bat and eye or even care that I have zero internet presence. In fact, many have said they prefer it because I'm not distracted whilst at work. Besides, I enjoy bein…

Your method also only works if you have a small social circle or don't go out much. Good luck planning a big party or trip without a Whatsapp/Telegram/Facebook group chat..

You understand that society did just fine for thousands of years without these things right? Maybe if you are 20 the social norms have changed so drastically that calling someone is unthinkable but I rather doubt that. Certainly for my generation and above ('84) it's not required.

Re: What could happen if you refuse to unlock your phone at the US border?

#99

Post by Turing_Machine »

jacquesm wrote: post #39
tptacek wrote: post #3

Worth remembering: US citizens can play chicken with CBP and lose nothing more than their computer/phone hardware (perhaps having it returned 6 months later). But non-citizens, possibly including LPRs, cannot: if an alien attempts to cross the border with a device they can't unlock "because they don't have the corresponding 2FA token with them" (as one friend suggested they do), they'll be detained, their devices con…

> The current best practice for border crossings --- really anywhere in the world --- is simply not to carry anything you're unwilling to unlock for Customs. Or, to simply stop traveling to countries that refuse to play nice with the rights of foreigners. The whole idea that this sort of thing is even anywhere near acceptable behavior revolts me.

"Or, to simply stop traveling to countries that refuse to play nice with the rights of foreigners. "

Which countries would those be? As far as I know, every country (or quasi-country, such as the EU) asserts the right to carry out a full inspection of anything crossing its border.

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