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US Customs block Canadian man after reading his Scruff profile

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Re: US Customs block Canadian man after reading his Scruff profile

#161

Post by sergers »

Canada wrote: post #102

I'm always nervous entering the US and Canada. My declarations are always proper, and I carry nothing I'd be upset to have searched. The feeling is just anchored. I get searched a lot and then let go. Waste of time for all concerned. I hate the airport security checkpoints too. I'm worried something of mine will be stolen if I get separated from it. For anyone else who feels this way, a good tip for US travel is to o…

I am Canadian born citizen who does most of work remotely with US companies.

A couple times a year I have to go-to US.

I am only traveling g for work, carrying nothing illegal and never done anything illegal in the US... Yet I get anxiety the US border agents are going to hassle me.

By the time I get up to US customs preclearance I am nervous and the agent thinks I am on something.

This leads to more questioning.

However by the end my nerves have calmed and I make it through every time.

I just say I hate to fly, and going through customs thinking they out to get me.

Usually CBP officer will say I should find another profession, or there is medication that can help.

--

5 years ago on a personal trip shopping with the wife in the US via car, we came back to Canada without buying anything in 3 hours cause I got in a argument with my wife.

Canadian border pulled us inside. They couldn't believe I didn't buy anything and I must be doing something nefarious. Agents questioned my wife if she knew my whereabouts the whole trip... Asked her how well she knew me

They took my wallet and wiped down every surface, card, with the agent telling me to speak up now cause the machine is going to tell them. 5 minutes later the agent comes back and throws my wallet on the table and tells us we can leave.

I avoid traveling cause it's a hassle, and stressful just going through customs borders, mainly now only travel on work trips when I have to.

Re: US Customs block Canadian man after reading his Scruff profile

#162

Post by smsm42 »

mc32 wrote: post #53
Mikeb85 wrote: post #27

In the US right now visiting, am Canadian. Was a pain, was held up over an hour at the border (via land). Apparently they don't believe there's any reason for a Canadian to visit the US as a tourist, we only want to work illegally (they're partially right, only came to visit family, our national parks are nicer). Also, based on my family members' experiences of working in the US, it's easier to work illegally than to…

That's how most countries are. For the most part the US is the exception for industrialized countries in that it's easy to work illegally because the gov does not enforce verification very hard and does not penalize employers often. I know countries I've been to, even if you could avoid interacting with authorities, there's no way to get other gov services while not having proper visas --ie, education, housing assist…

US has very strong political opposition to denying services to illegal immigrants in many states. Given how many there are, in is understandable - if you have 10 million population, you can not just deny them all healthcare or access to housing. That'd create tons of problems.

It could be done if tightening the rules is combined with finding solution for having so many illegal immigrants, one way or another (in various combinations). But political stances in US are such that making comprehensive solution is very hard, the trust between parties almost nonexistent, the desire to cooperate is very low, and the entrenched positions are incompatible and only cover part of the possible solution, which can not work without other parts.

Re: US Customs block Canadian man after reading his Scruff profile

#163

Post by smsm42 »

techdragon wrote: post #132
bruceb wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is part of the problem, not the questions but the attitude. I can understand them asking questions, they have a short time to figure out if the traveler might be "up to no good". That is no reason to ask questions in way that attacks a person. Ask all the questions you want just don't be terrorizing jerk about it. Now one instance can be chalked up to a bad apple but over and over again I have heard stories like…

Isn't the point of the giant world wide surveillance apparatus run by the NSA, etc. meant to let them know this sort of thing before they even buy a ticket for a plane trip? I know I'm being purposefully naive in saying this, but why pay for something that's not working?

You can't really find out in advance if someone intends to overstay their visa by surveillance. Surveillance is not magic, and mass surveillance has a problem of collecting huge mass of junk, and no agency, even NSA, would have resources to sift through this junk enough to find trivial matters like intent to overstay visa, even if that information actually was there. Surveillance may be useful to detect highly anomalous behavior, or to detect connections between people (e.g. is Mr. X connected to known terrorist Mr. Z?) but I don't see how it can be useful in trivial matters like immigration enforcement.

Re: US Customs block Canadian man after reading his Scruff profile

#164

Post by tallanvor »

kennywinker wrote: post #49

Everyone proposing clever technical solutions. Burner phones and encrypted cloud data etc... you are solving the wrong problem. Instead of engineering a way for the few people who care deeply to avoid this at great effort, engineer a way for this to not be legal. Write your congressperson, donate time and money to political parties, make privacy at the border for ALL (not just citizens) a priority in every election.

On the one hand I agree with you, but on the other hand, not enough Americans even experience what it can be like to go through border control as a citizen.* Even for those who do care, chances are that's not going to be a priority compared to other issues.

*I've written before about my experiences having to go through border control after booking last minute trips. I've been living overseas for over 10 years now, and twice I've had to do this twice now - dealing with a glorified mall cop on a power trip when you're trying to get home to see your mother before she dies is a perfect way to make you despise everything about border control.

Re: US Customs block Canadian man after reading his Scruff profile

#165

Post by smsm42 »

davedx wrote: post #81
abandonliberty wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're mostly right. At some point these experiences may affect tourism, business, and desirable immigration. But it's probably too distant of an effect to have that much political capital.

Yeah, who cares about business, tourism and desirable immigration? None of those things are worth much to the US economy I guess. (Our family was seriously considering a touring camper holiday to the US in a year or two. Now: no way in hell.)

Unless it causes a very noticeable drop in tourism - not on anecdotal level, but on the level of millions - about 70M tourists visit US yearly, so to make noticeable change, it probably should be like 10M at least - there will be no change. Note that there are literally millions of citizens who don't get a dime from tourists, don't care too much about tourists, but worry a lot about (real or imagined) threat of terrorism. They'd kick out any politician they perceive soft on border security faster than you can say "TSA".

Re: US Customs block Canadian man after reading his Scruff profile

#166

Post by smsm42 »

wvenable wrote: post #149
mc32 wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can see members of congress agreeing to privacy right at the border for citizens --only a very few would support the same for non-citizens, even Dems. There is no political upside to that position and it serves a very small percentage of Americans, indirectly, so, that's not going to fly.

There are many places in the US where a significant part of the economy comes from tourism.

There's also 300M+ people in US. Which means virtually none of these places relies only on international tourism. There should be a huge change in tourism for them to notice enough to actually lobby for political change. And such huge changes, even if they would happen - which is not a given, for each person who have read a horror story about a Canadian turned away at the border there are thousands of people who never heard about it - it would take a long time.

Re: US Customs block Canadian man after reading his Scruff profile

#167

Post by superfad »

te_chris wrote: post #59
NamTaf wrote: post #48

Over the last few years I've gone from wanting to visit the US and planning it as one of the next few holidays I'd like to do, to wanting to visit the US but holding off until 'later', to now simply not wanting to visit due to these sort of policies and actions at the border. It's a shame; US citizens are generally lovely people, the US natural environment is beautiful and, hell, the US makes killer craft beers that…

Go to NZ. Natural wonder of the world and the craft beer is killer. You'll thank me.

They will be asking for passwords in NZ too before too long by the sound of it.

https://nzccl.org.nz/content/customs-able-demand-unlockpassw...

Plus there is what happened to Sam Blackman

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objecti...

Re: US Customs block Canadian man after reading his Scruff profile

#168

Post by xyzzy_plugh »

tempestn wrote: post #113
sneak wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My phone almost always costs around a thousand dollars, roughly the amount the guy persecuted by the CBP was complaining about losing on flights. It's also instrumental for getting me from the airport I land at to my hotel, as well as remembering the name and address of the hotel I need to travel to from the airport. I would do what you suggest but a) the Apple store isn't always open when I land, and b) I have no wa…

And besides, it still wouldn't help. They could hand you a device and tell you to log into your social media accounts. If you say you don't have the passwords because of whatever technical measures you cooked up to make them temporarily inaccessible, you're back to, "Don't do that next time. You're not entering today."

I'd be interested in their response to this technical measure: they're written down in a book on my desk at home.

Re: US Customs block Canadian man after reading his Scruff profile

#169

Post by smsm42 »

krushing wrote: post #120
fulafel wrote: post #38

Argh, you couldn't invent this kafkaesque stuff: "When he went through secondary inspection at Vancouver airport, US Customs officers didn’t even need to ask for his passwords — they were saved in their own system." "They said, ‘Next time you come through, don’t have a cleared phone,’ and that was it. I wasn’t let through. " -- I know that US/Canada privacy laws might not give people protection in this situations, bu…

And, of course, the United States is based on the concept of natural rights. Hence the Bill of Rights saying, "Congress shall may no law". Americans 4th Amendment right wasn't created by the 4th Amendment, but merely acknowledged by it. All human beings have an inherent right to privacy -- to suggest otherwise as a US citizen is self-contradictory.

The problem is no human beings except US citizens have the inherent right to enter US. So you can easily refuse to surrender your privacy - and they can as easily to deny you entry to the US. Unless, of course, you are a citizen - then they'd make it suck as much as they legally and semi-legally can but eventually they'd have to let you in.

Re: US Customs block Canadian man after reading his Scruff profile

#170

Post by smsm42 »

danm07 wrote: post #137

I'm Canadian running a company in California, and every time I cross the border, I get pulled into the office for an hour. There was one time last year where I got detained for 8 because they didn't believe that a college dropout could run a company, even calling me "full of shit" at one point. They had my computer and went through my email one by one asking me to cite specific dates of employment at 3am in the morni…

Can't you use NEXUS to avoid all contact with them?
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