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Canada Border Services seizes lawyer's phone, laptop for not sharing passwords

cbc.ca

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Re: Canada Border Services seizes lawyer's phone, laptop for not sharing passwords

#131

Post by temac »

LeonM wrote: post #99

I have asked this question before, but never really got a satisfiable answer: why do governments (not just USA/canada) spend these resources to check data physically at a border? It's not like you need to 'smuggle' any form of data physically. I mean, any data considered to be dangerous (like terrorist attack plans, atomic bomb designs or political inside information) can be accessed across borders via the internet.…

They probably just want to take advantage of old laws and/or not precise enough that allows them to search everything (according to their interpretation, including virtual things) on anybody -- without even any probable cause.

Most government can't do that (in theory...) when you are a citizen or maybe even just a resident, except when you cross the border. So if they want to watch you politically, they do that (at least) at the border.

Re: Canada Border Services seizes lawyer's phone, laptop for not sharing passwords

#132

Post by khazhoux »

vuln wrote: post #57
gruez wrote: post #9

>Wright refused, telling the officer both devices contained confidential information protected by solicitor-client privilege. >He said the officer then confiscated his phone and laptop, and told him the items would be sent to a government lab which would try to crack his passwords and search his files. Can this be used to get whatever case(es) he was defending thrown out because solicitor-client privilege was violate…

You will never be able to prove parallel construction happened.

edit: wrote comment about Herring v. United States but this is a Canadian case.

Re: Canada Border Services seizes lawyer's phone, laptop for not sharing passwords

#133

Post by adzicg »

Consultant32452 wrote: post #105
andy_ppp wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean what counts as work and where it occurs are becoming very difficult to manage? What happens if you have to do work while on a real holiday, should you be deported for this? Is it valid to allow these searches for these sort of offences, it seems like at some point everyone will be guilty of doing these things.

I wonder this myself. There is a difference between traveling for the purposes of work, and working while traveling. I have a 100% remote position. I normally do my work in the US. I've considered flying to Europe for a few weeks, where due to time zone differences I could do touristy stuff during the day and then work my US 9-5 shift in the EU evening. This would allow me to travel but to not take vacation time. Wou…

I’m not a lawyer, but tend to travel a lot and had lots of conversations with border agents as a result :) My impression is that it’s primarily a question of payment - if you travel to say Belgium to get paid by a Belgian company, then it’s work. If you’re there and your work is not really related to Belgium in any way, you are on a salary paid by a US company, then your purpose isn’t really work. The shades of gray start when your employer is being paid by the local company for your work. Many countries will allow you to attend meetings for a week or two, run demos, provide some on-site support, but staying for six months and working on site likely require a business visa.

Re: Canada Border Services seizes lawyer's phone, laptop for not sharing passwords

#134

Post by screye »

pjc50 wrote: post #77
WrtCdEvrydy wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, to be honest, that's probably illegal, but I have never liked trading freedom for security.

People love trading other people's freedom for security. Especially if it has to do with immigration.

Immigration : the government's favorite scape goat.

Re: Canada Border Services seizes lawyer's phone, laptop for not sharing passwords

#135

Post by pooya13 »

lixtra wrote: post #90
andromeduck wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Snowden revealed that the government is capable of planting malware in peripheral firmware. So you can have a hacked bios/EFI, system controller, security chip, hard drive, SSD, GPU, WiFi/networking card/chip that is virtually impossible to detect from the main OS.

Yes, if determined the government agencies have tremendous capabilities. But will they use it at a large scale, i.e. against an arbitrary lawyer?

I’m thinking maybe this guy was flagged because he is a lawyer and might have sensitive information on a person of interest.

Re: Canada Border Services seizes lawyer's phone, laptop for not sharing passwords

#136

Post by derefr »

jandrewrogers wrote: post #48
gruez wrote: post #9

>Wright refused, telling the officer both devices contained confidential information protected by solicitor-client privilege. >He said the officer then confiscated his phone and laptop, and told him the items would be sent to a government lab which would try to crack his passwords and search his files. Can this be used to get whatever case(es) he was defending thrown out because solicitor-client privilege was violate…

This and related edge cases are something that I've always wondered about e.g. where compliance would be illegal. There are a number of scenarios where one can have content on devices that it is expressly illegal to disclose to random border police. Even within a single country, there is a conflict of authority here.

If someone is travelling from country X through country Y with documents destined for country Z, and the government of X wants the documents to reach Z unobserved, this is the usual use-case for a government-of-X diplomatic pouch. (Or, if it’s the Z embassy sending to Z, a government-of-Z diplomatic pouch.)

I wonder if you could make the case here that the US government should be ensuring the functioning of its judicial system by issuing lawyers who leave the country a “loopback” diplomatic pouch—one issued by X, destined for X, protected during travels to all not-X.

(This could currently be achieved by X-gov issuing a pouch destined for X-embassy in transit country Y, which the traveller must visit to have their documents re-wrapped in a pouch from X-embassy back to X-gov. The change would just simplify things by making the visit to X-embassy unnecessary.)

Re: Canada Border Services seizes lawyer's phone, laptop for not sharing passwords

#137

Post by zulln »

nine_k wrote: post #71
jtms wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Call me paranoid, but i'd be putting those devices into a heavy duty shredder if I got them back.

Why — security researchers would gladly buy them for a nonzero sum.

That would mean giving away your private data you had on the device to security researchers as well though. While I would want to have such device analysed, I am not sure I am fine with that compromise.

Re: Canada Border Services seizes lawyer's phone, laptop for not sharing passwords

#138

Post by aroberge »

khazhoux wrote: post #132
vuln wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You will never be able to prove parallel construction happened.

edit: wrote comment about Herring v. United States but this is a Canadian case.

This is about a Canadian case. There is no such thing as a precedent from an American court.

Re: Canada Border Services seizes lawyer's phone, laptop for not sharing passwords

#139

Post by [deleted] »

LeonM wrote: post #99

I have asked this question before, but never really got a satisfiable answer: why do governments (not just USA/canada) spend these resources to check data physically at a border? It's not like you need to 'smuggle' any form of data physically. I mean, any data considered to be dangerous (like terrorist attack plans, atomic bomb designs or political inside information) can be accessed across borders via the internet.…

[deleted]

Re: Canada Border Services seizes lawyer's phone, laptop for not sharing passwords

#140

Post by lohszvu »

sandworm101 wrote: post #129
gruez wrote: post #9

>Wright refused, telling the officer both devices contained confidential information protected by solicitor-client privilege. >He said the officer then confiscated his phone and laptop, and told him the items would be sent to a government lab which would try to crack his passwords and search his files. Can this be used to get whatever case(es) he was defending thrown out because solicitor-client privilege was violate…

>> Can this be used to get whatever case(es) he was defending thrown out because solicitor-client privilege was violated or parallel construction was used? That isn't what this is about. Nobody is talking about what this is really about and it isn't anything to do with him being a lawyer. This guy (1) was traveling alone (2) to a distant (3) and poor (4) country without preexisting business ties (5). Those are all re…

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