EFF on countermeasures: 'Defending Privacy at the U.S. Border: A Guide for Travelers Carrying Digital Devices' (December 2011) https://www.eff.org/document/defending-privacy-us-border-gui...
Oh, what a coincidence ;)
ACTA will force border searches of laptops, smartphones for pirated content
81–90 of 197 posts
Re: ACTA will force border searches of laptops, smartphones for pirated content
#82If detained at the border, and all your storage is encrypted, many countries have laws that require you to reveal your passphrase. OK. But, what about key escrow? What if I gave the keys to my attorney? Can I be compelled to lie to my attorney about whether I'm under arrest? Or Jacob Appelbaum, who carries USB drives with the Bill of Rights encoded on them. If the remaining blocks were noise, would he have to somehow…
Encryption or no encryption, or any of these other little games won't do anything.
Look, if border patrol is in the wrong mood and you try to pull a "well, I'd let you see it but it's encrypted and I don't have the key!" they're going to detain you until they have the information they want. So what's the point? That's the real issue here: we've given more authority to uneducated, power-hungry citizens to mistreat others at will.
Re: ACTA will force border searches of laptops, smartphones for pirated content
#83All my drives are already TrueCrypted. I have nothing to hide, but I do not want to be treated like a criminal for doing something as simple as crossing the US border.
Please stop saying "I have nothing to hide" after talking about crypto. You imply that most people who use crypto have somthing to hide, witch is not the case.
Re: ACTA will force border searches of laptops, smartphones for pirated content
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
> If "they" find out about my encrypted LUKS blocks, I can also ask my friend to provide half of the GPG passphrase, so that I can honestly claim I don't have the passphrase to unlock the blocks. This won't help you legally. You may honestly claim that you don't have the passphrase, but you cannot honestly claim that you cannot decrypt the contents. You just have to call and ask your friend while you're detained at c…
The friend may claim he has forgotten his part of the passphrase, though. I wonder what would happen in that case.
If they want the key from you, they're going to get the key. That's what will happen.
Ask the inverse: they decide to detain you, indefinitely, until you produce the encryption key or admit that there's some base level of contraband on your computer that you're responsible for. What happens in that case?
Maybe as a Canadian I see this differently. At least as an American you will have certain rights that you can hope to depend on in your own country. But I forfeit all those rights when I cross the border. What's to stop these guys from detaining me as an international terrorist?
Re: ACTA will force border searches of laptops, smartphones for pirated content
#85Earlier quoted context omitted.
ACTA is not only US.
USA is behind it, they're almost the only ones who really want it, they write it and also their world view gets into it and then imposed on the other countries.
> USA is behind it
Prove it. Isn't it about time Europeans started to take responsibility for their ("democratic") governments? Why did your government sign the dotted line? If answer is "US made us", then news flash: You do not live in a democracy. If you insist you Europeans have your act together (where as we boobs in US don't) then clearly it is your own government that is behind it.
ACTA: http://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/docs/2010/april/tradoc_1460... [ARTICLE 6.1: BECOMING PARTY TO THE AGREEMENT is worth a gander.]
Re: ACTA will force border searches of laptops, smartphones for pirated content
#86Earlier quoted context omitted.
http://xkcd.com/538/ (yep, it's the "hit him with a wrench" one)
To be fair, when they bring out the wrench, you know (at least for a few moments before the impending brain trauma) someone is trying to get your data. If your disk is encrypted, you can be fairly certain that no one will get at your data while your laptop is out of your hands (back room bag searches, etc.)
Unfortunately, if the goal of the exercise is to extract information then they won't hit you on the head and they certainly won't want you going unconscious. :-(
Re: ACTA will force border searches of laptops, smartphones for pirated content
#87What strikes me most strongly about all this is how utterly weird it is. Border guards give 'enhanced pat downs' to a middle class suburban family and find no weapons or contraband, but then open the family computer to find an unlicensed Finding Nemo avi, and haul them all off to jail. It's just such a bizarre mix of nanny-state and fascism. I know it's a pointless rhetorical question, but... how on earth has it come…
> how on earth has it come to this??
First they came for the communists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew.
Then they came for the Catholics,
and I didn't speak out because I was Protestant.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left to speak out for me.
It has come to this one small step at a time. That is how politicians work. They know that the "whole" is to scary for voters to accept all at once. So they find just what they can get away with this year, then grab a tiny bit more next year, and so on. Eventually, everyone looks back and thinks "how on earth has it come to this??"
Re: ACTA will force border searches of laptops, smartphones for pirated content
#88How can they tell it is pirated? I mean, the audio files may have been ripped from a legit CD. They can't tell for sure. Similarly, I may have ripped an AVI from a legit DVD. For my own convenience while traveling. I sometimes do.
"I may have ripped an AVI from a legit DVD"
Ripping a DVD is, I believe, a criminal act in the US and a number of other countries (including the UK).
Re: ACTA will force border searches of laptops, smartphones for pirated content
#89What strikes me most strongly about all this is how utterly weird it is. Border guards give 'enhanced pat downs' to a middle class suburban family and find no weapons or contraband, but then open the family computer to find an unlicensed Finding Nemo avi, and haul them all off to jail. It's just such a bizarre mix of nanny-state and fascism. I know it's a pointless rhetorical question, but... how on earth has it come…
> how on earth has it come to this?? First they came for the communists, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak out because I was Protestant. Then they came for me and there was n…
The scary part is that I don't imagine any politician actually wanting this.
Or am I just too naive?
Re: ACTA will force border searches of laptops, smartphones for pirated content
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
> how on earth has it come to this?? First they came for the communists, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak out because I was Protestant. Then they came for me and there was n…
The scary part is that I don't imagine any politician actually wanting this. Or am I just too naive?
They're not scrutinized at the border.