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Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

cbc.ca

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Re: Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

#71

Post by jackweirdy »

grecy wrote: post #65
toomuchtodo wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you not backup your device, wipe it at the border, and then when they request the password simply say "There is no data on the device. Its as it comes from the factory" and hand it to them? You could then perform an over the air recovery once safely away from the border.

Yes, you can do that, and many business people now do exactly that when flying in/out of the US knowing that any data they carry across the US border is fair game.

China too - a friend’s dad works in chip manufacture & flies regularly from the UK to China - he leaves his personal phone at home and gets issued a new phone by his company every time he goes, which is wiped when he returns.

Re: Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

#72

Post by powertower »

Please look into the details of the court papers before making a judgement.

I would say that at least 70-80% of these stories leave out very important details and contexts - to mold what happened to fit whatever narrative the spinners subscribe to.

For example -

The person could have been importing a large amount of goods with him that exceeded the value he stated.

Once questioned about the disparity, he might have made statements about having the transactions documented in his phone.

The boarder agents would then have asked to see those transactions. Or even said, "could you just turn on your phone, move the screen towards us, and show us (or just email it to us so we can print out and attach the record to your declaration)".

I've looked into pretty much every major story, and once you get passed the superficial reporting, and into the actual details, it becomes depressingly clear that the media (at all levels and all sides) are just political (or ideological) organizations that filter, mold, and in a lot of cases make up, everything they put out.

Re: Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

#73

Post by mattm »

nasalgoat wrote: post #49
brandon272 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did they go through your phone because you told them you had text messages and/or emails where the value was discussed?

No, I brought out my phone to bring up an email showing the ebay ad for the car in question and at that point they asked me to hand over my phone. From now on, I'm backing it up and wiping it before I get to the border. Just on principle.

Unfortunately, the best policy when dealing with these people is "say and do as little as possible". Give one word answers and don't offer any other information that you're specifically asked for. Also, don't engage in any friendly conversation. I tried that before and would get hounded by questions whereas if I just answer "Yes", "no", "2 weeks", "travelling" then I get through much more quickly.

Re: Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

#74

Post by happyscrappy »

allendoerfer wrote: post #61
robertfw wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

just fyi, this was in Canada. just as bad :(

Canada is in America, I knew that this would come, could not resist the bait ;-) Arguably the last part applies less to Canada.

If smugness had value Europe would be a superpower and not a toothless windbag.

Re: Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

#75

Post by pedalpete »

higherpurpose wrote: post #26
DennisP wrote: post #8

Smartphones should have optional extra user accounts, with no indication of whether they exist. Same phone number, but the account you use is the one that records the history. Keep one mostly clean and that's the one you unlock.

Android 5.0 does. It's actually quite hidden and I only found out about it by mistake when playing with my new update (although I remembered Google announced it earlier after that, but had forgotten about it). More operating systems should be doing this, including desktop ones. Windows makes multiple accounts too obvious.

Why would this get downvoted??

Re: Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

#77

Post by toomuchtodo »

MagicWishMonkey wrote: post #42
toomuchtodo wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you not backup your device, wipe it at the border, and then when they request the password simply say "There is no data on the device. Its as it comes from the factory" and hand it to them? You could then perform an over the air recovery once safely away from the border.

The whole point is that sort of thing shouldn't be necessary. The government shouldn't have the authority to demand you hand over the contents of your phone/laptop without reasonable suspicion in the first place.

I'm not saying it should be necessary. It SHOULDN'T be. I shouldn't have to pay $100 every 5 years for Global Entry/PreCheck even though I'm already not a risk on the air transport network, but I do because the time savings is ridiculous.

What I'm saying is: Can X be done until sanity has been restored to Y? It appears that, yes, it can.

Re: Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

#79

Post by wongarsu »

happyscrappy wrote: post #69
allendoerfer wrote: post #56

As a European I have to say, that I associate these sort of things with totalitarian regimes and it is just unimaginable for me why the American society tolerates this while fighting for democracy elsewhere.

If you had bothered to read the article you would know this was Canadian Border Patrol.

Canada is located on America (North America, to be more specific). I'm not trying to start the old argument about the use of the word America here, but under the dictionary definition of the word Canadian society is an American society.

Re: Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

#80

Post by spiritplumber »

ignostic wrote: post #17

Customs officials forcing you to unlock your phone is not just an invasion of privacy - it's a pointless invasion of privacy. Customs agents don't even know where to start in finding data that a user wants hidden. Even if allowed access to personal devices, data is slippery enough that it could be stored in almost anything. Here's yet another example of taking away rights in a way that does nothing to deter actual cr…

I had this experience. My laptop wasn't locked, but I was asked to let someone look through it. That took about 20 minutes, which caused me to miss my coincidence.

Since I now had time to waste, I asked to see the customs lady's supervisor, and then berated the person who inspected my laptop for not having any idea how to do this sort of search properly. So, I ended up sitting both the customs lady and her supervisor there for another hour or so while I taught them how to use undelete and some basic free forensic tools.

I then handed them a bill for an hour of my time and left to wait for the next plane.

I like to think it took them a while to process just what the hell had happened. Mindless securistas like that need to be humiliated at every turn, or they'll never stop. Society - the segment of society with which they interact - must make it clear that their job is not wanted, not needed, and not welcome.

This was in Montreal in 2009, if anyone cares.

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