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Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

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Re: Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

#161

Post by seanp2k2 »

hnnewguy wrote: post #151
PeterWhittaker wrote: post #66

Interesting. I don't have a password. And I defy you to unlock my phone. The question is "Can I be forced to unlock my own phone? Under what circumstances? Under what circumstances can I be charged for refusing to do so?" If you haven't already guessed, I use a complex swipe pattern, one that uses all nine points and cannot be determined from reading the grease streaks, at least not easily. I know this because I move…

> Can I be compelled to describe how to perform the swipe? To describe the pattern? To guide the agent? Yes, yes and yes. Until there is legal precedent, if they want into your phone and you don't provide them access, you'll be in trouble. Any "cleverness" regarding a security code will likely make it worse.

And this is why deniable encryption is important: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deniable_encryption

Re: Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

#162

Post by csense »

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 have nothing to hide, then invasive surveillance doesn't hurt you.

If the alternative to invasive surveillance is terrorists flying planes into our buildings and killing thousands of innocent people, then a little extra hassle at the airport is a small price to pay.

That's how most people think. Finding the incorrect implicit assumptions made by these arguments is left as an exercise to the reader.

Re: Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

#163

Post by shard972 »

JohnTHaller wrote: post #124

We should frame this story with what the actual end result of 'unlocking your phone' is when discussing it. The government routinely claims that it is no different than asking a traveler to open a physical briefcase. It is very different. If you're treating the phone as a 'good' as indicated in the quotes on this story, you can inspect my phone as a good. You can look at the phone. You can xray it. You can open up th…

And then you will be fined for your non-compliance with the law, if you don't like the law go ahead and leave.

Re: Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

#164

Post by vacri »

dublinben wrote: post #147
vacri wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By 'not durable', do you mean 'the concept stretches as far back as we have written records'? Yes, 'nations' meaning 'something that gives you a passport' haven't been around long, but 'nations' meaning 'geopolitical entities' is as old as record-keeping itself. And what do you mean by 'rule of law'? Do the decisions of tribal elders count? That doesn't suggest consistency, which is the spirit of the term.

>but 'nations' meaning 'geopolitical entities' is as old as record-keeping itself This is completely untrue. States as we recognize them in the modern sense have only existed since the 17th Century in Europe[0], and much later in other parts of the world[1]. Before this time, political organizations consisted of kingdoms, principalities, city-states, tribes, and various other small groupings of people. [0] https://en…

This is completely untrue. States as we recognize them in the modern sense

Well, I said 'nations', in response to the parent saying 'nations'. I didn't say 'states'. If you are going to be pedantic, then be pedantic correctly.

Before this time, political organizations consisted of kingdoms, principalities, city-states, tribes, and various other small groupings of people.

I guess places like Egypt, the Roman Empire, and Ming were all 'small groupings of people'?

That somehow 'Rome', that stretched from the Atlantic to the Red Sea, was merely a 'city state'? Even after the capital was moved to a different city half a continent away? That despite having a complicated system of senators, emperors, provincial governors (or that they even had the concept of 'provinces'!) and so forth, that there was no 'political organisation'?

In the context of the conversation, the OP's 'nations and borders', there's nothing wrong with what I said - 'nations' and 'borders' have been around for as long as we have records.

Re: Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

#165

Post by bhayden »

allendoerfer wrote: post #102
bhayden wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not that we tolerate it, it's that our voting populace is largely single issue voters and don't really care about whether the next president wants to remove the Patriot Act. They care about social issues like reproductive rights. Added to mostly binary voting (two party system) means you only have two real choices that are polar opposites on the hot button social issues.

I think in the end it comes down to the way the parties are funded. With state financed parties and regulations to cut costs of campaigns, smaller parties would have better chances to gain traction. The problem is that nobody currently in charge has the slightest interest to do as he would cut of his own monopoly to the financing. Maybe you could start by sneaking in some clever cost-cutting tricks for the campaigns.

It's sad how much advertising plays into elections. It comes down to living in a society where most people are pretty dumb and make voting decisions based on a 15 second commercial and biased journalism.

Re: Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

#166

Post by patmcc »

PeterWhittaker wrote: post #66

Interesting. I don't have a password. And I defy you to unlock my phone. The question is "Can I be forced to unlock my own phone? Under what circumstances? Under what circumstances can I be charged for refusing to do so?" If you haven't already guessed, I use a complex swipe pattern, one that uses all nine points and cannot be determined from reading the grease streaks, at least not easily. I know this because I move…

A swipe pattern is no different than a password, either legally or practically speaking. It's just a nine digit number (with restrictions); the fact that it's swiped instead of entered is for ease of your own memory, nothing else.

Re: Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

#167

Post by powertower »

tomek_zemla wrote: post #113
powertower wrote: post #72

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 m…

Actually majority of people searched going through borders turn out to be perfectly innocent... Which means that if the law does allow officers to search everybody's personal information on their electronic devices they can browse at will my personal communication every time I cross the border. One good thing about this story is that electronic device searches on Canadian borders are somewhat in the legal grey zone a…

I don't think I was stating otherwise.

Re: Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

#168

Post by pigscantfly »

shard972 wrote: post #163
JohnTHaller wrote: post #124

We should frame this story with what the actual end result of 'unlocking your phone' is when discussing it. The government routinely claims that it is no different than asking a traveler to open a physical briefcase. It is very different. If you're treating the phone as a 'good' as indicated in the quotes on this story, you can inspect my phone as a good. You can look at the phone. You can xray it. You can open up th…

And then you will be fined for your non-compliance with the law, if you don't like the law go ahead and leave.

With that attitude, how do you expect to ever improve anything?

Re: Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

#169

Post by chc »

zero_iq wrote: post #127
chc wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't doubt some people in the government have the capability to read people's text messages, but what you're suggesting is way past that. In the scenario you seem to be proposing, some random border agents are not only privy to top-secret NSA projects, but also have access to the data collected by said top-secret projects, and not only that, but they know everybody who's going to drive across the border on a given…

It doesn't mean anything of the sort. They just need a tip-off at the border. They don't need access to everything or even need to know how or why. They don't even need to know that it's a tip-off: a computer could just spit out "selected for random phone search" and maybe "suspected immigration fraud" when that person reaches border control. The border agent needn't know how or why the selection was made, nor have a…

And who do you reckon is doing all of this expensive, technically demanding and legally hazardous work just to catch people getting married for green cards? The NSA does not give a crap about that.

If every government agency were dipping into the NSA's cookie jar of secrets so liberally, we'd most likely have known about all these not-so-secret programs years before Snowden ever worked there.

It's not impossible, but it's sufficiently implausible that you'd be crazy to bet on it.

Re: Canadian Charged for Not Unlocking Smartphone at Canadian Border

#170

Post by Mikeb85 »

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.

> while fighting for democracy elsewhere.

They don't fight for democracy elsewhere. They fight for dominion and economic subjugation of those people.

They fight for the right to buy up all their mining and oil rights, set up Walmarts and McDonalds, subject them to Hollywood movies and American music, and convince them they need to buy iPhones and iPads for every person in their household...

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