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DHS Watchdog OKs ‘Suspicionless’ Seizure of Electronic Devices Along Border

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Re: DHS Watchdog OKs ‘Suspicionless’ Seizure of Electronic Devices Along Border

#131

Post by pasbesoin »

tptacek wrote: post #69
betterunix wrote: post #4

So, remember a few months ago, when people like me were saying that the third parties are the only hope in America's democracy? Then a bunch of people said that Obama was worlds different from Romney, and that comparing Obama to Bush was lunacy. I have to wonder what happens when those Obama supporters with left-wing sentiments read an article like this.

An article like what? I voted or and contibuted to Obama because I felt he would fight for public schools and against nationwide voucher programs, and because he supported meaningful health care reform. I had absolutely zero expectation that Obama would waste political capital revamping CBP. The TSA is a far bigger problem for ordinary Americans than CBP is, and a more constitutionally offensive one. I think we can a…

I saw the "within 100 miles of a border" graphic in the following article (which is linked in the OP article), earlier today.

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2008/10/aclu-assails-10/

I thought at the time and still wonder whether it must be wrong. It defines the entire shore of Lake Michigan as a border -- as drawn.

If that is indeed the case, it extends CBP authority over Chicago and the Chicagoland area (and Milwaukee, for that matter).

It's a bit stunning to consider all the major cities and population areas this applies to. That's a big chunk of the U.S.'s population and economic activity, where "the 4th Amendment can go hang".

This is undoubtedly a simplistic interpretation. Nonetheless, when I add the electronics searches to the license plate scanners (also a CBP initiative, for example in areas throughout upstate New York), the TSA moving into train and bus stations and vehicles, and sports venues, and...

It seems we are ever more at the mercy of policy and government self-restraint, rather than the protection of law, with regard to rights and freedoms many of us (although certainly not all, such as some "ethnic minorities" depending upon definition and timeframe) have long more or less taken for granted.

Neat trick, that: Using CBP to backdoor the Fourth Amendment.

Are they doing it? Probably in at least minimal fashion. How much, and under what cases? A lot of that seems to remain a "secret" that they "dare not divulge". Given recent history, I'm not optimistic about where this goes in the future.

P.S. I'm too tired to work it into what I've said in a better fashion, but, "Oh, also, domestic drones!"

Re: DHS Watchdog OKs ‘Suspicionless’ Seizure of Electronic Devices Along Border

#132

Post by tptacek »

pasbesoin wrote: post #131
tptacek wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An article like what? I voted or and contibuted to Obama because I felt he would fight for public schools and against nationwide voucher programs, and because he supported meaningful health care reform. I had absolutely zero expectation that Obama would waste political capital revamping CBP. The TSA is a far bigger problem for ordinary Americans than CBP is, and a more constitutionally offensive one. I think we can a…

I saw the "within 100 miles of a border" graphic in the following article (which is linked in the OP article), earlier today. http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2008/10/aclu-assails-10/ I thought at the time and still wonder whether it must be wrong. It defines the entire shore of Lake Michigan as a border -- as drawn. If that is indeed the case, it extends CBP authority over Chicago and the Chicagoland area (and Milwa…

It's wrong. It's an interpretation of the border search exception that has been explicitly rejected by SCOTUS.

Re: DHS Watchdog OKs ‘Suspicionless’ Seizure of Electronic Devices Along Border

#133

Post by pasbesoin »

tptacek wrote: post #132
pasbesoin wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I saw the "within 100 miles of a border" graphic in the following article (which is linked in the OP article), earlier today. http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2008/10/aclu-assails-10/ I thought at the time and still wonder whether it must be wrong. It defines the entire shore of Lake Michigan as a border -- as drawn. If that is indeed the case, it extends CBP authority over Chicago and the Chicagoland area (and Milwa…

It's wrong. It's an interpretation of the border search exception that has been explicitly rejected by SCOTUS.

Well, thanks for that clarification.

Do you happen to recall (I don't know) how it ended up before SCOTUS? (I'm assuming that someone was therefore pushing for that interpretation. And I wonder, to what end -- or what they expressed as their need and reasoning.)

P.S. Rereading, I'm a bit worried, so let me clarify in case the above reads wrong or so: I didn't intend any snark. Honest thanks and follow-up question.

Also, I guess I should enable and read through the Wired comments for that article, in case they address this.

P.P.S. Looking further, myself, the map in question appears to have originated with the ACLU. It's mentioned in a couple of their articles/posts on or around 10/22/2008.

http://www.aclu.org/blog/technology-and-liberty/homeland-sec...

http://www.aclu.org/technology-and-liberty/fact-sheet-us-con...

However, it also appears to be cited as an "interactive map" back on December 15, 2006.

http://www.aclu.org/national-security_technology-and-liberty...

I haven't found their explanation for including and ranging out from the shore of Lake Michigan.

This Slashdot article, for lack of anything better that I've found so far, provides various and differing explanations, or opinions, for the source and nature of the definition of this zone.

http://yro.slashdot.org/story/13/02/09/0054212/dhs-can-seize...

Amongst other things, this Wikipedia article is mentioned.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Border_search_exception

I've about reached the limit of what I can search/read/skim, for tonight.

Re: DHS Watchdog OKs ‘Suspicionless’ Seizure of Electronic Devices Along Border

#134

Post by _b8r0 »

tptacek wrote: post #82
_b8r0 wrote: post #79

It's things like this that mean that I won't go back to America. I love Americans, and there's a great deal of the US I'd love to see but it's just not going to happen while stuff like this goes on.

My most vivid experience of traveling in Europe in 2000 was of having my bags searched on a train midway between Zurich to Prague. Not as a condition of getting on the train, but 30 minutes out from the last station we'd stopped at. Not on any individualized suspicion, but as one of several passengers to receive the same treatment. Not in order to protect the safety of passengers, but (evidently) as part of a drug in…

> Beware the grass-is-greener trap.

Please don't confuse my views for a grass-is-greener view. I live in one of the most expansive surveillance states in the world (the UK) and generally what happens in the US tends to come over here eventually.

However, I do have the option to travel or not to travel to the US, and as long as the US Government treats visitors and it's own citizens in this way, I choose not to. For what it's worth, I also choose not to go to Israel and some other countries for a whole load of other reasons. I was simply stating my view on the USA's zany policies.

> You can certainly be searched without a warrant all throughout Europe.

I can't speak for all of Europe but we certainly have Section 44 (of the Terrorism Act 2000) Stop and Search in the UK which has been routinely abused.

Re: DHS Watchdog OKs ‘Suspicionless’ Seizure of Electronic Devices Along Border

#135

Post by tptacek »

pasbesoin wrote: post #133
tptacek wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's wrong. It's an interpretation of the border search exception that has been explicitly rejected by SCOTUS.

Well, thanks for that clarification. Do you happen to recall (I don't know) how it ended up before SCOTUS? (I'm assuming that someone was therefore pushing for that interpretation. And I wonder, to what end -- or what they expressed as their need and reasoning.) P.S. Rereading, I'm a bit worried, so let me clarify in case the above reads wrong or so: I didn't intend any snark. Honest thanks and follow-up question. Al…

I think ACLU was basically protesting the absurdity of DHS's claim.

Re: DHS Watchdog OKs ‘Suspicionless’ Seizure of Electronic Devices Along Border

#136

Post by jorgem »

tptacek wrote: post #92
jorgem wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep: http://www.aclu.org/constitution-free-zone-map

It is worth knowing that this map is intended to illustrate the absurdity of a specific (old) statement from DHS. It is almost definitely not the case that living in NYC puts you at risk of arbitrary border searches; among other things, SCOTUS has specifically said it doesn't.

I guess it just applies to folks in the south west, hundreds of miles from the border.

Re: DHS Watchdog OKs ‘Suspicionless’ Seizure of Electronic Devices Along Border

#137

Post by __--__ »

tptacek wrote: post #124
__--__ wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reference, please? If this has been challenged in court, I'd love to see some evidence so I can stop worrying about it.

Ameida-Sanchez v. US But the search of the petitioner's automobile by a roving patrol, on a California road that lies at all points at least 20 miles north of the Mexican border,[5] was of a wholly different sort. In the absence of probable cause or consent, that search violated the petitioner's Fourth Amendment right to be free of "unreasonable searches and seizures."

Sweet, thanks. :)

Re: DHS Watchdog OKs ‘Suspicionless’ Seizure of Electronic Devices Along Border

#138

Post by sneak »

angersock wrote: post #88
sneak wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sometimes, when faced with a terrible set of game theory circumstances, the only winning move is not to play.

A wonderful quip, but what is its explanatory power here? What is it here "not to play"? I'm as much Fuck the Man as the next person, but let's try to dig a bit deeper.

After PATRIOT turned ten, I realized there was no hope for restoring the rule of law in the USA.

The only move, at that point, is to emigrate to somewhere without the authority to imprison you forever without trial, somewhere the phones aren't tapped.

It's not easy, but it is necessary.

Re: DHS Watchdog OKs ‘Suspicionless’ Seizure of Electronic Devices Along Border

#139

Post by sneak »

tedunangst wrote: post #93
angersock wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A wonderful quip, but what is its explanatory power here? What is it here "not to play"? I'm as much Fuck the Man as the next person, but let's try to dig a bit deeper.

Obviously, you're supposed to not vote for anyone, then go online and tell everybody about how you're fighting the system.

What I chose to do is a touch more difficult than simply doing nothing.
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