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What happens if authorities seize your laptop?

bbc.co.uk

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Re: What happens if authorities seize your laptop?

#21

Post by kubiiii »

nmc wrote: post #13
zacinbusiness wrote: post #8

Is it possible to encrypt two files together with two different keys? Say I have my class notes from freshman Latin and I have my plans to take over the world. I encrypt them together into a single file "dont_read_super_secret.encrypted" and if I enter "fuzzykitty98" as the key then I see only the notes. But if I enter "downwithfreedom2000" then I see only the diabolical plans. Is that possible? If anyone builds this…

Of course this is possible. You can even take it a step further: full disk encryption, one key will give an innocent Windows install, and another key will give the diabolical plans. However, information is only compressible to the extent of redundancy involved, so this can be spotted: compare the amount of encrypted data with the size of the innocent data.

Make sure to add some shameful evidences on the innocent Windows install to make it more convincing. "Sh.. you found my porn folder! Well done guys".

Re: What happens if authorities seize your laptop?

#22

Post by nhaehnle »

joshka wrote: post #11

"Or you can scrub your laptop clean, storing everything on an external hard drive that you leave at home. Then you know you are safe from prying authorities, at least at the border." That is unless you believe that those prying authorities have the will and the way to leave an undetectable backdoor in your laptop. Breaking the chain of custody in any laptop today is akin to destruction of trust in that device. Who is…

I would second this. We know for a fact that the NSA uses BIOS malware. I don't believe we know for a fact that such malware is routinely installed by border guards, but it's not a very far-fetched worry at this point.

The technical expertise required to do so is very limited as long as you don't password-protect the BIOS: Basically, they only need to be able to plug in a USB stick and reconfigure the BIOS to boot from it.

In other words: If you leave your laptop outside of your physical control for even a few minutes, you may have to assume that it is totally compromised as long as you don't have a BIOS password.

If the laptop is outside of your control for a longer period of time, you probably have to assume that it has passed through the hands of somebody with sufficient technological know-how to work around the BIOS password as well.

Re: What happens if authorities seize your laptop?

#23

Post by oracuk »

I have seen the corporate response of only providing remote desktops via browser and SSL to foreign (US) deployed personnel. Means the data never physically crosses the border.

No clear players in this market for consumers though. Where is the consumer remote desktop via browser+SSL that doesn't rely on a US hosted cloud service?

Re: What happens if authorities seize your laptop?

#24

Post by blueskin_ »

oracuk wrote: post #23

I have seen the corporate response of only providing remote desktops via browser and SSL to foreign (US) deployed personnel. Means the data never physically crosses the border. No clear players in this market for consumers though. Where is the consumer remote desktop via browser+SSL that doesn't rely on a US hosted cloud service?

>Where is the consumer remote desktop via browser+SSL that doesn't rely on a US hosted cloud service?

The one you host on your own infrastructure?

Re: What happens if authorities seize your laptop?

#25

Post by mcdougle »

joshka wrote: post #11

"Or you can scrub your laptop clean, storing everything on an external hard drive that you leave at home. Then you know you are safe from prying authorities, at least at the border." That is unless you believe that those prying authorities have the will and the way to leave an undetectable backdoor in your laptop. Breaking the chain of custody in any laptop today is akin to destruction of trust in that device. Who is…

reimage it again when you get home?

edit: To those below: True. I thought about hardware after I posted; didn't even think about the BIOS thing but that's a great point.

Re: What happens if authorities seize your laptop?

#26

Post by blueskin_ »

zacinbusiness wrote: post #8

Is it possible to encrypt two files together with two different keys? Say I have my class notes from freshman Latin and I have my plans to take over the world. I encrypt them together into a single file "dont_read_super_secret.encrypted" and if I enter "fuzzykitty98" as the key then I see only the notes. But if I enter "downwithfreedom2000" then I see only the diabolical plans. Is that possible? If anyone builds this…

2c2 by Michal Zalewski ( http://lcamtuf.coredump.cx/ ) is a theoretical exercise in this, but probably not safe for real use.

Re: What happens if authorities seize your laptop?

#27

Post by zacinbusiness »

valarauca1 wrote: post #18
zacinbusiness wrote: post #8

Is it possible to encrypt two files together with two different keys? Say I have my class notes from freshman Latin and I have my plans to take over the world. I encrypt them together into a single file "dont_read_super_secret.encrypted" and if I enter "fuzzykitty98" as the key then I see only the notes. But if I enter "downwithfreedom2000" then I see only the diabolical plans. Is that possible? If anyone builds this…

It'd be possible but difficult. I don't know how to do it without some kind of markup / document system (no morning coffee yet). I figure it wouldn't be that hard. You could use a TDMS file(v1), which each channel is an item. When ran you give the program a password, which it checks against each channel, calculating the salted hash of your password. When it finds a matching hash it decrypts the document (saved as dat…

Knock yourself out. People will be buying anything that they think can keep their data safe, so someone may as well come up with a decent solution. We can build it and let the HN community battle test it. Split on profits can be 60/30 as you're doing the work :-)

Re: What happens if authorities seize your laptop?

#28

Post by pogden »

mcdougle wrote: post #25
joshka wrote: post #11

"Or you can scrub your laptop clean, storing everything on an external hard drive that you leave at home. Then you know you are safe from prying authorities, at least at the border." That is unless you believe that those prying authorities have the will and the way to leave an undetectable backdoor in your laptop. Breaking the chain of custody in any laptop today is akin to destruction of trust in that device. Who is…

reimage it again when you get home? edit: To those below: True. I thought about hardware after I posted; didn't even think about the BIOS thing but that's a great point.

Hardware keylogger.

Re: What happens if authorities seize your laptop?

#30

Post by 01Michael10 »

mcdougle wrote: post #25
joshka wrote: post #11

"Or you can scrub your laptop clean, storing everything on an external hard drive that you leave at home. Then you know you are safe from prying authorities, at least at the border." That is unless you believe that those prying authorities have the will and the way to leave an undetectable backdoor in your laptop. Breaking the chain of custody in any laptop today is akin to destruction of trust in that device. Who is…

reimage it again when you get home? edit: To those below: True. I thought about hardware after I posted; didn't even think about the BIOS thing but that's a great point.

Re-imaging your hard drive will not help with BIOS malware. Re-installing the BIOS yourself may help.

Your data should stay at home and a VPN connection to your home PC would be a good first step.

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