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A US-born NASA scientist was detained at the border until he unlocked his phone

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Re: A US-born NASA scientist was detained at the border until he unlocked his phone

#301

Post by mahyarm »

6nf wrote: post #293

This guy is a US citizen. What are they going to do if he refuses? He has the right to enter the USA. At worst they can confiscate the phone but without a court order I don't see how they can detain him indefinitely. Can they?

They harass you for a quite a while and detain your for possibly a day or more. They might even play a game of 'I don't think your actually a US citizen'. You also get a note of 'had problems at the border' and all future crossings for you and anyone travelling with you will be far more unpleasant for many years.

Not very pleasant for most people, and most people don't care about the contents of their phone that much unfortunately.

Re: A US-born NASA scientist was detained at the border until he unlocked his phone

#302

Post by Kostchei »

Sir_Substance wrote: post #177
Jonnax wrote: post #10

Their point about how other countries will take the US's stance as a cue is somewhat scary. If you try and cross any border it will be relinquishing access to all accounts. I'm assuming email also comes along with 'social media', since communication is by its definition social. So how do you protect yourself? I think just going with "Don't have any social media" isn't a good answer because the relationship that child…

>So how do you protect yourself? Here, now, today? Set all your accounts up with auto-generated passwords, and store the whole lot in a password vault[1]. Don't bring the password vault file with you when you cross the border. Arrange to acquire it after you have entered the country[2]. Now you can honestly say you don't know any of your passwords. If enough people do this, then this law will be pointless. Also, for…

How about this. Make 2 email accounts. One for your stuff, one that is more or less empty. Re-set your phone to factory. Synch with the empty account. When you are in-country, reset phone, synch with first account. Done. 45 minutes or less with decent wi-fi. Of course my preference is to avoid said country on principle in the first place.

Re: A US-born NASA scientist was detained at the border until he unlocked his phone

#303

Post by anigbrowl »

aaron-lebo wrote: post #290
anigbrowl wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Civil liberties advocates have been gently coddling people's feels for years now in hopes of persuading people of the existence of a problem. Personally I don't feel like there's time for that any more. Just last night I found that white nationalists are planning a 4 mile march from Oakland to Berkeley that's going to go right past my home in a few weeks. At their last big rally in sacramento last year, 10 people wer…

That sucks, it really does. I can only say that I attended a community college, El Centro, and it was pretty shocking for me to watch the 7/7 attacks last year and see a black supremacist gun down a cop by a pillar I used to stand against and another in an intersection I've crossed hundreds of times. Strange place for it to happen, too, because that always was a very diverse place. Clearly something is off-kilter, bu…

Well, you can think what you like but I'm raising an alarm about this after 15 years of patient observation, so I think your equanimity is misplaced. I'm also old enough to be your parent and this isn't my first rodeo.

As you're well-educated in politics, you're well-positioned to process this: https://independent.academia.edu/JamesScaminaci

I can vouch for the bulk of this material through my own independent study over the last 15 years. RW extremism is my anthropology hobby.

Re: A US-born NASA scientist was detained at the border until he unlocked his phone

#304

Post by masonic »

anigbrowl wrote: post #283
aaron-lebo wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can we not make the leap from searches at border checkpoints (a major issue in and of itself) to murdering 6 million people in every thread? It's a valid concern but that kind of language immediately turns people off and tilts the entire discussion one way.

Civil liberties advocates have been gently coddling people's feels for years now in hopes of persuading people of the existence of a problem. Personally I don't feel like there's time for that any more. Just last night I found that white nationalists are planning a 4 mile march from Oakland to Berkeley that's going to go right past my home in a few weeks. At their last big rally in sacramento last year, 10 people wer…

  At their last big rally in sacramento last year, 10 people were stabbed, all by the neo-Nazi side.
That's not how it was reported. There was no violent contact until "black bloc" rioters armed with clubs rushed the cordon.[0] There were two reported stab wounds that required a trip to hospital.

[0] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jun/26/white-nation...

Re: A US-born NASA scientist was detained at the border until he unlocked his phone

#305

Post by manarth »

morgante wrote: post #211
koolba wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'll protect myself by refusing. They can detain me for as long as they want. I'll fight it in court, because I am a US citizen and god dammit they do not have the right to warrantlessly review my encrypted communications. While I don't agree it's a good thing, I think they do have the right to detain you indefinitely and/or search whatever they damn well please if it's on your person. I don't think asking for a pa…

> I don't think asking for a password that doesn't unlock a device in your possession would pass muster, but unlocking your phone would. I don't think they can force me to give up my PIN. Not even a court can do that. My rights as a citizen are indeed less, in that they can detain me in an attempt to force compliance. The thing is that it's never been fully tested. In all the cases I've reviewed, either the person re…

  "I don't think they can force me to give up my PIN. Not even a court can do that."
Meanwhile, on HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13629728

Re: A US-born NASA scientist was detained at the border until he unlocked his phone

#306

Post by Kostchei »

DrScump wrote: post #292
Sir_Substance wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>So how do you protect yourself? Here, now, today? Set all your accounts up with auto-generated passwords, and store the whole lot in a password vault[1]. Don't bring the password vault file with you when you cross the border. Arrange to acquire it after you have entered the country[2]. Now you can honestly say you don't know any of your passwords. If enough people do this, then this law will be pointless. Also, for…

Also, for the love of god stop bringing your smartphone with you when you travel. Is there a risk of bringing a smartphone with no past context on it (e.g. a previously-unused refurb or new phone)? Even one that has been factory reset would give basic prying eyes nothing to find, barring the use of forensic tools.

factory reset will do the job even for forensic tools- the border-class forensic tools- cellebrite, magnet forensics aquire, oxygen, etc are all accessing above the flash translation layer. So deleted is deleted, in that case, on a phone. And chip off is Mossad level expertise, due to chip size/complexity, wear-leveling and said flash translation.

Re: A US-born NASA scientist was detained at the border until he unlocked his phone

#307

Post by anigbrowl »

JustSomeNobody wrote: post #296
anigbrowl wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And if they won't let you?

I'm a US citizen and as such I have the right to legal counsel. Edit: yes that's I guess only technically during prosecution. But I still wouldn't turn over anything until I did.

Yes, but good luck enforcing that if they don't like your face. Of course you should always assert your rights, but the notion that this will always be sufficient suggests to me that the holder hasn't ever been in a tough situation.

I'm not having a go at you. I've seen criminal lawyers' jaws fall open when they take a class in immigration law and discover there's a whole parallel and much scarier legal system for 'other people'.

Re: A US-born NASA scientist was detained at the border until he unlocked his phone

#308

Post by bradneuberg »

If this becomes common place across borders phones should come with a "fake" unlock access code - if you enter it it drops you into a plain vanilla setup with some fake contacts perhaps. Might make sense to create fake email and social media accounts too then...

Re: A US-born NASA scientist was detained at the border until he unlocked his phone

#309

Post by mcv »

jakewins wrote: post #189
Syzygies wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So how do you protect yourself? We need a "kill code" on secured devices: A separate password that silently resets the device to a saved state suggesting mild use and offering nothing of substance. Alarm systems have these: A code you only enter under duress, that looks like a regular disarm code, but silently summons help. So where are Apple and Google on something similar for our digital privacy?

Unless this wipes the device, it serves no use. They don't want your pin to browse through the phone - CBP policy is to take a full disk image, which would not work without the real pin as I understand it. This was the case in the OP article as well - CBP took a full copy of the phone.

If they take the phone apart to get to the storage, they don't need your pin, unless the entire storage is encrypted, in which case an alternate pin should probably not decrypt the entire storage.

If they access it through the phone, they can only access what the OS allows.

I think an OS that would allow you to expose only a safe part of your phone, would be an excellent idea.

Re: A US-born NASA scientist was detained at the border until he unlocked his phone

#310

Post by E6300 »

Erik816 wrote: post #284
devoply wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So how do you protect yourself? "Sorry, sir, I use a password keeper and left the password file at home. I do not have any passwords with me." That's not a lie, and I would love for them to explain to the judge if they did ever choose to detain you as to how this is not a valid and legal excuse and non-cooperation in any way. And if you are in doubt about saying something like this, actually use a password keeper,…

Except you probably have a password manager client app on your phone so you can look up and enter any passwords you need for your own convenience.

Since you probably have such an app, then you possibly don't have it.
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