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Felony charges for citizen deleting phone data at US Border

nytimes.com

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Re: Felony charges for citizen deleting phone data at US Border

#301

Post by ApolloFortyNine »

QuantumNoodle wrote: post #178
trollbridge wrote: post #163

U.S. citizens are going to need obtain a burner phone before returning, and load it with the absolute minimum to load boarding passes, etc., perhaps some reading material or a movie to watch on the plane, and be prepared to share full credentials for thing at the border. (I used to do some travel patterns where taking a certain client laptop wasn’t an option. It was an absolute gigantic pain for the type of work I di…

Giving up knowledge (password) is something that is typically scrutinized at the border as well. Had he just handed over the phone and the phone had abilities to self destruct if tampered with (e.g too many incorrect pin entries) -- well the gov's case wouldn't been much harder. If they seized property and accidently destroyed the data, then that's on them.

You are correct, you have to give up the phone but can't be compelled to give up the password, and you'd get it back some indeterminate amount of time later.

It's actually been on the books for a while (decades at least) that customs can search you at the border without a warrant even if you are a citizen.

This case seems to have become a big 'Trump bad' poster child (people are calling the US East Germany in these comments...), but if this exact scenario happened at least in the last two decades (I found an example upholding the searches from 2004) then it would at least be possible to charge them with deleting evidence. Even this probably would have been nothing if he refused to give up his password, not being required to provide a password has been upheld for years. They can seize your phone for some time but I'm unsure on the times they ask and then just let you move on when they find out your a citizen.

Re: Felony charges for citizen deleting phone data at US Border

#302

Post by honeybadger1 »

btbuildem wrote: post #227

The naivete of some of the comments here is astounding. It doesn't matter whether you're right, it doesn't matter whether it's the law, it's irrelevant that you have rights, etc. Those things are of the past now, for the US. I think it would be easier to understand the playing field and choose your actions accordingly, if you accept the US has entered its East Germany / late 20th century Soviet era -- except of cours…

[flagged]

Re: Felony charges for citizen deleting phone data at US Border

#303

Post by thesimon »

rootusrootus wrote: post #244
Zak wrote: post #189

For exactly the border search scenario, I wish smartphones could be imaged and restored as easily as PCs. Imagine booting the phone from a flash drive, making an encrypted image of the phone on said drive, and writing a fresh OS before reaching the border. There's no deception required to protect sensitive data or avoid the seizure of an expensive phone. Consent to unlocking the phone, refuse to unlock the drive. The…

I've restored iPhones before, and it does seem pretty simple. Easier than PCs for sure. It's not instant, but the basic configuration is restored pretty quickly while the bulk data restoration happens in the background while you're able to use the phone.

What about banking apps and stuff? Does the device binding still work or do you need to set it up again?

Re: Felony charges for citizen deleting phone data at US Border

#304

Post by joenot443 »

ericmay wrote: post #298
joenot443 wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> if you accept the US has entered its East Germany / late 20th century Soviet era -- except of course with 1000x more invasive and effective surveillance tech. I'm pretty optimistic that after the next general America will be ready to give up on the extremity of late turn over a new leaf. I fully expect a new president to be ushered in, whether R or D, and for some level of normalcy to start creeping back. The Sovie…

Your day to day is still pretty much normal. If you turned off the news and never read about Felony charges for citizen deleting phone data [1] you'd just in your head remember there are tens of millions of folks flying, going through customs and border security and all that with 0 issues. What you wrote I think regarding the decade of silliness precisely supports the point, in my opinion. [1] I'm not defending the b…

> Felony charges for citizen deleting phone data

Yeah, that's awful. As far as federal overreach of power goes, that's pretty inexcusable. I'd probably posit that COINTELPRO in the 60s was more insidious, but that doesn't discount this story individually being terrible.

I still maintain that America is not in the midst of its own demise and a comparison to East Germany is inaccurate.

Re: Felony charges for citizen deleting phone data at US Border

#305

Post by ratelimitsteve »

Zak wrote: post #189

For exactly the border search scenario, I wish smartphones could be imaged and restored as easily as PCs. Imagine booting the phone from a flash drive, making an encrypted image of the phone on said drive, and writing a fresh OS before reaching the border. There's no deception required to protect sensitive data or avoid the seizure of an expensive phone. Consent to unlocking the phone, refuse to unlock the drive. The…

I mean, you could ship your real phone to w/e destination ahead of you and bring a $50 burner to the border. If you're a person of interest this won't work because they can monitor you and the destination but if you're a regular schmuck then a burner that never touches your private data or accounts and has a bunch of dummy stuff on it will get you past the border goons.

Re: Felony charges for citizen deleting phone data at US Border

#306

Post by technothrasher »

rootusrootus wrote: post #248
gbriel wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you’re a U.S. citizen: CBP cannot deny you entry to the United States merely because you refuse to unlock the phone. If you’re a non-citizen seeking admission: refusal is much riskier. The important wrinkle is that CBP’s published policy expressly guarantees that a person being admitted as a U.S. citizen won’t be denied entry solely because CBP couldn’t inspect the device. It doesn’t give lawful permanent resident…

Isn't the guarantee for citizens a bit stronger than CBP's policy? I don't think they can lawfully deny entry of a citizen, period.

They cannot (lawfully) deny entry. But they can admit you and then immediately detain and/or arrest you.

Re: Felony charges for citizen deleting phone data at US Border

#307

Post by hamburglar »

patcon wrote: post #213

I used to play around on projects adjacent to Tor and TailsOS, and had an idea for a setup I was researching. It's a little intense and probably has annoying failure modes, but sharing in case anyone else finds it helpful: - Tasker is an automation app for setting up rules for triggers and actions. It allows extension apps to be created to add new triggers and actions. - someone at one point made an extension to add…

I like the idea of a phone that automatically wipes itself if I don’t act to stop it. I wonder about the legality of that if the duress code is considered “destroying evidence.”

Re: Felony charges for citizen deleting phone data at US Border

#309

Post by ratelimitsteve »

panny wrote: post #247
Zak wrote: post #189

For exactly the border search scenario, I wish smartphones could be imaged and restored as easily as PCs. Imagine booting the phone from a flash drive, making an encrypted image of the phone on said drive, and writing a fresh OS before reaching the border. There's no deception required to protect sensitive data or avoid the seizure of an expensive phone. Consent to unlocking the phone, refuse to unlock the drive. The…

Think for a moment. What is the difference between giving them a password which wipes the phone and giving them a password which opens a blank phone? It's the same thing. They punched in a code, they are presented with a wiped phone. Can they prove the guy gave them a distress password and wasn't simply carrying a wiped phone to begin with? No, but they just need to imply that is the reason to charge him with the fel…

>What is the difference between giving them a password which wipes the phone and giving them a password which opens a blank phone?

They don't get any indication that there was data there to be deleted, and you don't just factory reset but flash w an image of a clean phone that's been used. It has apps, it has accounts, it looks to the untrained eye (because that's who's looking at it) like a phone that was used normally by someone who has done nothing wrong.

Re: Felony charges for citizen deleting phone data at US Border

#310

Post by panarky »

joenot443 wrote: post #282
btbuildem wrote: post #227

The naivete of some of the comments here is astounding. It doesn't matter whether you're right, it doesn't matter whether it's the law, it's irrelevant that you have rights, etc. Those things are of the past now, for the US. I think it would be easier to understand the playing field and choose your actions accordingly, if you accept the US has entered its East Germany / late 20th century Soviet era -- except of cours…

> if you accept the US has entered its East Germany / late 20th century Soviet era -- except of course with 1000x more invasive and effective surveillance tech. I'm pretty optimistic that after the next general America will be ready to give up on the extremity of late turn over a new leaf. I fully expect a new president to be ushered in, whether R or D, and for some level of normalcy to start creeping back. The Sovie…

> some level of normalcy

You are undoubtedly correct that at some point there will be new leadership in the US.

Politics makes leadership change a possibility. Biology makes it an inevitability.

But I don't think the evidence is very strong that switching from one man to a different man, even if the new man wears a blue hat instead of a red hat, will make that much difference against capital and its surveillance state.

This isn't a false equivalence "both sides" argument. I'd greatly prefer the blue hat over the red hat.

But the blue hat only makes the underlying forces of late capitalism a little slower and a little less vicious, while simultaneously legitimizing that system.

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