Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

US Customs wants to collect social media account names at the border

theverge.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 174 posts

Re: US Customs wants to collect social media account names at the border

#61

Post by ominous »

agotterer wrote: post #42
andreasklinger wrote: post #2

I was always very confused/amused by the questions at the border: "Are you a terrorist or affiliate with a terrorist organization?" "Are you a secret spy" Why would anyone say yes? What's the purpose of this. Do they just need it to avoid arguments like "we dont even ask?" A friend of mine explained it to me: - let's say that they have the suspicion or evidence that you are affiliated w/ a terrorist organization. by…

The border agents are looking for you to slip up or provide a tell. Asking questions like that may sound silly, but that's the point. They want to try to catch people off guard with unexpected questions and see how they react. These agents are trained to read your reaction and body language. Your body language and voice levels can help reveal some truth or at least the fact that you're uncomfortable answering the que…

Because when The Law asks questions, it is rarely innocent.

> 'Sir, when was the last time you broke the law?'

> 'Can you describe in some detail where did you spend your last paycheck?'

> 'Sir, step away from the queue. I want to ask you about this picture you took where you happen to be in front of a bank'

> 'Sir, are you innocent?'

The list of things one has to agree to in order to live in peace is getting longer and longer.

Re: US Customs wants to collect social media account names at the border

#62

Post by cesarb »

agotterer wrote: post #42
andreasklinger wrote: post #2

I was always very confused/amused by the questions at the border: "Are you a terrorist or affiliate with a terrorist organization?" "Are you a secret spy" Why would anyone say yes? What's the purpose of this. Do they just need it to avoid arguments like "we dont even ask?" A friend of mine explained it to me: - let's say that they have the suspicion or evidence that you are affiliated w/ a terrorist organization. by…

The border agents are looking for you to slip up or provide a tell. Asking questions like that may sound silly, but that's the point. They want to try to catch people off guard with unexpected questions and see how they react. These agents are trained to read your reaction and body language. Your body language and voice levels can help reveal some truth or at least the fact that you're uncomfortable answering the que…

> And why would you be uncomfortable answering a question about whether your a terrorist or not?

Because it can be interpreted as accusing you of being a terrorist, which is very offensive.

Re: US Customs wants to collect social media account names at the border

#63

Post by anilgulecha »

DanBC wrote: post #59

Be interesting to see Facebook enforce (or modify to allow enforcement) their terms of service over this. https://developers.facebook.com/policy/#thingstoknow > 3.15 Don't use data obtained from Facebook to make decisions about eligibility, including whether to approve or reject an application or how much interest to charge on a loan. (EDIT: I know this is the Platform Policy, and not the general TOS.)

That's just the ToS for normal developers. US Govt can get a special developer policy.

Re: US Customs wants to collect social media account names at the border

#66

Post by Kadin »

dempseye wrote: post #37
ProfChronos wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not as simple as that: they would still need to make the case but you lying at the border just gives US authorities bigger evidence. Couple of years ago a French tourist answered "yes" to make fun of US borders and ended up in jail for a couple of days - not years as obviously he was more a dumb tourist than a real terrorist

He's not necessarily dumb because he made the mistake of thinking your border drones had a sense of humour. And given that English is probably not a native language for him, it's entirely possible that the sarcasm did not get through. Quaking in fear in front of authority figures might be the norm in the USA, but it is not the norm everywhere.

In that case, at least he received a gentle warning in the form of a few days in the cooler, as opposed to wandering into the US where his attitude could have easily (depending on his skin color and other factors) have gotten him a sucking chest wound for his trouble.

Best to learn not to argue with people with guns at the border.

(Somewhat tongue-in-cheek here but I actually do think this is the purpose of aggressive border authorities. As someone who traveled around old, pre-EU, pre-Schengen Europe, you used to see it quite a bit there as well. Hard to say if it was intentional or just the product of different training, though.)

Re: US Customs wants to collect social media account names at the border

#67

Post by riprowan »

benevol wrote: post #50
em3rgent0rdr wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But, people's online presence is rarely who they really are. Americans are free to create whatever online presence they want to.

> Americans are free to create whatever online presence they want to. Which are all captured by Prism and other mass surveillance programs (google "Edward Snowden"). Nobody escapes the NSA.

Point being the NSA is collecting a lot of noise.

Re: US Customs wants to collect social media account names at the border

#68

Post by AlexandrB »

heroprotagonist wrote: post #34
thawkins wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Last year i set up a facebook account with a fake name and then never accessed it ever. After a few weeks i started getting emails from fb asking if i knew xxxxxxx, the only way they could have known that i knew these people is by tracking my ip and comparing it with others, looking at those ips and working out who was common amongst their connections. Two people logging from the same ip, creates a bridge between two…

After spending 34 years without any photographs of myself landing on social media, my grandmother put up a photo of me on Facebook. I felt bad scolding her, because she really doesn't know any better. ...which is odd, because she was alive for the years when certain governments were identifying their homosexual and ethnic citizens and sending them off to gas chambers and/or internment camps. I worry that Facebook and…

> I worry that Facebook and its ilk will be a lot more effective than IBM's punchcard system for locating, identifying, and classifying their society's undesirables.

Yes, consider what's happening in Turkey [1]. A newly minted dictatorial regime could even mine your old posts for evidence against you. The only thing stopping this kind of thing in North America is the checks and balances that are slowly being undermined in the name of security.

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jun/05/turkish-police...

Re: US Customs wants to collect social media account names at the border

#69

Post by riprowan »

heroprotagonist wrote: post #34
thawkins wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Last year i set up a facebook account with a fake name and then never accessed it ever. After a few weeks i started getting emails from fb asking if i knew xxxxxxx, the only way they could have known that i knew these people is by tracking my ip and comparing it with others, looking at those ips and working out who was common amongst their connections. Two people logging from the same ip, creates a bridge between two…

After spending 34 years without any photographs of myself landing on social media, my grandmother put up a photo of me on Facebook. I felt bad scolding her, because she really doesn't know any better. ...which is odd, because she was alive for the years when certain governments were identifying their homosexual and ethnic citizens and sending them off to gas chambers and/or internment camps. I worry that Facebook and…

> which is odd, because she was alive for the years when certain governments were identifying their homosexual and ethnic citizens and sending them off to gas chambers and/or internment camps

excess trust in authority figures also runs deep in the greatest generation

Re: US Customs wants to collect social media account names at the border

#70

Post by riprowan »

agotterer wrote: post #42
andreasklinger wrote: post #2

I was always very confused/amused by the questions at the border: "Are you a terrorist or affiliate with a terrorist organization?" "Are you a secret spy" Why would anyone say yes? What's the purpose of this. Do they just need it to avoid arguments like "we dont even ask?" A friend of mine explained it to me: - let's say that they have the suspicion or evidence that you are affiliated w/ a terrorist organization. by…

The border agents are looking for you to slip up or provide a tell. Asking questions like that may sound silly, but that's the point. They want to try to catch people off guard with unexpected questions and see how they react. These agents are trained to read your reaction and body language. Your body language and voice levels can help reveal some truth or at least the fact that you're uncomfortable answering the que…

> Your body language and voice levels can help reveal some truth or at least the fact that you're uncomfortable answering the question.

Maybe I'm actually just uncomfortable being grilled by my own paranoid countrymen without my guaranteed Constitutional protections as though I'm some sort of enemy of the state when really I just got back from Cozumel.

Post reply on HN