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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

#631

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

While I agree with your sentiment, I have to imagine that the decision makers are still older and more out of touch?

Decision makers are never going to be responsible for such low level clerical work as reading every tech company product release.

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

#632

Would he have been better off just refusing to give a code?

Yes. They'd probably have kept the device for a while, but he wouldn't be in legal trouble.

Not to sound like a contrarian, but no. They would have thrown it in a faraday bag, cloned the device, and then would use one of the many existing forensic tools available to crack the pin.

https://cellebrite.com/en/blog/the-access-gap-is-closed-what...

https://www.magnetforensics.com/graykey-for-android-devices/

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

#633

The decoy passcode feature should boot into a separate partition that looks like a normal phone setup, and during that time quietly erase the user's actual data. They would never have known if it worked like this.

Not physically possible[1] to be deniable and a bad[2] idea. [1] https://veracrypt.io/en/Wear-Leveling.html https://veracrypt.io/en/Trim%20Operation.html [2] https://nitter.net/GrapheneOS/status/2082153517234676150#m

You don’t need it to delete anything, anyway. The encrypted second partition is indistinguishable from random data, so you don’t need to delete it.

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

#634

The decoy passcode feature should boot into a separate partition that looks like a normal phone setup, and during that time quietly erase the user's actual data. They would never have known if it worked like this.

That seems overcomplicated and opening yourself up to risk IMO the correct solution is to erase your phone before crossing the border, and then restore it after you’ve crossed

What’s to stop them from seeing an empty phone, and then accuse you of deleting it when they asked to see it?

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

#635
post #576

I hope some day border agents ask for my phone, because I have not used one or even had a cell phone plan in over 5 years. Checkmate, assholes.

Do you still have a phone number(you can use something like jmp.chat on desktop)? If not, how do you navigate services like banks or utilities that demand one?

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

#636
"[...] Since 1953, the US Department of Justice has defined the border to be anywhere within 100 miles of the actual national limits.[...] According to the American Civil Liberties Union, about two-thirds of the people in the US live within 100 miles of a border. So in theory these 200 million border zone dwellers could have their phones seized and searched at any time by CBP agents without a warrant.[...]"

From the register (2023)

https://www.theregister.com/security/2023/06/01/us-court-fin...

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

#637

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It may be fun to fantasize about these things some times, but there is no technical solution to tyranny. Laws are not like code, intent matters. Ultimately if the intent is that the government wants to see your private data, hiding it in any way will be charged - it doesn't matter if you jump through hoops to avoid this specific instance.

Yes, trying to solve a regulation or legal issue by some technical workaround will never work, you have to fight it at the same level, legally, or system-wise, otherwise, you will be like the person who tries to wash the stairs from the bottom all the way up, it rarely works, you gotta go up to down, collectively go against the matter rather than individually duct taping it for your own specific needs. In that exampl…

Destruction of evidence as a crime goes back a long, long way. There's no precedent for making it illegal to install some OS or protocol the feds don't like. I don't particularly like what's being done to this guy, but what he did was pretty stupid. You can't be obligated to incriminate yourself but you aren't allowed to destroy evidence.

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

#638

"[...] Since 1953, the US Department of Justice has defined the border to be anywhere within 100 miles of the actual national limits.[...] According to the American Civil Liberties Union, about two-thirds of the people in the US live within 100 miles of a border. So in theory these 200 million border zone dwellers could have their phones seized and searched at any time by CBP agents without a warrant.[...]" From the…

Iirc this does not allow for warrantless home searches, so they can’t just waltz into your house and demand your phone. 100 miles is still wild tho.

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

#639

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Assuming he is found (edit: not) guilty, which is not guaranteed at all

Trumps DOJ has destroyed credibility with federal judges all ove the country. They’ve had more than one case come back not guilty so far (subway sandwich guy). I’m optimistic they fail to get a guilty verdict here too.

Sandwich guy was acquitted by a jury, not a judge.

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

#640

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So the real problem in the end is that your duress system should not put a big message "erasing all data" but "loading" slowly and just look mostly empty.

You sir have nailed it. Unfortunately, GrapheneOS seems too stuck up to eagerly appreciate and address such real world nuances.

They don't add features that rely on security through obscurity, would give attackers tons of attack surface, is physically impossible to make actually deniable, and could put regular GrapheneOS users in physical danger in authoritarian regimes.
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