This is a good article that covers the new decision handed down yesterday in U.S. District court. It also includes a link to the actual decision.
Does your laptop have anything to declare?
Now the files and photos on your laptop are fair game to customs agents at LAX and no, unlike the police, they don't need probable cause to search them. That's the latest ruling, handed down yesterday by the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco.
Yep. If you have any cute photos of your children when they were babies playing at the beach in the buff,(like the Coppertone ad) then you'd better delete them or you could be arrested for being a pedophile.
How deep do/will customs and security agents delve into the files of laptops? Are they just sifting around a bit blindly, or do they actually go into system folders, sub-folders, hidden folders (i.e. where cookies and temporary internet files are stored) and so on?
When the Canadian Border Agent decided to search my business laptop they used the "Search for Files and Folders" in Windows XP and specifically targeted any type of media files (jpg, gif, mpg, avi, etc.) and randomly opened whatever the search window returned. At the same time, they also confiscated my personal backup CDs of legitimate computer software I owned that was in my CD case. YMMV.
People may want to look at http://www.TrueCrypt.org for a very good *free* file encryption software package.
When going through Customs, they can inspect pretty much anything they want. If they ask you for the password to an encrypted drive and you say no, they can keep it.
When going through Customs, they can inspect pretty much anything they want. If they ask you for the password to an encrypted drive and you say no, they can keep it.
keep it permanently or keep it for X days / X months ?
Yep. If you have any cute photos of your children when they were babies playing at the beach in the buff,(like the Coppertone ad) then you'd better delete them or you could be arrested for being a pedophile.
I am so glad I don't live in the US anymore.
in that case you better sign up for virgins space travel because customs in just about any country i know of has the same rights.....
Yep. If you have any cute photos of your children when they were babies playing at the beach in the buff,(like the Coppertone ad) then you'd better delete them or you could be arrested for being a pedophile.
I am so glad I don't live in the US anymore.
Don't be thinking it's any better anywhere else. Can you name a country where they cannot search your laptop as they see fit when you enter?
It appears this was a non-UK citizen being searched in the UK. I have no problem with extensive searches of foreigners.
Do you have any reports of countries other than the US that treats its own citizens in this way? (Western Democracies, not China, Iran, or NK)
Why are the rights to individual privacy of foreigners any different than those of citizens? I personally believe in a universal approach to civil (and social) rights, with little to no exception (and I certainly would not make airport and customs inspections one of them). From a practical point of view, as soon as you start placing people into different "categories" that enjoy various limits on and degrees of freedoms, your own freedoms (as a citizen) are automatically falliable and can be modified/nullfied at any moment.
Besides that, in the end, all these searches and invasions of privacy are in the name of security, protecting our borders, protecting agriculture, protecting commerce, whatever. A citizen is just as capable of carrying kiddie porn or contaminated soil as an evil foreigner.
Furthermore, in the US your right to re-enter your country of citizen does not extend to a right to carry/import contraband and the like anyway. So I think the argument that allowing searches of foreigners while waiving citizens through it not only a violation of basic rights principles but also very ineffective policy of which no good can come.
I personally believe in a universal approach to civil (and social) rights, with little to no exception (and I certainly would not make airport and customs inspections one of them). From a practical point of view, as soon as you start placing people into different "categories" that enjoy various limits on and degrees of freedoms, your own freedoms (as a citizen) are automatically falliable and can be modified/nullfied at any moment. 
