Protecting Yourself From Suspicionless Searches While Traveling

From: Electronic Frontier Foundation

 

The Ninth Circuit's recent ruling (pdf) in United States v. Arnold allows border patrol agents to search your laptop or other digital device without limitation when you are entering the country. EFF and many civil liberties, travelers' rights, immigration advocacy and professional organizations are concerned that unfettered laptop searches endanger trade secrets, attorney-client communications, and other private information. These groups have signed a letter asking Congress to hold hearings to find out what protocol, if any, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) follows in searching digital devices and copying, storing and using travelers' data. The letter also asks Congress to pass legislation protecting travelers' laptops and smart phones from unlimited government scrutiny.

If privacy at the border is important to you, contact Congress now and ask them to take action!

In the meantime, how can international travelers protect themselves at the U.S. border, short of leaving their laptops and iPhones at home?

Many travelers practice security through obscurity. They simply hope that no border agent will rummage through their private data. Too many people enter the country each day for agents to thoroughly search every device that crosses the border, and there is too much information stored on most devices for agents to find the most revealing and confidential tidbits. But for travelers who may be targeted based on their celebrity, race or other distinguishing factor, obscurity is not an option. As last week's news that Microsoft is giving away forensic tools that can quickly search an entire hard drive on a USB "thumb drive" shows, it won't be long before customs agents can efficiently perform a thorough search on every machine. So long as there are no protocols or oversight for these searches, every traveler's personal information is at risk...