why can you not also be compelled to turn over a digital one? Because you may have forgotten it. It's likely you would not have had access to the hardware in t

why can you not also be compelled to turn over a digital one? Because you may have forgotten it. It's likely you would not have had access to the hardware in the many months these things drag out. I know I've forgotten some complex passwords in a day or two. Also, there may be an argument to be made that by demonstrating your knowledge of the password you are being forced to confess to ownership of whatever content is unlocked. Although the lock-and-key metaphor seems very attractive, it not necessarily the case that "decryption" equals "authentication". Encryption is easy, authentication is the harder problem! There have been encryption products sold and used that did not provide effective authentication, i.e., someone who didn't know the key could tamper with the contents of the disk so that it decrypted to something else.