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"Locking down" is almost always a bad approach when it comes to border crossings. You have very little rights at the border, so keeping your phone locked and re
by gruez 2y ago
"Locking down" is almost always a bad approach when it comes to border crossings. You have very little rights at the border, so keeping your phone locked and refusing to divulge the 20 characters password isn't really an option. Even without the threat of detaining you, they can refuse entry (if you're not a citizen/permanent resident), or seize your $1000 phone/laptop. Far better to wipe your phone and restore from backup after you've crossed the border. The article does make a good point that you should seed your wiped phone with signs of activity so it doesn't look freshly wiped.
- crossroadsguy 2y agoAnd maybe remove business critical or private data from "well known" online accounts or cloud services well known to US or from US or the one they might force you to give them access to - or the account where it might be trivial for them to show you have an account and then they might demand access. I know the article says they won't ask you for cloud accounts but I mean who the hell knows (esp. in today's USA), they might as well ask you to give access to iCloud Backup/restore because as you said they have close to or exactly zero rights there.
- joshlemer 2y agoWhat happens if it looks freshly wiped?
- ty6853 2y agoIt's my experience that once you get sent to secondary they have already decided to fuck you, they are just deciding which flimsy excuse they will use to do it. My totally non-legal conjecture (and livid experience) is if you are a citizen they will play mind games with you in secondary or a holding cell for hours to a day or so and then eventually reluctantly release you after muttering threats about revoking your passport and/or not letting you in.
- GenshoTikamura 2y agoDetainment for having a phone without any content in it is just pure and utter fascism.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- Jare 2y agoAuthoritarianism always finds a way, but it's shocking that 60 million invited it for dinner.
- actionfromafar 2y agoThey thought it would only be a TV dinner. The bad stuff wasn't supposed to happen on their side of the TV screen.
- selimthegrim 2y agoBrown Girl in The Ring, in other words.
- akimbostrawman 2y agoThese border searched have existed since the patriot act...
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- hangonhn 2y agoDoes anyone more knowledgable know if US citizen 5th amendment rights still applies at the border, i.e. I can't legally be compelled to unlock my phone at the US border? Law is not my area of expertise at all. (The article might have addressed this but it's behind a paywall.) Thanks in advance.
- fn-mote 2y agoThe ACLU has authoritative advice [1]. The article about electronic device searches [2] explains that the government claims the right to search devices without a warrant at the border. > U.S. citizens cannot be denied entry to the United States for refusing to provide passwords or unlocking devices. Refusal to do so might lead to delay, additional questioning, and/or officers seizing your device for further inspection. [...] If an officer searches and/or confiscates your laptop or cell phone, get a receipt for your property. [1]: https://www.aclu.org/know-your-rights/what-do-when-encountering-law-enforcement-airports-and-other-ports-entry-us#do-i-have-to-provide-my-laptop-passwords-or-unlock-my-mobile-phone-for-law-enforcement-officers-at-the-border https://www.aclu.org/know-your-rights/what-do-when-encounter... [2]: https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/can-border-agents-search-your-electronic https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/can-border-agen...
- dylan604 2y agoIf your device leaves your sight for any length of time and later returned, consider it compromised. It is now to no longer be considered a friendly device. If you're paranoid enough that is
- tenacious_tuna 2y agoI am not a lawyer, though I am a US citizen. First, it's the fourth amendment that protects against unreasonable search. Fifth amendment is protection against self-incrimination. My understanding is that fourth amendment protections effectively do not apply at the border [1] because the border is inherently a reasonable place to search people. In regards to being compelled to unlock your phone, CBP maintains the position [2] that in order to uphold their duties they're inherently able to compel you. Anecdotally, if you don't unlock your device, they may (a) confiscate it (and possibly apply all sorts of cracking tech to it), or (b) refuse you entry. That said, a random law firm [3] cites that you can withhold a password-based lock, but CBP can compel you to provide biometric unlocking [3]. To me, this is a case of https://xkcd.com/538/ https://xkcd.com/538/ ; you may have a legal basis to refuse, but in the current iteration of the administration I find it unlikely that it would be a positive experience if you were to stand on it. (Not that CBP is going to beat you with a pipe wrench, but if they want in your phone, they're gonna get in your phone.) [1] https://law.justia.com/constitution/us/amendment-04/19-border-searches.html https://law.justia.com/constitution/us/amendment-04/19-borde... [2] https://www.cbp.gov/travel/cbp-search-authority/border-search-electronic-devices https://www.cbp.gov/travel/cbp-search-authority/border-searc... [3] https://borderslawfirm.com/border-search-computers/ https://borderslawfirm.com/border-search-computers/
- gorgoiler 2y agoI used to do this but these days I’m petrified of the restore being imperfect in some way. I use the he.net app for TOTP. Will I get those back in working order? I have a billion photos I want to keep — were they properly backed up to iCloud? My mail settings are a pita to recreate. Will those come back? Are passwords stored in the Secure Enclave? Could I lose those? When I sign back into iCloud am I going to be able to use a username and password, or is it going to require me to approve the login on my laptop — which I left at home — as a second factor? WhatsApp, Signal — how much is tied to my physical phone and/or any key material unique to the OS — material that is irretrievably lost, by design, when it is wiped. I think really the long term answer is to stop using an opaque, closed source iPhone. Maybe some time in the next five years one will emerge that competes with Apple’s quality? Until then, every border crossing is going to risk handing over a huge part of my life to ICE because I can’t risk losing anything in a backup/restore hysteresis loop. Post.: Another future direction would be for iOS and apps to recognise this as a common use case and provide guarantees about what is and what isn’t restorable after a wipe. There’s also a conflict here between wiping data so that it is irretrievable and wiping data to later retrieve it. If you wipe with the intent to retrieve I can believe that immigration will just detain you until you restore your phone so that it can be searched.
- shepherdjerred 2y agoThis is like sticking your head in the sand. Okay, maybe the backup is imperfect? What’s your plan if you phone is lost, damaged, or stolen?
- IncandescentGas 2y agoYour phone could become damaged and inoperable every day. From dropping it in the toilet, being stolen, a house fire, etc. If you're "petrified" of losing your data, it's worth the work to ensure your data backup procedures are adequate.
- gorgoiler 2y agoYou’re right, but also I know I have enough backed up to survive a catastrophe. What I don’t want to do is to test my backup in a non catastrophe situation and invalidate all my TOTP, WhatsApp history, mail settings etc. just because I wanted to test disaster recovery. It feels like buying a fire safe (phone and app backups) without any kind of understanding if it works then burning your house down to see if it works. I want a fire safe (phone and app backups) that is up-front with guarantees it works! I should have said this by the way: for a long time I did wipe my phone when crossing borders, learning the hard way all the little details that don’t quite work properly when doing a restore from backups.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- eastbound 2y ago> Far better to wipe your phone and restore from backup after you've crossed the border. It’s a mantra but it’s incorrect: You’re supposed to list your “online accounts” to the border agent in the US.
- dylan604 2y agodon't have your backup online
- AstralStorm 2y agoSure you can, don't have it on any "account". :)
- buyucu 2y agoMy company gives burner phones and laptops for employees and salespeople traveling to countries with agressive borders. USA is on the list, together with Israel, Iran and a few others I can't remember now.
- fragmede 2y agoChina
- buyucu 2y agoChina is not on the list. We never had any difficulty or problem in the Chinese border.
- fragmede 2y agofascinating! Where are you from? I'm in the US and for employees going into China, best practice has been to issue them burner phones and laptops for the trip for decades at this point.
- aftbit 2y agoOh interesting. They were on our list (US company). In fact, our official guidance suggested not bringing work hardware to China at all.
- AstralStorm 2y agoThat's mostly not due to their border security services but industrial espionage, theft and maybe special security.
- stackedinserter 2y agoWhat kind of business is this, if US border is danger but Chinese is not?
- buyucu 2y ago
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- tantalor 2y ago> refusing to divulge the 20 characters password isn't really an option > wipe your phone and restore from backup If they can compel you to divulge the password, then they can compel you to restore from backup in front of them.
- Pooge 2y agoI think their point is that you have plausible deniability because they wouldn't know you have a backup.
- AstralStorm 2y agoExcept they might know that if it's a major provider. That's easier to learn than the password to unlock it.
- reassess_blind 2y agoA dual password "Hidden OS" feature like Veracrypt offers, or at least used to offer would be best. If implemented correctly the existence of the hidden OS can't be proven, and a dummy password would log into a dummy OS. I don't think it exists for phones, but is surely a gap in the market.
- ryanmcbride 2y agoWell since the phone is wiped just don't be logged into your real account and don't have any cloud backups to backup from?
- notatoad 2y agothey can't if they don't know you have a backup. if they're really out to target you and they've got you under investigation, then maybe they know what your primary email account is and that your phone isn't signed in to it. but the advice here is for the traveller who just doesn't want to be hassled at the border by the guard who wants to flex their power.
- jjav 2y ago> If they can compel you to divulge the password, then they can compel you to restore from backup in front of them. Of course, if your backup is to a US-based cloud service, they already have full access to it.
- sksxihve 2y agoThis 100x, last time I crossed a border I shutdown my phone and because my phone was off the border guard considered that suspicious. Also apparently not using google maps is considered suspicious even if you're in an area you've lived your entire life.
- dylan604 2y agoI would definitely come across as suspicious to any border inspection. I have no Google apps, I have no social media apps. I have very few apps at all. I definitely qualify as someone that would be the type to wipe their phone. Also, my photos would definitely look like something someone staged to show activity, as the vast majority of my photos are of my fur babies. I don't do selfies, so that would be sus too. My browser history would also appear to them to be wiped, because I simply do not browse the web on the phone. I doubt it would be a quick conversation of me convincing them I'm really just that boring.
- AstralStorm 2y agoSomeone needs to implement an application that fakes these things convincingly...
- dylan604 2y agoThen the storm troopers would just look to see if you had that app
- wing-_-nuts 2y ago>or seize your $1000 phone/laptop. So be it. I used to say that the reason I valued my privacy was not that I did not trust my government _today_, it was the fact that data would be available to every potential authoritarian government _tomorrow_. Welp, today has become tomorrow, and yeah, I'd _absolutely_ rather just have my devices seized than have the contents of my phone dumped into a database that can be searched without a warrant, for the next 15 years. Rights (like the 4th amendment) that are not exercised are not upheld. I'm sure the threat of having one's devices stolen (let's be clear, that's what this is), is enough to deter many people. For myself, my next course of action would be to contact the ACLU and sue the government for violating the 4th amendment.
- dylan604 2y agoHaving your $1000 device stolen by the government as an acceptable outcome is something only a fatcat on HN with their cushy salary would be able to tolerate. I'm not a FAANG employee, and don't make that kind of salary. Loosing a $1k anything would not be something I could just shrug my shoulders and just turn around and immediately replace it. Even if you do sue the gov't, it'll be at least a year before any kind of resolution that results in the return of that device. Them keeping my phone would be one thing, but if they also kept my laptop, I'd be screwed. My laptop is much more than $1k, and there's no free laptop with contract cell service I could use to replace it. Now I'd be without a means of working. These kinds of situations make me really yearn for the days of replacing the internal hard drive of a laptop. I could swap out my daily use drive for a travel drive, which would be much less of a hassle than the options on offer for modern laptops.
- aftbit 2y agoMy Lenovo from last year still has non-soldered NVMe drives. I would probably just install Windows on a separate partition and set it to boot to that, then install a few games and set my Chrome homepage. I bet CBP won't be mucking around with bootloader settings looking for Linux, and even so it would be pretty trivial to just remove GRUB from the EFI partition for the travel days.
- wat10000 2y agoI plan to keep my phone locked if it ever happens to me. I can buy a new phone.