9 ms·

GrapheneOS Defends Data-Wiping Function That Blocked US Border Search

182 points by pseudolus 3mo ago

BLKNSLVR 3mo ago
Keep fighting the good fight GrapheneOS!
br0ceph 3mo ago
yasss this is a feel good story they entered the pass themselves, so by their own treasonous logic, they should charge themselves. hope the crim charges get dismissed, and a civil suit is filed get paid, donate a chunk Go Team Graphene!!!!
butvacuum 3mo ago
is it just me or is it about once a decade somebody gets publicised for this and the government *really* throws the book at them.
1970-01-01 3mo ago
"defends" is doing quite a bit of flashy work for this headline. "Feature works as advertised, nobody upset" would be a much more practical headline.
- RobotToaster 3mo ago
  The government appears to be quite upset. You wouldn't want to upset ingsoc would you?
ChrisArchitect 3mo ago
Related: US Government targets Cop City protester over phone operating system https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49024436 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49024436
mmastrac 3mo ago
The founding fathers would be aghast at what America became. Hard to imagine modern America passing some of those constitutional amendments that older America passed wayyy back.
- petcat 3mo ago
  [flagged]
  - Zigurd 3mo ago
    What about the abolitionists among the signers of the Declaration?
    - petcat 3mo ago
      I don't want to get into a whole thing about the founding fathers and American mythology. Yes, they had some pretty good ideas that have withstood the test of time. They also had some pretty f'ing bad ideas that we had to change. So some comment about the founding fathers rolling over in their graves about what America has become is complete nonsense.
      - colordrops 3mo ago
        What is your point? The original comment was really just a wry statement about the extreme level of corruption and ineffectiveness of the US government. Sounds like you find the current situation to be A-OK?
      - bastardoperator 3mo ago
        Executive war making, overgrown militaries, debt, party politics, concentrated power, corporate power, and foreign entanglement. The framers did not invision America in its current state, to state otherwise would be nonsense because we can just read the words they wrote.
- TFNA 3mo ago
  On the other hand, why care what the American founding fathers thought? There have been two centuries since then of developments in democratic countries that some Americans could choose as a model they like more. And now it's the Chinese century anyway.
  - 3mo ago
whizzter 3mo ago
Someone who is a lawyer knows any details about the US justice systems precedents with regards to the fifth amendmend (regards to self incrimination) vs obstruction of justice (by destroying evidence) as would be applicable to a duress wipe? Also would the distinction of being (or not) read their miranda rights and placed under arrest in this case make a difference as to the status of any possible obstruction?
- CountHackulus 3mo ago
  According to Homeland Security, within 100 miles of the border is a "constitution free zone". So there's a whole lot to unpack before we even get to miranda rights.
- iamnothere 3mo ago
  Not a lawyer, but my understanding is that refusal to give the PIN (“remaining silent”) would be a valid application of the 5th, but not giving a false PIN. 5th does not imply the right to mislead or lie to someone investigating a crime. Not clear on anything else regarding the duress PIN but I don’t think a 5th defense would apply. Note that you apparently have to explicitly invoke your right to remain silent or your silence could be implied as an admission of guilt (thanks to Salinas v. Texas). I imagine you’d have to repeat your assertion multiple times, and the person demanding the PIN will tell you that you can’t use the 5th, will threaten you with arrest and additional charges, etc. Consult a lawyer and get training if you’re doing critical work where you may need this defense.
  - tracker1 3mo ago
    I'm mixed... if they really thought there was evidence on the phone, they should have seized the phone and acquired a warrant IMO to compel the valid, non-destructive PIN be given over. As I mentioned earlier, this is part of why my own plans for international travel are to only go with a notebook/sheet with contact numbers and buy throwaway devices on the other side. I don't think I'd travel internationally with a phone or laptop at this point, and that's kind of been my thoughts for a while. Especially given the direction that many countries, not just the US have taken. For that matter, I don't think I'd ever even risk travelling to the UK or China at this point. Not that I like the surveillance state here in the US, at least I still have some rights preserved.
mingus88 3mo ago
This should be an interesting case in today’s legal climate Obviously grafeneOS has no liability. But the owner of the device didn’t take the action to remove the data, the CBP officer entered it. We already have some precedent around being forced to give up your password. How does that change if you are forced to give up a password that is destructive? What if the password works fine at home and the same password does a wipe based on location? Either way, the user complied, and did not take action to wipe their device.
- victorbjorklund 3mo ago
  Intentions matter. If the intent is to trick the officer to enter a PIN code that will destroy potential evidence then it does not matter that you didn't type the PIN code. Your speech is the thing that triggers a series of events that you know will lead to a wipe. Just like you can be charged with destruction of evidence even if you trick someone else to take the action.
  - Groxx 3mo ago
    while attempting to avoid armchair-law-interpreting because I really do not intend that, and I agree that this is going to be an interesting/deeply-worrying legal case: wiping the device before carrying it across the border seems essentially identical to me. like, saying "you can't wipe it when searched" would also imply "you can't have an empty device when crossing because it may have been wiped before the search to avoid having your data searched" since people can (and often do) do that for exactly that reason. that may very well be what they want / what they are trying to legally allow during searches, but it also seems like it'd raise a hell of a lot more outrage. it's essentially claiming all citizens are under full legal hold all the time, if they ever intend to leave the country for any length of time.
    - iamnothere 3mo ago
      To my knowledge, no citizen has ever been prevented from reentry due to a blank or absent device. In fact they cannot block a citizen’s legal reentry for any reason, they can only detain you while they investigate. Beyond this, “I dropped my phone in the ocean” is always a perfectly valid reason. If you’re a foreigner and they already suspect you of something, they can deny you entry for any reason. It may be better to be denied than arrested!
pavel_lishin 3mo ago
The "agent entered password themselves, therefore they're to blame" seems as good of a logic as "I'm going to start swinging my arms and start walking forward, so if you don't move, it's YOU hitting YOURSELF".
- skullone 3mo ago
  Maybe digital forensics shouldn't be handled by barely highschool graduates at a busy border crossing
  - gruez 3mo ago
    Should we take the same approach for physical searches? If the cops are executing a search warrant on a house, and there's a safe, should they send in a safe cracker on the off chance the safe is wired with a "duress pin" (eg. thermite that burns the contents)?
    - intrikate 3mo ago
      I mean, if it's possible to configure and there is at all a reason for someone to configure it as such, then it makes the most sense to treat it as a very valid possibility, right?
      - gruez 3mo ago
        Hindsight is 20/20 right? Sure, the duress pin feature was around for years, but so was the technology to set up a thermite boobytrap in a safe. Maybe now CBP officers should be more careful about entering random pins people gave them, but snarky remarks like "Maybe digital forensics shouldn't be handled by barely highschool graduates at a busy border crossing" are entirely unjustified.
        skullone 3mo ago
        It is not snarky, it's the truth. Suspending the constitution within 100 miles of every port of entry? Nah son, the government can conduct their petty investigations with a warrant and proper digital forensics if they want to search your property.
tracker1 3mo ago
And this is why part of my plans for any international travel are to simply have a physical notebook with phone numbers to trusted friends/family and to buy throwaway devices on the other side (phone and chromebook or similar). TBF, similar mindset if I ever attend defcon, etc. as well.
- flr03 3mo ago
  The crazy part is that you might be denied entering the country you don't travel with a device...
  - drnick1 3mo ago
    I have never heard of something like that.
  - tracker1 3mo ago
    So be it, they can send me back.
- __turbobrew__ 3mo ago
  The simpler option is to fly through a place with USA pre-clearance. At least in Canada you can revoke you application to enter the USA at any time when in pre-clearance, and there are very limited instances when you can be legally detained by CBP (mostly around being an immediate threat or the CBP officer has evidence that you broke a law such as attempted smuggling). I currently fly to the USA through Canada and if CBP ever insists on seeing my phone I will revoke my application to enter and accept that Im most likely banned from entry for a while.
Magicrafter13 3mo ago
As a GrapheneOS user and a U.S. citizen that cares about the constitution, I fully support the actions taken by the individual
- mindslight 3mo ago
  Seriously. All of these comments talking about the legality are completely missing the point. At most this indicts the current laws, rather than the person who was illegally and immorally surveilled, searched, detained, coerced, and now harassed through the legal system. Anybody standing on a narrow view of "but this is just the law" while we have an outright hostile government that actively hates our individual liberties has wholly lost the plot.
  - brnt 3mo ago
    > Anybody standing on a narrow view of "but this is just the law" It's a pity Americans must learn empirically rather than from history books how fascism operates.
    - mindslight 3mo ago
      Hey now, you can't just go casually dropping F-bombs like that in polite conversation. "Fascism" is something terrible from history, highly specific to that time, and can never happen again unless the people involved loudly proclaim themselves Fascists. And even then it's questionable if they would have the right to use the trademark! In fact I'm not even sure if I believe that the events that happened in Italy during the early 20th century should be called fascism. The word means something really really bad (though I'm not sure what), and we shouldn't speak ill of the dead. What's happening in the US is something completely new, different, and totally worth seeing what it can accomplish this time. Think of all those sci-fi "dystopias" with a privileged ruling class living lives of comfort and luxury, and not having to think about the filthy underclass. Good vibes are what I'm here for.
    - Magicrafter13 3mo ago
      I want to engage with this comment in good faith, but I'm confused on what is trying to be said. Per American Heritage Dictionary 5th Edition: > A system of government marked by centralization of authority under a dictator, a capitalist economy subject to stringent governmental controls, violent suppression of the opposition, and typically a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism. Looking at this case so far; - we have not observed any dictatorial behavior, - this is unrelated to economics, - we have not observed any violent suppression, - we have not observed any actions based on nationalism/race, given these facts, at least by this definition of fascism, there appears to be none yet present in this case. What history books or definition should Americans learn from that would lead them to view what transpired as fascism, and how should that inform their beliefs/decisions differently than how they are currently informed about the situation?
yardie 3mo ago
This is possibly the best advertising. GrapheneOS was kind of niche before. But if the US Government hates you then you're on the right track.
- illithid0 3mo ago
  On one hand, I love GrapheneOS and see it as a cornerstone of digital privacy software. I have supported the project financially for years. On the other hand, I'm worried that the publicity will only make explicit targets out of GrapheneOS users, and that you would only be using it "if you have something to hide".
  - mpdpsycho 3mo ago
    Say that as they may, it’s a whole different slope to fall down if they want to do anything about that beyond pointing and whining. If we cross that bridge, we probably have bigger things to worry about. So I think it should be fine for now.
    - illithid0 3mo ago
      The DOJ is attempting to prosecute, so I suppose the success or failure of that will tell us what we need to know about bridges and slopes.
      - mpdpsycho 3mo ago
        Yeah, I’m placing some faith here on that falling through for sure.
  - pelotron 3mo ago
    I have plenty of things to hide from Google which is the primary reason I use it.
    - illithid0 3mo ago
      I, too, would prefer Google not have their hands in a lot of my stuff. That doesn't mean the federal government won't take it personally that I won't let them look at all of it and take action.
gadders 3mo ago
UBS had a similar capability on their laptops so they facilitate tax evasion for US clients: https://www.cnbc.com/2015/04/30/why-did-the-us-pay-this-former-swiss-banker-104m.html https://www.cnbc.com/2015/04/30/why-did-the-us-pay-this-form...
- gruez 3mo ago
  That's probably safer because you can plausibly argue you're protecting your workstation, not unlike corporate security policies that require you to lock your workstation when you get up. Where they get into trouble is when they specifically say "use this when the IRS comes knocking". It's like offering an encrypted chat app (eg. signal) vs offering an encrypted chat app and marketing it to criminals. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantom_Secure#Law_enforcement_operations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantom_Secure#Law_enforcement...
- triceratops 3mo ago
  Only the people working on tax evasion had this on their laptops?
  - gadders 3mo ago
    Probably all bankers.
    - triceratops 3mo ago
      So why did you say it was to "facilitate tax evasion"?
      - gadders 3mo ago
        RTFA. That is exactly what it was for - to hide account information from nation-level investigations.
cdrnsf 3mo ago
The border agents didn't act in good faith, regardless of what they're empowered to do. They wanted the data for one reason and fabricated another to prompt the device search. The data they were interested in pertained to protest activity protected under the constitution but the lie they told was about something criminal. That anything within 100 miles of the border is constitution free tosses that out, I guess, but is extremely problematic on its own.
- deepsun 3mo ago
  Interesting that all that rules don't apply to water. The moment you stepped on a boat, coastal guard can (and do regularly) board it and conduct a search without any reasoning. They don't need any probable causes, warrants, nothing. Seems like so far it didn't create any problems, so public is ok with that.
  - tsimionescu 3mo ago
    The same is true at any border crossing - you have to submit to searches by CBP agents, who don't need any probable cause. I believe device searches are still a somewhat greyer area, at least if password protected (as providing a password would be compelled speech, unlike a luggage search which can be conducted without any action from your part).
    - john_strinlai 3mo ago
      >as providing a password would be compelled speech which is a good reminder for anyone with reason to be concerned about this sort of thing to turn off biometric/face id/etc. access to their devices.
      - akimbostrawman 3mo ago
        that's why GrapheneOS has biometric+pin
      - nickthegreek 3mo ago
luxuryballs 3mo ago
Next version should wipe the phone while presenting a dummy account so they can't easily tell anything is missing.
deleted 3mo ago
[deleted]
shreddit 3mo ago
Couldn’t GrapheneOS provide a special pin which boots into an “empty”session? Where the user can install some default stuff to not look suspicious?
- petilon 3mo ago
  Right, they should restore the phone to a user-picked previous state, as opposed to wiping it clean.
- gruez 3mo ago
  They said they don't bother because it's non-trivial to implement convincingly, so they don't bother, lest it gives people a false sense of security. For instance, if you do this, and the adb logs aren't scrubbed, then that's massively suspicious and that'd still you in legal hot waters.
- john_strinlai 3mo ago
  im not sure if grapheneos does or not, but it's not a novel idea, and often will only be a delay tactic. forensics will reveal the other partition(s), and then you're in the exact same position having to answer "what's the other partition, provide the password"
- deepsun 3mo ago
  People are doing that in Belarus (since 2020 the repression still continue). You also need to create a convincing profile and story for all the usual apps. Alibi if you wish.
  - Cider9986 3mo ago
    Not forensically safe. I guess the authorities are aware but don't take the steps all the time except important cases. Really puts the citizens on their toes.
- grapheneos 3mo ago
  It would be easily detected by widely used forensic software from Cellebrite and other companies. It would also definitely look suspicious. We explained in much more depth in response to a related proposal: https://nitter.net/GrapheneOS/status/2082153517234676150#m https://nitter.net/GrapheneOS/status/2082153517234676150#m
Zak 3mo ago
This probably doesn't hold up legally, but it does hold up logically: if the reason a border search exemption exists is to prevent importation of material that is unlawful to import, wiping a storage device also fulfills that purpose.
- RegW 3mo ago
  It would seem that the officer was searching for evidence of a crime, not to prevent importation. However, did that evidence really exist? And if it did, was it for something else? Perhaps, the guy just worried about something far more mundane being discovered? We shall never know. Think Schrodinger's password.
  - Zak 3mo ago
    The border search exemption is not intended to allow searching for evidence of crimes that aren't related to importing something illegally. Of course CPB isn't expected to ignore evidence of other crimes they happen to see incidentally while checking for things that are illegal to import. Courts have been fairly tolerant of law enforcement using pretexts like that to expand their powers.
  - danudey 3mo ago
    This is the issue with these sorts of laws. How do you make it illegal to destroy evidence of criminal misconduct when the destruction of evidence can make it impossible to prove it ever existed? That seems to be along the lines of what they're arguing here - they wanted to perform an ostensibly legal search, and he destroyed everything that might have been evidence either way. It would be like a corporation getting an e-mail from the SEC saying "Give us all the communications your company has had about these three stocks" and the company saying "Oops someone erased our e-mail server so I guess we don't have any communications about that." If you're this paranoid about being searched, or you have something to hide (even if that 'something' is a sense of morality and a desire for a free and just society), wipe your phone before you cross the border and not during. Put some basic apps on (reddit, twitter, etc), leave them logged out or put them on some empty account and tell them you're not a big social media guy or you're on a digital cleanse or something. Wiping your phone when you're being detained by law enforcement is a bad look one way or the other.
nilamo 3mo ago
No warrent? No data. Easy as.
- john_strinlai 3mo ago
  no warrant required at a border crossing.
josefritzishere 3mo ago
The Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution is supposed to protect people from random and arbitrary stops and searches. It's a fundamental American right. But in the 100 mile border zone, the federal government has tried to impinge on those basic rights. https://www.aclu.org/know-your-rights/border-zone https://www.aclu.org/know-your-rights/border-zone
TheqO 3mo ago
It's great publicity for GrapheneOS, has probably led to a huge spike in traffic to their website and downloads. And ongoing publicity as the trial happens.
seethishat 3mo ago
It is illegal to lie to a police officer in the US. It's better to remain silent than to tell a lie. Giving a false PIN is a lie. And that by itself is a crime. I'm not taking sides here, I just wanted to make that clear. And you should understand that they can lie to you. That's OK and legal, but you cannot lie to them.
- EPWN3D 3mo ago
  There are limits to the lies they can tell, IIRC. They are limited to lies which would not harm an innocent person. So if an officer says "We have your fingerprints on the murder weapon", that is fine, because an innocent person will know that there is no way that can be true. Whereas a guilty person would presumably find that lie plausible. But if an officer gets a confession by saying, "They just passed an amendment, and you don't have the right to a lawyer anymore, so you have to answer my question or I'll send you to a torture dungeon", that is a lie that can harm anyone, regardless of guilt.
t1234s 3mo ago
any reason with graphine os to wipe vs power off? Unless you have an easy bfu password doesn't it protect you from multiple password attempts?
- grapheneos 3mo ago
  It uses hardware with a secure element only permitting 20 attempts. The past 5 unique attempts are rejected early out for usability. We published a technical overview of how GrapheneOS protects against data extraction covering the major protections it adds: https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/40700-grapheneos-protections-against-data-extraction-from-locked-devices https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/40700-grapheneos-protection...
  - t1234s 3mo ago
    graphine os needs a feature to triple press the power button for an immediate power off.
mannanj 3mo ago
If only these phones could have a feature where you can enter a mode to encrypt segments of data with different encryption keys, all able to be unlocked still by one single master encryption key that you could also enter at any time. Then when in travel, and about to pass a border, you enter that selective mode. You can enter a different password as the proxy to unlock the phone in this bare minimal data mode. The agents can access it, etc but wont have all the data. That data shouldn't even be visible in the OS, and if they try to copy the hard drive they will get encrypted data in the other blocks. You still legally comply with orders and unlock the phone but the other partitions don't unlock/decrypt unless you specifically unlock them.
- pbgcp2026 3mo ago
  This feature exists today – it's called "leave your gadgets at home". S3 bucket and / or laptop with Tails on USB stick is all you need.
  - mannanj 3mo ago
    Well yes it exists, however it's too high friction IMO for me to use - and I'm already a software guy. And I mean the data at the application level too - it wouldn't be practical for me to have to keep removing apps and data since they don't integrate with this at an OS level and with your proposal we would have to manually sync/remove data from S3. Or I suppose we would program something to make this. Just saying, doesn't exist today it seems but would be valuable for us.
- br0ceph 3mo ago
  if u read the grapheneos tweet about this, any form of minimal account puts all ur other accounts at risk. agents should never get any form of code execution on ur device, even from a sandbox account. the linux kernel is not secure, and they can just hold the device till the next public disclosure or use one of their existing cellebrite attacks. duress password to shutdown instead of wipe could be an option. duress password to restore to snapshot, effectively wiping all data after snapshot, is another option, as it would be hard to know what happened. all the now "free space" gets overwritten with prng. when entering the duress password, maybe grapheneos needs to put some UI theatre, like saying battery low, shutting down... so the agents think the phone is just shutting down due to low battery. another theatre could be a fake shutdown, that appears to not startup again... just wipe and kexec a fake kernel that just mimics a dead phone, till the batter actually dies. any attempts by the agents to charge the phone , is met with a fake boot and a charging error. This is just a phone with a bad battery, nothing to see here.
deepsun 3mo ago
Please note that "search" does not mean agent just scrolling through your photos. In Belarus, such "search" means plugging a USB cable and downloading everything from your phone AND connected clouds (Google Photos, iCloud etc). Then their software (bought for millions of dollars from a foreign security company) compares every single face in your photos/videos with every single face gov has in their database. And you don't have control of the downloaded data.
ramgine 3mo ago
Unfortunately, these days with how governments want to spy on everything your phone is your biggest vulnerability. Better to travel with a dumb phone than something that will send you to jail. Regardless whether it’s wiped or not, depending on the mood of the officer.
doh 3mo ago
I was always worried about situation like this. Wiping out the whole device is easy to prove. When I was designing my secure vault app for iOS[0], my approach was to make one of the “folders” (I call them vaults), to trigger the wipe out without any sign of doing so while retaining the data in the opened vault. It technically only deletes the index and the keys, and obfuscates them by replacing them with random bytes. I already heard from a person that was forced to open their app but was let go, because they complied. [0] https://vaultaire.app/ https://vaultaire.app/
627467 3mo ago
Imo it is not controversial that intent to destroy evidence is ilegal is most reasonable jurisdictions. Now, is this what's at stake here? Evidence of what? Surely at some point, clear allegations need to me made for which the content of the phone is evidence for. There's alot of speculation of what the indicted person was involved in, or motives of the border agents. Or the insinuation that the tooling that allowed the alleged destruction of evidence is (or should be) ilegal or indications of nefarious intent by those who use such tools. This is all BS. Am I missing something?
Cider9986 3mo ago
These are the relevant GrapheneOS statements: Duress hidden profiles viability statement: https://xcancel.com/GrapheneOS/status/2082153517234676150#m https://xcancel.com/GrapheneOS/status/2082153517234676150#m Regular defenses statement: https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/40700-grapheneos-protection https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/40700-grapheneos-protection... Discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49055169 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49055169

182 points by pseudolus 3mo ago

Keep fighting the good fight GrapheneOS!

yasss this is a feel good story they entered the pass themselves, so by their own treasonous logic, they should charge themselves. hope the crim charges get dismissed, and a civil suit is filed get paid, donate a chunk Go Team Graphene!!!!

butvacuum 3mo ago

is it just me or is it about once a decade somebody gets publicised for this and the government *really* throws the book at them.

1970-01-01 3mo ago

"defends" is doing quite a bit of flashy work for this headline. "Feature works as advertised, nobody upset" would be a much more practical headline.

RobotToaster 3mo ago
The government appears to be quite upset. You wouldn't want to upset ingsoc would you?

ChrisArchitect 3mo ago

Related: US Government targets Cop City protester over phone operating system https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49024436 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49024436

mmastrac 3mo ago

The founding fathers would be aghast at what America became. Hard to imagine modern America passing some of those constitutional amendments that older America passed wayyy back.

petcat 3mo ago
[flagged]
- Zigurd 3mo ago
  What about the abolitionists among the signers of the Declaration?
  - petcat 3mo ago
    I don't want to get into a whole thing about the founding fathers and American mythology. Yes, they had some pretty good ideas that have withstood the test of time. They also had some pretty f'ing bad ideas that we had to change. So some comment about the founding fathers rolling over in their graves about what America has become is complete nonsense.
    - colordrops 3mo ago
      What is your point? The original comment was really just a wry statement about the extreme level of corruption and ineffectiveness of the US government. Sounds like you find the current situation to be A-OK?
    - bastardoperator 3mo ago
      Executive war making, overgrown militaries, debt, party politics, concentrated power, corporate power, and foreign entanglement. The framers did not invision America in its current state, to state otherwise would be nonsense because we can just read the words they wrote.
TFNA 3mo ago
On the other hand, why care what the American founding fathers thought? There have been two centuries since then of developments in democratic countries that some Americans could choose as a model they like more. And now it's the Chinese century anyway.
- 3mo ago

whizzter 3mo ago

Someone who is a lawyer knows any details about the US justice systems precedents with regards to the fifth amendmend (regards to self incrimination) vs obstruction of justice (by destroying evidence) as would be applicable to a duress wipe? Also would the distinction of being (or not) read their miranda rights and placed under arrest in this case make a difference as to the status of any possible obstruction?

CountHackulus 3mo ago
According to Homeland Security, within 100 miles of the border is a "constitution free zone". So there's a whole lot to unpack before we even get to miranda rights.
iamnothere 3mo ago
Not a lawyer, but my understanding is that refusal to give the PIN (“remaining silent”) would be a valid application of the 5th, but not giving a false PIN. 5th does not imply the right to mislead or lie to someone investigating a crime. Not clear on anything else regarding the duress PIN but I don’t think a 5th defense would apply. Note that you apparently have to explicitly invoke your right to remain silent or your silence could be implied as an admission of guilt (thanks to Salinas v. Texas). I imagine you’d have to repeat your assertion multiple times, and the person demanding the PIN will tell you that you can’t use the 5th, will threaten you with arrest and additional charges, etc. Consult a lawyer and get training if you’re doing critical work where you may need this defense.
- tracker1 3mo ago
  I'm mixed... if they really thought there was evidence on the phone, they should have seized the phone and acquired a warrant IMO to compel the valid, non-destructive PIN be given over. As I mentioned earlier, this is part of why my own plans for international travel are to only go with a notebook/sheet with contact numbers and buy throwaway devices on the other side. I don't think I'd travel internationally with a phone or laptop at this point, and that's kind of been my thoughts for a while. Especially given the direction that many countries, not just the US have taken. For that matter, I don't think I'd ever even risk travelling to the UK or China at this point. Not that I like the surveillance state here in the US, at least I still have some rights preserved.

mingus88 3mo ago

This should be an interesting case in today’s legal climate Obviously grafeneOS has no liability. But the owner of the device didn’t take the action to remove the data, the CBP officer entered it. We already have some precedent around being forced to give up your password. How does that change if you are forced to give up a password that is destructive? What if the password works fine at home and the same password does a wipe based on location? Either way, the user complied, and did not take action to wipe their device.

victorbjorklund 3mo ago
Intentions matter. If the intent is to trick the officer to enter a PIN code that will destroy potential evidence then it does not matter that you didn't type the PIN code. Your speech is the thing that triggers a series of events that you know will lead to a wipe. Just like you can be charged with destruction of evidence even if you trick someone else to take the action.
- Groxx 3mo ago
  while attempting to avoid armchair-law-interpreting because I really do not intend that, and I agree that this is going to be an interesting/deeply-worrying legal case: wiping the device before carrying it across the border seems essentially identical to me. like, saying "you can't wipe it when searched" would also imply "you can't have an empty device when crossing because it may have been wiped before the search to avoid having your data searched" since people can (and often do) do that for exactly that reason. that may very well be what they want / what they are trying to legally allow during searches, but it also seems like it'd raise a hell of a lot more outrage. it's essentially claiming all citizens are under full legal hold all the time, if they ever intend to leave the country for any length of time.
  - iamnothere 3mo ago
    To my knowledge, no citizen has ever been prevented from reentry due to a blank or absent device. In fact they cannot block a citizen’s legal reentry for any reason, they can only detain you while they investigate. Beyond this, “I dropped my phone in the ocean” is always a perfectly valid reason. If you’re a foreigner and they already suspect you of something, they can deny you entry for any reason. It may be better to be denied than arrested!

pavel_lishin 3mo ago

The "agent entered password themselves, therefore they're to blame" seems as good of a logic as "I'm going to start swinging my arms and start walking forward, so if you don't move, it's YOU hitting YOURSELF".

skullone 3mo ago
Maybe digital forensics shouldn't be handled by barely highschool graduates at a busy border crossing
- gruez 3mo ago
  Should we take the same approach for physical searches? If the cops are executing a search warrant on a house, and there's a safe, should they send in a safe cracker on the off chance the safe is wired with a "duress pin" (eg. thermite that burns the contents)?
  - intrikate 3mo ago
    I mean, if it's possible to configure and there is at all a reason for someone to configure it as such, then it makes the most sense to treat it as a very valid possibility, right?
    - gruez 3mo ago
      Hindsight is 20/20 right? Sure, the duress pin feature was around for years, but so was the technology to set up a thermite boobytrap in a safe. Maybe now CBP officers should be more careful about entering random pins people gave them, but snarky remarks like "Maybe digital forensics shouldn't be handled by barely highschool graduates at a busy border crossing" are entirely unjustified.
      - skullone 3mo ago
        It is not snarky, it's the truth. Suspending the constitution within 100 miles of every port of entry? Nah son, the government can conduct their petty investigations with a warrant and proper digital forensics if they want to search your property.

tracker1 3mo ago

And this is why part of my plans for any international travel are to simply have a physical notebook with phone numbers to trusted friends/family and to buy throwaway devices on the other side (phone and chromebook or similar). TBF, similar mindset if I ever attend defcon, etc. as well.

flr03 3mo ago
The crazy part is that you might be denied entering the country you don't travel with a device...
- drnick1 3mo ago
  I have never heard of something like that.
- tracker1 3mo ago
  So be it, they can send me back.
__turbobrew__ 3mo ago
The simpler option is to fly through a place with USA pre-clearance. At least in Canada you can revoke you application to enter the USA at any time when in pre-clearance, and there are very limited instances when you can be legally detained by CBP (mostly around being an immediate threat or the CBP officer has evidence that you broke a law such as attempted smuggling). I currently fly to the USA through Canada and if CBP ever insists on seeing my phone I will revoke my application to enter and accept that Im most likely banned from entry for a while.

Magicrafter13 3mo ago

As a GrapheneOS user and a U.S. citizen that cares about the constitution, I fully support the actions taken by the individual

mindslight 3mo ago
Seriously. All of these comments talking about the legality are completely missing the point. At most this indicts the current laws, rather than the person who was illegally and immorally surveilled, searched, detained, coerced, and now harassed through the legal system. Anybody standing on a narrow view of "but this is just the law" while we have an outright hostile government that actively hates our individual liberties has wholly lost the plot.
- brnt 3mo ago
  > Anybody standing on a narrow view of "but this is just the law" It's a pity Americans must learn empirically rather than from history books how fascism operates.
  - mindslight 3mo ago
    Hey now, you can't just go casually dropping F-bombs like that in polite conversation. "Fascism" is something terrible from history, highly specific to that time, and can never happen again unless the people involved loudly proclaim themselves Fascists. And even then it's questionable if they would have the right to use the trademark! In fact I'm not even sure if I believe that the events that happened in Italy during the early 20th century should be called fascism. The word means something really really bad (though I'm not sure what), and we shouldn't speak ill of the dead. What's happening in the US is something completely new, different, and totally worth seeing what it can accomplish this time. Think of all those sci-fi "dystopias" with a privileged ruling class living lives of comfort and luxury, and not having to think about the filthy underclass. Good vibes are what I'm here for.
  - Magicrafter13 3mo ago
    I want to engage with this comment in good faith, but I'm confused on what is trying to be said. Per American Heritage Dictionary 5th Edition: > A system of government marked by centralization of authority under a dictator, a capitalist economy subject to stringent governmental controls, violent suppression of the opposition, and typically a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism. Looking at this case so far; - we have not observed any dictatorial behavior, - this is unrelated to economics, - we have not observed any violent suppression, - we have not observed any actions based on nationalism/race, given these facts, at least by this definition of fascism, there appears to be none yet present in this case. What history books or definition should Americans learn from that would lead them to view what transpired as fascism, and how should that inform their beliefs/decisions differently than how they are currently informed about the situation?

yardie 3mo ago

This is possibly the best advertising. GrapheneOS was kind of niche before. But if the US Government hates you then you're on the right track.

illithid0 3mo ago
On one hand, I love GrapheneOS and see it as a cornerstone of digital privacy software. I have supported the project financially for years. On the other hand, I'm worried that the publicity will only make explicit targets out of GrapheneOS users, and that you would only be using it "if you have something to hide".
- mpdpsycho 3mo ago
  Say that as they may, it’s a whole different slope to fall down if they want to do anything about that beyond pointing and whining. If we cross that bridge, we probably have bigger things to worry about. So I think it should be fine for now.
  - illithid0 3mo ago
    The DOJ is attempting to prosecute, so I suppose the success or failure of that will tell us what we need to know about bridges and slopes.
    - mpdpsycho 3mo ago
      Yeah, I’m placing some faith here on that falling through for sure.
- pelotron 3mo ago
  I have plenty of things to hide from Google which is the primary reason I use it.
  - illithid0 3mo ago
    I, too, would prefer Google not have their hands in a lot of my stuff. That doesn't mean the federal government won't take it personally that I won't let them look at all of it and take action.

gadders 3mo ago

UBS had a similar capability on their laptops so they facilitate tax evasion for US clients: https://www.cnbc.com/2015/04/30/why-did-the-us-pay-this-former-swiss-banker-104m.html https://www.cnbc.com/2015/04/30/why-did-the-us-pay-this-form...

gruez 3mo ago
That's probably safer because you can plausibly argue you're protecting your workstation, not unlike corporate security policies that require you to lock your workstation when you get up. Where they get into trouble is when they specifically say "use this when the IRS comes knocking". It's like offering an encrypted chat app (eg. signal) vs offering an encrypted chat app and marketing it to criminals. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantom_Secure#Law_enforcement_operations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantom_Secure#Law_enforcement...
triceratops 3mo ago
Only the people working on tax evasion had this on their laptops?
- gadders 3mo ago
  Probably all bankers.
  - triceratops 3mo ago
    So why did you say it was to "facilitate tax evasion"?
    - gadders 3mo ago
      RTFA. That is exactly what it was for - to hide account information from nation-level investigations.

cdrnsf 3mo ago

The border agents didn't act in good faith, regardless of what they're empowered to do. They wanted the data for one reason and fabricated another to prompt the device search. The data they were interested in pertained to protest activity protected under the constitution but the lie they told was about something criminal. That anything within 100 miles of the border is constitution free tosses that out, I guess, but is extremely problematic on its own.

deepsun 3mo ago
Interesting that all that rules don't apply to water. The moment you stepped on a boat, coastal guard can (and do regularly) board it and conduct a search without any reasoning. They don't need any probable causes, warrants, nothing. Seems like so far it didn't create any problems, so public is ok with that.
- tsimionescu 3mo ago
  The same is true at any border crossing - you have to submit to searches by CBP agents, who don't need any probable cause. I believe device searches are still a somewhat greyer area, at least if password protected (as providing a password would be compelled speech, unlike a luggage search which can be conducted without any action from your part).
  - john_strinlai 3mo ago
    >as providing a password would be compelled speech which is a good reminder for anyone with reason to be concerned about this sort of thing to turn off biometric/face id/etc. access to their devices.
    - akimbostrawman 3mo ago
      that's why GrapheneOS has biometric+pin
    - nickthegreek 3mo ago

luxuryballs 3mo ago

Next version should wipe the phone while presenting a dummy account so they can't easily tell anything is missing.

deleted 3mo ago

[deleted]

shreddit 3mo ago

Couldn’t GrapheneOS provide a special pin which boots into an “empty”session? Where the user can install some default stuff to not look suspicious?

petilon 3mo ago
Right, they should restore the phone to a user-picked previous state, as opposed to wiping it clean.
gruez 3mo ago
They said they don't bother because it's non-trivial to implement convincingly, so they don't bother, lest it gives people a false sense of security. For instance, if you do this, and the adb logs aren't scrubbed, then that's massively suspicious and that'd still you in legal hot waters.
john_strinlai 3mo ago
im not sure if grapheneos does or not, but it's not a novel idea, and often will only be a delay tactic. forensics will reveal the other partition(s), and then you're in the exact same position having to answer "what's the other partition, provide the password"
deepsun 3mo ago
People are doing that in Belarus (since 2020 the repression still continue). You also need to create a convincing profile and story for all the usual apps. Alibi if you wish.
- Cider9986 3mo ago
  Not forensically safe. I guess the authorities are aware but don't take the steps all the time except important cases. Really puts the citizens on their toes.
grapheneos 3mo ago
It would be easily detected by widely used forensic software from Cellebrite and other companies. It would also definitely look suspicious. We explained in much more depth in response to a related proposal: https://nitter.net/GrapheneOS/status/2082153517234676150#m https://nitter.net/GrapheneOS/status/2082153517234676150#m

Zak 3mo ago

This probably doesn't hold up legally, but it does hold up logically: if the reason a border search exemption exists is to prevent importation of material that is unlawful to import, wiping a storage device also fulfills that purpose.

RegW 3mo ago
It would seem that the officer was searching for evidence of a crime, not to prevent importation. However, did that evidence really exist? And if it did, was it for something else? Perhaps, the guy just worried about something far more mundane being discovered? We shall never know. Think Schrodinger's password.
- Zak 3mo ago
  The border search exemption is not intended to allow searching for evidence of crimes that aren't related to importing something illegally. Of course CPB isn't expected to ignore evidence of other crimes they happen to see incidentally while checking for things that are illegal to import. Courts have been fairly tolerant of law enforcement using pretexts like that to expand their powers.
- danudey 3mo ago
  This is the issue with these sorts of laws. How do you make it illegal to destroy evidence of criminal misconduct when the destruction of evidence can make it impossible to prove it ever existed? That seems to be along the lines of what they're arguing here - they wanted to perform an ostensibly legal search, and he destroyed everything that might have been evidence either way. It would be like a corporation getting an e-mail from the SEC saying "Give us all the communications your company has had about these three stocks" and the company saying "Oops someone erased our e-mail server so I guess we don't have any communications about that." If you're this paranoid about being searched, or you have something to hide (even if that 'something' is a sense of morality and a desire for a free and just society), wipe your phone before you cross the border and not during. Put some basic apps on (reddit, twitter, etc), leave them logged out or put them on some empty account and tell them you're not a big social media guy or you're on a digital cleanse or something. Wiping your phone when you're being detained by law enforcement is a bad look one way or the other.

nilamo 3mo ago

No warrent? No data. Easy as.

john_strinlai 3mo ago
no warrant required at a border crossing.

josefritzishere 3mo ago

The Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution is supposed to protect people from random and arbitrary stops and searches. It's a fundamental American right. But in the 100 mile border zone, the federal government has tried to impinge on those basic rights. https://www.aclu.org/know-your-rights/border-zone https://www.aclu.org/know-your-rights/border-zone

TheqO 3mo ago

It's great publicity for GrapheneOS, has probably led to a huge spike in traffic to their website and downloads. And ongoing publicity as the trial happens.

seethishat 3mo ago

It is illegal to lie to a police officer in the US. It's better to remain silent than to tell a lie. Giving a false PIN is a lie. And that by itself is a crime. I'm not taking sides here, I just wanted to make that clear. And you should understand that they can lie to you. That's OK and legal, but you cannot lie to them.

EPWN3D 3mo ago
There are limits to the lies they can tell, IIRC. They are limited to lies which would not harm an innocent person. So if an officer says "We have your fingerprints on the murder weapon", that is fine, because an innocent person will know that there is no way that can be true. Whereas a guilty person would presumably find that lie plausible. But if an officer gets a confession by saying, "They just passed an amendment, and you don't have the right to a lawyer anymore, so you have to answer my question or I'll send you to a torture dungeon", that is a lie that can harm anyone, regardless of guilt.

t1234s 3mo ago

any reason with graphine os to wipe vs power off? Unless you have an easy bfu password doesn't it protect you from multiple password attempts?

grapheneos 3mo ago
It uses hardware with a secure element only permitting 20 attempts. The past 5 unique attempts are rejected early out for usability. We published a technical overview of how GrapheneOS protects against data extraction covering the major protections it adds: https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/40700-grapheneos-protections-against-data-extraction-from-locked-devices https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/40700-grapheneos-protection...
- t1234s 3mo ago
  graphine os needs a feature to triple press the power button for an immediate power off.

mannanj 3mo ago

If only these phones could have a feature where you can enter a mode to encrypt segments of data with different encryption keys, all able to be unlocked still by one single master encryption key that you could also enter at any time. Then when in travel, and about to pass a border, you enter that selective mode. You can enter a different password as the proxy to unlock the phone in this bare minimal data mode. The agents can access it, etc but wont have all the data. That data shouldn't even be visible in the OS, and if they try to copy the hard drive they will get encrypted data in the other blocks. You still legally comply with orders and unlock the phone but the other partitions don't unlock/decrypt unless you specifically unlock them.

pbgcp2026 3mo ago
This feature exists today – it's called "leave your gadgets at home". S3 bucket and / or laptop with Tails on USB stick is all you need.
- mannanj 3mo ago
  Well yes it exists, however it's too high friction IMO for me to use - and I'm already a software guy. And I mean the data at the application level too - it wouldn't be practical for me to have to keep removing apps and data since they don't integrate with this at an OS level and with your proposal we would have to manually sync/remove data from S3. Or I suppose we would program something to make this. Just saying, doesn't exist today it seems but would be valuable for us.
br0ceph 3mo ago
if u read the grapheneos tweet about this, any form of minimal account puts all ur other accounts at risk. agents should never get any form of code execution on ur device, even from a sandbox account. the linux kernel is not secure, and they can just hold the device till the next public disclosure or use one of their existing cellebrite attacks. duress password to shutdown instead of wipe could be an option. duress password to restore to snapshot, effectively wiping all data after snapshot, is another option, as it would be hard to know what happened. all the now "free space" gets overwritten with prng. when entering the duress password, maybe grapheneos needs to put some UI theatre, like saying battery low, shutting down... so the agents think the phone is just shutting down due to low battery. another theatre could be a fake shutdown, that appears to not startup again... just wipe and kexec a fake kernel that just mimics a dead phone, till the batter actually dies. any attempts by the agents to charge the phone , is met with a fake boot and a charging error. This is just a phone with a bad battery, nothing to see here.

deepsun 3mo ago

Please note that "search" does not mean agent just scrolling through your photos. In Belarus, such "search" means plugging a USB cable and downloading everything from your phone AND connected clouds (Google Photos, iCloud etc). Then their software (bought for millions of dollars from a foreign security company) compares every single face in your photos/videos with every single face gov has in their database. And you don't have control of the downloaded data.

ramgine 3mo ago

Unfortunately, these days with how governments want to spy on everything your phone is your biggest vulnerability. Better to travel with a dumb phone than something that will send you to jail. Regardless whether it’s wiped or not, depending on the mood of the officer.

doh 3mo ago

I was always worried about situation like this. Wiping out the whole device is easy to prove. When I was designing my secure vault app for iOS[0], my approach was to make one of the “folders” (I call them vaults), to trigger the wipe out without any sign of doing so while retaining the data in the opened vault. It technically only deletes the index and the keys, and obfuscates them by replacing them with random bytes. I already heard from a person that was forced to open their app but was let go, because they complied. [0] https://vaultaire.app/ https://vaultaire.app/

627467 3mo ago

Imo it is not controversial that intent to destroy evidence is ilegal is most reasonable jurisdictions. Now, is this what's at stake here? Evidence of what? Surely at some point, clear allegations need to me made for which the content of the phone is evidence for. There's alot of speculation of what the indicted person was involved in, or motives of the border agents. Or the insinuation that the tooling that allowed the alleged destruction of evidence is (or should be) ilegal or indications of nefarious intent by those who use such tools. This is all BS. Am I missing something?

Cider9986 3mo ago

These are the relevant GrapheneOS statements: Duress hidden profiles viability statement: https://xcancel.com/GrapheneOS/status/2082153517234676150#m https://xcancel.com/GrapheneOS/status/2082153517234676150#m Regular defenses statement: https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/40700-grapheneos-protection https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/40700-grapheneos-protection... Discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49055169 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49055169