Something else to get paranoid about

[dianeduane]

Gaah.

Tags: computer, detention, laptop, examination, gaah, paranoia, government

Comments

[were-gopher.livejournal.com]

Customs Deputy Commissioner Jayson P. Ahern said the efforts "do not infringe on Americans' privacy."

I'd love to know what his definition of privacy is then.

[blue_ant]

Possibly it's that we don't have any. Next up: brain scans, because that's one storage device they can't confiscate (yet).

[alitalf.livejournal.com]

The brain scans probably won't be working well enough, even in the lab, to do anything like reading your mind, in less than ten years from now. BUT they can now use realtime mri to determine which of several different words you are thinking of, and detection of lies can be done with mri more accurately than by other means to date.

What won't be possible at all soon is downloading your memory. The mri machines, at least for a long time, will only be able to register current brain activity. Old memories that you are not actively recalling are unlikely to be able to be retrieved any time soon.

Long before that, it will be possible to show on a screen a picture of what you are thinking about at the time. It may not be able to be very high resolution at first, and I guess there will be a profession of interpreting the blurry blobs the machine will probably give in early stages of development.

[keristor.livejournal.com]

There's a bit in the front of a lot of books, in the copyright stuff, which says something like "You musn't make copies ... or store it in any information and retrieval device". I've wondered whether I'm breaking that by reading the books (there are several chunks which I can and do quote verbatim)...

[beamjockey.livejournal.com]

Next up: brain scans, because that's one storage device they can't confiscate (yet)

Not quite. Next up are skin scans (http://beamjockey.livejournal.com/95897.html).

[casacorona.livejournal.com]

And the moral of this story is: leave a complete backup at home, and gmail any new work to yourself before you cross the US border.

And you know that if Congress makes any rule about not profiling victims, Homeland Security will just seize every computer coming into the country.

[keristor.livejournal.com]

leave a complete backup at home, and gmail any new work to yourself

That's not sufficient. Nuke the entire drive before crossing the border. Or preferably don't take anything across at all, note that any written materials can also be seized. You're reading a 'subversive' book, like Heinlein? Leave it at home. In fact, I doubt that even a Bible would be safe, because they have been used to smuggle subversive materials.

I'm waiting for the ruling which will mean that all travellers must be totally naked. After all, if bombs and papers can be hidden in shoes why not in any other clothing? As long as those pretty stewardesses also have to obey the rule I won't mind *g*...

And some people still wonder why I refuse to enter the USA...

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

also have to obey the rule I won't mind *g*...

No, you will mind. Because you will be naked, put into temporary hibernation and stacked tightly. After all, the only way to make you safe is to make sure you cannot deliberately do anything, and once you're unconscious, why have cabin crew any longer.

The only downside for the aviation industry is that it'll negate the wonderful SLF initialisation.

[keristor.livejournal.com]

Ah, but I did qualify it. If there are no pretty stewardesses I don't fly (unless I'm pilot!).

[jerel.livejournal.com]

Having just flown domestic (WI to FL) yesterday, I can say I would not mind being unconscious for a flight. Air travel just ain't what it used to be.

On Topic: okay, so I understand that if they get a laptop, they can look for things on it. (And I'm not saying they should.) But if I'm carrying, say, 1984, what would be the point of taking it? What can they possibly learn about me? I'd have to fight the urge to say "You must have a copy of this already. Isn't it your field manual?"

(Actually, I'm thinking they'd definitely take my copy of Finnegan's Wake, because they'd probably think it was some kind of code.)

[were-gopher.livejournal.com]

I think their field manual is closer to We or Brave New World.

[siliconshaman.livejournal.com]

The problem with that is, they are doing their best to build an electronic border too.

basically, under proposed legislation the telecoms companies will enable the DHS to intercept any emails etc coming in from abroad.

[casacorona.livejournal.com]

Intercept and read, yes. Confiscate, no. The current customs protocol has them confiscating the electronics, possibly for months.

[siliconshaman.livejournal.com]

Well, if the aim is to keep your private data, private, then intercepting it has the same affect as it being physically purloined.

Of course, you still get a copy...

[natural20.livejournal.com]

Oh dear holy Lord. I wonder how long it has been in place and how many items they've seized, but that's just scary.

[alitalf.livejournal.com]

They're possibly making a nice sideline in selling second hand computers, long after the owners have returned to their countries of origin and are not able to collect the items seized. I wonder, could you claim on your travel insurance for the cost of replacement?

[fiveforsilver]

Note to self: Never take computer out of the US. Gaah indeed.

[alitalf.livejournal.com]

Or your telephone, or your ipod, or indeed any expensive digital gadget you can't easily afford to replace.

[fiveforsilver]

True enough. God. I guess if I travel again, it'll be the time to get a PAYG phone and a cheap mp3 player.

[fiveforsilver]

Not to mention camera! But that's the whole POINT of my digital camera! Gah.

[ariaflame.livejournal.com]

If I ever do get round to doing my round the world trip, I know one country I will certainly be avoiding. (I was disinclined to go there prior to this, but this certainly adds another nail in the no touring the USA coffin)

[occams_pyramid]

What, and miss the chance to wear one of these?
http://www.informationweek.com/news/security/intrusion_prevention/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=208803214

[ariaflame.livejournal.com]

I don't think it would go with my usual outfits. I'm just not a fashion follower.

[occams_pyramid]

"Why are you trashing all concept of privacy or civil rights?"

"violent jihadist materials" as well as images of child pornography!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh well, that's OK then. Just shouting keywords makes it quite alright doesn't it.

And in the age of the internet, it's ludicrously obvious security theatre.

[albireo.livejournal.com]

...Seriously? Wow, USA, wow.

I was just talking to my boss about something like this yesterday

[dakiwiboid.livejournal.com]

I was packing up some documents to send, and noticed that Fed-Ex has a laptop box. I said to her, "You know, it might be sensible for people to Fex-Ex their laptops on to their destinations rather than taking them along on planes, what with all of these new search and seizure policies." She thought about and said that she was really glad the company doesn't send her abroad these days.

[cjmr.livejournal.com]

The really scary thing is that an Federal Appeals Court has already upheld this obvious violation of the Constitutional protection against unreasonable search and seizure. And it would take a miracle for the current formulation of the Supreme Court to overturn it.

I guess if I ever again take my digital camera out of the country, I'll be FedEx-ing my memory cards home, except for a blank/dummy with a couple boring pictures on to leave in the camera. And I won't be taking my laptop.

[cmdr-zoom.livejournal.com]

Which shows you how screwed up things are, because that strikes me as the very definition of "unreasonable search and seizure." Ah, but the Constitution does not apply in times of emergency, which will continue for as long they say so...

[giza.livejournal.com]

All the more reason to start encrypting my sensitive stuff with TrueCrypt (http://www.truecrypt.org/).

That being said, if my laptop is ever confiscated, I intend to file both a police report and an insurance claim.

I know that the police probably won't accomplish much, other than create another headache for DHS and maybe make them reconsider their decision.

The insurance claim would also be another way of putting pressure on them since, if my insurer were to reimburse me for my loss, chances are that they would then go after DHS for compensation.

I hope it never comes to that, though.

[gidget-ca.livejournal.com]

They can actually hold you until you provide them with passwords/keys -- indefinitely.

So, encrypting your stuff like that is just another way of saying 'send me to Guantanamo Bay.'

[giza.livejournal.com]

This is true. That is one reason why TrueCrypt has Plausible Deniability: http://www.truecrypt.org/docs/?s=plausible-deniability

[occams_pyramid]

So you'd better hope that you don't know anybody who would think it 'funny' to put a large random-number file on your computer, that there is no decryption for.

[ibneko.livejournal.com]

From what I've read (second-hand information, mind), insurance won't do much, as they usually have small bits freeing them from having to pay for things the government seizes? :\

[siliconshaman.livejournal.com]

How long do you think, before the US decides the best way to be 'safe' is to simply close the borders to all travel apart from their government officials and the military?

I mean, at this rate the airline industry is going to collapse anyway, all these 'safety' features just keep driving the cost up, and driving passengers away...

[uozaki.livejournal.com]

This and other articles I've read on the subject are why I'll be pushing for my field work to all be done within the US (as I am an unfortunate resident of same). Between this, and the reports of things going missing from luggage checked and carryon alike, I can't stomach getting on a *domestic* flight ever again, much less international.

[sibylle]

Oh, fantastic. I am an American Studies teacher and, while the next thing I really *ought* to be doing after my contract here runs out is find a job at a uni in the US, I've been less and less motivated to actually do so. It's not the people, it's the government. Bah.

[notosa.livejournal.com]

there was a recent article in one of our australian papers about Ipods being potentially confiscated and exaimined incase they contained illegal downloaded Mp3s - but ANY electronic storage advice being confiscated is even scarier.. Do you have to hand over passwords? Because how many people have their mail/other sign in sites including banking saved on their pc's with cookies. Granting access to the laptop -

[rabidfangurl.livejournal.com]

Why is it I suddenly feel the urge to collect all the receipts, boring note-to-selfs, trashy novels, and all other bits of utter boring and useless detritus I can and carry it over the Canadian border, just so I can surrender it to the DHS agents as I return home? I can just see the look on their faces as I empty my purse of a years worth of 'pocket litter.'

[mithriltabby]

This is why I’m a member of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

[gidget-ca.livejournal.com]

This is why we won't fly via the US anymore. Thank god there's Vancouver -> Melbourne service now!

[dorianegray.livejournal.com]

This makes me want to go to the US, just so I can enter with a USB stick half full of "subversive literature" ("A Vindication of the Rights of Women", "1984", the lyrics of "Jerusalem" (or better yet, a recording thereof), etc.), and half full of e-mails saying "okay", notes-to-self, Project Gutenberg bookmarks for early 20th century girls stories, and other random detritus. And watch them take it off me, and snigger quietly to myself.

Hm...wonder what they'd make of a USB stick full of the works of J. Irving Hancock (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H._Irving_Hancock)...?

[kayshapero]

I'd already planned to never take a laptop or anything electronic more complicated than my wristwatch onboard an airplane, because I really don't need the lifetime degraded by the frippin' scanners (the one at the courthouse where I last did jury duty is probably responsible for the early demise of my last cell phone, not that I can prove it enough to collect damages.) Here's hoping turfing out the current administration will at least serve to stem the avalanche a little. Words fail me.

Not directly related to the content of the post itself, but....

[marlinkhylacat]

....I'm so impressed with how calmly and reasonably people are discussing this here that I just HAD to say something. It appears that, unlike most of the Intardwebz, Miz Duane's friends and fans are largely intelligent thinkers who don't feel that every discussion should deteriorate into flame wars and personal attacks. Good on all you guys! :D

Oh, This Again?

[dewline.livejournal.com]

I've been hearing about this for a couple of months now. Unnerving.

As for the possible fallout of a successful ACTA negotiation, you don't ever want to go there...

[dershem.livejournal.com]

Egad. What next?