U.S. Border Agents Can Search Laptops Without Cause, Court Rules

by Jarrett Martineau | April 23, 2008 at 05:32 pm | 289 views | 4 comments

This federal appeals court ruling will have significant implications for the millions of people who travel to and from the United States with their laptops, mobile phones, and digital cameras, assuming that the contents of these devices is personal, private and won't be shared with government agents.

Turns out, it will be.

Federal agents at the border do not need any reason to search through travelers' laptops, cell phones or digital cameras for evidence of crimes, a federal appeals court ruled Monday, extending the government's power to look through belongings like suitcases at the border to electronics.

The unanimous three-judge decision reverses a lower court finding that digital devices were "an extension of our own memory" and thus too personal to allow the government to search them without cause. Instead, the earlier ruling said, Customs agents would need some reasonable and articulable suspicion a crime had occurred in order to search a traveler's laptop.

The ruling (.pdf) came in a case where customs agents searched the laptop of Michael Arnold who was returning from the Philippines. They found images they believed to be child pornography, seized the laptop and later arrested him. While the lower court ruling excluded from trial the pictures of young boys the government says it found on the hard drive, they now can be used again.

...travelers should be aware that anything on their mobile devices can be searched by government agents, who may also seize the devices and keep them for weeks or months. When in doubt, think about whether online storage or encryption might be tools you should use to prevent the feds from rummaging through your journal, your company's confidential business plans or naked pictures of you and your-of-age partner in adult fun.

And we crying foul over social networking sites' privacy policies?

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jordan

at 17:57 on April 23rd, 2008

good stuff:

Good stuff... scary, though...

jordan

at 18:00 on April 23rd, 2008

By extension, encrypted data can be seen as some sort of proof of wrongdoing. Business travellers could well find themselves squished between US Customs' snooping and their own confidentiality arrangements with their bosses. Not an enviable position to find oneself in, and no clear benefit for travellers: since when are border agents IT security experts, or masters of data security? Unless they're both of the above, they're doing more harm than good.

PEP

at 00:14 on April 24th, 2008

"They found images they believed to be child pornography, seized the laptop and later arrested him. While the lower court ruling excluded from trial the pictures of young boys the government says it found on the hard drive, they now can be used again."

Well, for Gawd's sake, we can't be prosecuting and possibly convicting people who may be involved in child pornography or child sex, now, can we?

Computers are heavily used in "pedophile sex travel" these days.

Another storm is moving in, so I can't go read the entire article right now, too bad. But as much as I want my computer to be private, the bottom line is that criminals--especially child predators--are going to make that very hard to continue.