Subject: Be aware when traveling to the USA.

From: Franck Martin <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 2 Aug 2008 13:25:44 +1200 (FJT)

http://www.reuters.com/article/technologyNews/idUSN0126069520080801?feedType=nl&feedName=ustechnology 

U.S. agents can seize travelers' laptops: report 
Fri Aug 1, 2008 8:13am EDT 

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. federal agents have been given new powers 
to seize travelers' laptops and other electronic devices at the border 
and hold them for unspecified periods the Washington Post reported on 
Friday. 

Under recently disclosed Department of Homeland Security policies, 
such seizures may be carried out without suspicion of wrongdoing, the 
newspaper said, quoting policies issued on July 16 by two DHS 
agencies. 

.... 

Franck Martin 
ICT Specialist 
[email-masked] 
SOPAC, Fiji 
GPG Key fingerprint = 44A4 8AE4 392A 3B92 FDF9 D9C6 BE79 9E60 81D9 1320 
"Toute connaissance est une reponse a une question" G.Bachelard 
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From: "Steven M. Bellovin" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 1 Aug 2008 21:35:25 -0400

Be aware when traveling *from* the US, too -- according to the policy
at
http://www.cbp.gov/linkhandler/cgov/travel/admissability/search_authority.ctt/search_authority.pdf
they worry about exports as well...

In fairness, though, many countries reserve the right to search
laptops.  See http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/150465.stm for a
story about it happening to a journalist entering the UK from France.
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---

From: Truman Boyes <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 2 Aug 2008 14:09:57 -0400

Hi there,

According to the US Customs and Border Protection Policy document it  
appears that search and seizure at border/immigration centers does not  
apply directly to sealed letter class mail; and documents inside  
sealed letter class mail may not be read by officers without a  
appropriate search warrant.

How about mailing yourself a USB drive with encrypted data and taking  
that along for the trip.

Truman

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From: Jeroen Massar <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 02 Aug 2008 20:37:12 +0200

Truman Boyes wrote:
> apply directly to sealed letter class mail; and documents inside sealed 
> letter class mail may not be read by officers without a appropriate 
> search warrant.

For folks concerned about this, do at least read:
http://www.cbp.gov/linkhandler/cgov/travel/admissability/search_authority.ctt/search_authority.pdf 

as it might clarify some things which might be misunderstood otherwise.

That document also mentions:
"Notwithstanding this law enforcement mission, in the course of every 
border search, CBP will protect the rights of individuals against 
unreasonable search and seizure."

Unfortunately they don't specify what they call unreasonable, as IMHO 
this whole 'mission' of them described in that PDF is unreasonable.

> How about mailing yourself a USB drive with encrypted data and taking 

Or what about, trying to use this great invention called... The Internet

Which kind makes it completely useless for them to be doing this in the 
first place (IMnsHO) because the people who want to bring data from A to 
B will just send it that way and nicely over all kinds of secure 
channels. Then again, a plane full of tapes is faster than most internet 
connections of course.

I am still wondering what the real reasoning is behind this lame 
security theater setup. It is just another annoying step from wanting me 
to go there.

For me the procedure seems simple and applies actually to any case where 
you might expect your data/hardware to be stolen (it is the same thing 
in my opinion if they take it with law behind them, or a thief just 
steals something from me):

  - Don't bring along anything you don't want others to get
  - For the hardware you bring along before entering _and_ leaving
    the country:
     - use shred(*1) on the full disk and other media you have
     - re-install a full copy of $distro, so that you have the tools
     - just have one account: username=root, password=root
   Then after arrival, download and use your data, before leaving
   (might take 8 hours++ for the shred) upload your data to your
   internet host, shred+re-install in the same way.

Now if they want your laptop or other hardware/storage, you can just 
give it up, yes, you loose them for some time, but there is nothing you 
have really lost. Yes, it is, like every other Security Theater, very 
annoying, but at least you avoid the problem where you loose something 
you didn't want to loose, and you can also just tell the guys there 
"this is my re-install cd, you can have it, you'll figure out that there 
is nothing on this thing that can be illegal or violating anything"

Don't forget that your PSP or DS, that you are using in-flight, might 
also contain precious save-games especially after 8 hours of gaming 
in-flight), so don't forget to figure out a way to back-up those after 
landing ;)

Of course, one can always make use of Tor (http://www.torproject.org/) 
to send your data around so that you'll remain quite anonymous too.

For these kind of nasty rules, we'll just have to bend over and keep on 
smiling (but not too much, because they won't like that either...)

Greets,
  Jeroen

*1 = 
http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/shred-invocation.html

---

From: Bill McQuillan <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 2 Aug 2008 12:42:50 -0700

>> How about mailing yourself a USB drive with encrypted data and taking 

Unfortunately, the above interpretation is defeated by the last two
sentences of the relevant paragraph in the CBP document:

----------8<----------
Sealed Letter Class Mail. Officers may not read or permit others to read
correspondence contained in sealed letter class mail (the international equivalent
of First Class) without an appropriate search warrant or consent. Only articles in
the postal system are deemed "mail." Letters carried by individuals or private
carriers such as DHL, UPS, or Federal Express, for example, are not considered to
be mail, even if they are stamped, and thus are subject to a border search as
provided in this policy.
----------8<----------

Guess they thought of that workaround.  :-(

So, back to the internet as savior!

-- 
Bill McQuillan <[email-masked]>