Border Searches - my Laptop

[Guest rainwalker]

Several days ago, I returned to my home country Canada from LOS and, again, was called out of the customs line and subjected to a full search.

 

In the last 2 years, each time I crossed the border I was targeted and my luggage searched.

 

They took the laptop - with years worth of private emails and business records - and my 2 cell phones, a PDA, a camera and my iPod into a backroom and left me waiting for 40 minutes while they searched the electronics for contraband data files.

 

The last time, I discovered that there was a very sophisticated spyware program - a key-logger - installed on my laptop in a 2 day window that included the Customs search time which no freeware removal tool was able to eliminate.

 

I found a program called Steganos Security Suite which removed the tracker.

 

As well, it encrypts and even hides sensitive files.

 

A word to the wise...

 

Rainwalker

 

Steganos Security Suite combines ten powerful tools for protecting your privacy:

Steganos Safe protects your sensitive data - it serves as your encrypted hard disk. You open the safe with a password, USB stick or your ActiveSync-capable SmartPhone: via Bluetooth or even wireless.

 

Laptop lost or stolen? With Steganos AntiTheft, you increase your chance of restoring it. Your valuable data will definitely not be accessible. USB sticks, too, can be turned into portable safes: now even rewritable.

 

Federal court okays warrantless searches of laptops at US borders

 

RAW STORY Published: Friday July 28, 2006

 

 

In a unanimous ruling, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that laptop computers may be searched by police at the US border, according to Technology Today, RAW STORY has learned. The court's three judges ruled that laptops searches and seizures are allowed "under the border search doctrine."

 

In its ruling, the court noted that the appellant, defendant Stuart Romm, had been in a hotel room in the US where he connected to the Internet and downloaded images of child pornography. Subsequently, Romm was denied entrance to Canada when authorities at the border learned he had a criminal past and was serving probation for a conviction of possessing child pornography. Romm was turned over to US agents who searched his laptop and discovered the pornographic images.

 

Based on information from Romm's computer, he was sentenced to fifteen years. This case was a result of his appeal.

[Gaybutton]

It's interesting you wrote about this. A friend of mine recently had the same sort of thing happen to him at the Detroit airport when he recently returned from Thailand. He was detained for over an hour and a half while Customs searched through his laptop. He did have photos of boys on his computer, but all were of age and all were at least partially clad and in non-pornographic poses.

 

Customs gave him the third degree. At first the inspector refused to believe that the boys were at least 18 years old. They even said they want to go to his home and search his desk top computer. I don't know if they actually did that. I have not heard from him since he told me the story.

 

The point is, be very careful about what is on your laptop computer when you are traveling. Obviously customs officials are checking. The whoile thing seems absurd to me because anyone can take the photos on a laptop and E-mail them to themselves or store them on the Internet somewhere, and then delete them from their computer.

 

I dislike the idea of Customs prying into people's personal affairs whether it's legal or not. Most people are not foolish enough to place illegal photos on their laptops when traveling internationally and the time it takes for such searches can easily cause people to miss connecting flights. Just what you need after a long haul flight . . . a needless delay and hassle getting through customs that can cause you to miss a connecting flight, and then having to go through an ordeal just trying to get back home. Such an experience can ruin an entire holiday, and for what?

[Guest stef]

That's sucks... I can't believe they went through all that.

But this is not the first time I have heard this from the US. Now canada I am surprised but probably the same law goes for both country.

 

I have been coming back and forth from Thailand to the other side of the world, I have 2 laptops and 4 externals hard drive + Ipod and never got stopped.

 

The worst is when I have to take it out of my hand language and go through X-rays. They look at me like I am a nut case with all the technology I bring along with me... but not once, they checked the content of my stuffs. Never happened yet.

 

I really believe it does happen a lot for those who flies direct from BKK to the States or Canada. Never done it with a directly flight , that's probably why.

 

Also if you fly to Thailand like every other months for years, they might be suspecious on what you are doing over here...

 

Go figure.

 

I hope you did not miss any connection flight because of that. I bet they did not care.

 

I know Steganos Security Suite very well. I used to have it on my Window computer, but it not on Mac unfortunately... but I for sure miss it.

 

It is probably the best program ever out there for security.

 

You can encrypt files to the maximun security which is impossible to decrypt. Lost the password once and I wasn't a very happy camper when I realized it was gone for ever

 

So make sure you take it easy on the password

[Gaybutton]

I too have never had my laptop searched, but these searches seem to be a recent thing. Customs officials do check people who fit certain profiles. I don't have any idea how they arrive at these profiles, but it does seem logical for them to have suspicions about a single man with a lot of entry and exit stamps from Thailand in his passport.

 

Maybe your laptop will be searched and maybe it won't. The trouble is there is no way to know until you try to pass through customs. The obvious solution . . . don't have anything questionable on your laptop.

 

I don't know how the law works, but even with the encryption software I wonder if customs has the authority to insist that you decrypt the files for inspection or have your laptop seized. Does anyone know?

 

To my mind, the whole thing seems ridiculous. To me, it's just like the Pattaya police spending so much time worrying about fining helmetless motorcyclists when there is so much true crime out there. I'd rather see customs officials spending their time searching for drugs and possible terrorist activity rather than spending any time at all worrying about whether someone has pornographic photos on a laptop.

[Guest stef]

I too have never had my laptop searched, but these searches seem to be a recent thing. Customs officials do check people who fit certain profiles. I don't have any idea how they arrive at these profiles, but it does seem logical for them to have suspicions about a single man with a lot of entry and exit stamps from Thailand in his passport.

 

Maybe your laptop will be searched and maybe it won't. The trouble is there is no way to know until you try to pass through customs. The obvious solution . . . don't have anything questionable on your laptop.

 

I don't know how the law works, but even with the encryption software I wonder if customs has the authority to insist that you decrypt the files for inspection or have your laptop seized. Does anyone know?

 

To my mind, the whole thing seems ridiculous. To me, it's just like the Pattaya police spending so much time worrying about fining helmetless motorcyclists when there is so much true crime out there. I'd rather see customs officials spending their time searching for drugs and possible terrorist activity rather than spending any time at all worrying about whether someone has pornographic photos on a laptop.

 

I agree, most likely the customs officials do check people who fit certain profiles, most likely those who have many stamps from Thailand or those countries where many "things" happens.

 

But I still believe it i stronger in the US an Canadian customs cause I haven't heard any of this anywhere else so far.

 

I know now 4 peoples who have been stopped and questionned about their trip in Thailand. Also asked about Ipod and went through their computers. All were from the US and Canada.

 

I understand the reasons, and I really believe it is good to go chase for the underage pornography but it must be a pain in a butt when you are the good guy , not trying to hide anything. The vicious people will hide whatever which has to be hiden , so well it must be hard to find. So yes go ahead and look to any laptops or computers .... it must be time comsuming.. with all the flights in provenance of BKK...

 

Not sure where the law stands about the customs forcing you to decrypt files. what do you do if you loose your password ? Go to jail ? I wonder what would happen if something like that happen.

 

The Steganos Security suite was so good that even B** L***** ( sorry but I don't want to spell this name ) used this software at one point. I have read that on computer articles when Steganos wasn't that popular. It is unbreakable.

 

End of story : be a good guy and stay away from underage porn and photos.

 

Adult pornography isn't a problem correct ? Cause I have many movies with Adults on them. You can tell the guys are over 30. I don't hide them . well not yet......

 

[Bob]

Other than a competent "wiping*" of your harddrive, you can't "delete" an image that the government program can't find so simple deletion of a image will hardly protect you. This is true even with all of the various kinds of media for digital camera.

For example, I found a free program on the net that will let you "find" deleted images on compact flash and smart media cards (because I screwed them up or accidentally deleted them). I can usually recover 80-90%of the photos that have been deleted and have even done so after reformatting the media. And that's using a free, simple, program (the feds certainly do better).

If you're carrying a computer or any other type of media, the only 100% safe way to do that is not to have ever had questionable photos on the harddrive/media. While I had the inclination to take a nude photo or two of close friends, I have stiffled myself so far as I don't want or need the risk.

 

*There are many "wiping" programs available on the net, some for free. Supposedly you can be 99.99% safe by wiping the free space to DOD (Department of Defense) standards (which I understand is a minimum of 9 passes - and that'll usually take 15-24 hours to do depending on your chip speed). Even with this, I have no clue if the federal programs can or can't find something that's been wiped to that standard.

[Gaybutton]

usually take 15-24 hours to do depending on your chip speed). Even with this, I have no clue if the federal programs can or can't find something that's been wiped to that standard.

 

The next question, then, is how long does it take for such programs to find what has been deleted or completely wiped? Rainwalker says he was kept waiting forty minutes. Can such an in-depth search be conducted in that amount of time?

 

According to what Rainwalker wrote, at least part of their search is conducted with some sort of a sophistocated keylogger program that requires special software just to eliminate later.

 

Obviously, the only truly safe thing to do is to make sure the hard drive in the laptop does not, and never has had, illegal files on it.

 

Suppose the customs search does turn up illegal photos, illegally downloaded music, pirated software, or something else illegal. What happens?

[Guest stef]

I am not sure if they are so sophisticated at the customs, but we never know. I am sure they are running keywords or size of file and see what's up in the system. But to trully search the whole hard drive in 40 minutes is pretty amazing.

 

May be with a Mac , that's different I still would not want to get throught that process. It will take hours then.

 

If the search turns up illegal photos then I am sure you are in for trouble.

Now if you are french and get cut with something illegal on your computer in the US customs? Then you probably get 20 years without probation.... Just kidding

 

But Illegal music ?

How can they really know the music is illegal ? I mean unless you don't clean the music tag and it syas " freedownloadmusic.com" on it, then yes it is obvious but you can easily import all your CD music from your collection at home into your hard drive as MP3's, so how can they really get you with that ? Probably the Free Programs such as Napster, Limewire and others.

 

Most likely they were just looking for illegal photo , no doubts about that.

 

As you say Gaybutton, the best would be to make sure you haven't had anything of this sort on your computer.

[Bob]

A trusted friend of mine was told by a federal agent that their program is looking solely for porn (especially the kiddie variety) although some modifications have been made to it since 9/11/2001 for security purposes. He said that it takes about 3-4 minutes, once the program starts, for the program to signal a possible problem or no problem. I presume they'll take a bit longer if a possible problem crops up.

So, I doubt if they are looking for copyrighted music or other such things.

 

I also heard - totally hearsay - that they are capable of adding a bug to your computer that either helps them find something a second time or (and I hope not) will allow them remote access once you're later connected to the net. This rumor is so paranoid I don't want to contemplate it (although I don't personally worry as they'd be bored to death looking at my computer).

[Gaybutton]

I also heard - totally hearsay - that they are capable of adding a bug to your computer that either helps them find something a second time or (and I hope not) will allow them remote access once you're later connected to the net.

 

I would be very interested to hear a response to this from an attorney, if any attorneys are reading this. Can they do something like that, especially the part about remote access to your computer, and do so without your knowledge or consent?

 

I could understand that if they had sufficient reason to suspect terrorist activity, but even then I can't imagine them being able to do something like that without a court order.

 

But to clandestinely place software on someone's computer so they can later monitor to see if you are looking at porn on the net? I hope they are not wasting our tax dollars and their manpower on something as ridiculous as that. Can you imagine having the police suddenly burst through your door, yelling "Gotcha!" while you're sitting in front of your computer looking at a porn site? I thought that kind of thing is what the USA is supposed to be fighting against.

 

If this sort of thing is really going on, then welcome to Big Brother and neo-facism.

 

[Guest catawampuscat]

A couple of trips ago to the USA, I went thru customs in Minneapolis and it was a major hassle..

The agent asked me about my laptop and I told him I didn't have one..As I had all my carry on and checked luggage in front of me opened, I couldn't understand where he thought the laptop might be but he kept asking the same questions..Then he wanted to see my I-pod.. I don't have an I-pod but he asked me several more times for the I-pod.. Then he asked me over and over how long did I stay in Thailand and why did I go? Then he asked again and again as if it were for the first time..

 

It was all very annoying especially in his midwestern accent and pompous attitude but really was he

blind or just stupid?.... I can understand it if you have a laptop and /or I-pod but when you don't

why play the game??

 

BTW, NYC customs always a breeze for me and a walk in the park..Never a hassle or attitude or

stupid questions asked over and over...

[Gaybutton]

how long did I stay in Thailand and why did I go? Then he asked again and again as if it were for the first time..

 

I wonder what they expect you to say. It's kind of obvious how long you stayed when you have dated entry and exit stamps in your passport . . . you know, the same passport they have right in their hands and are looking at when they ask these questions.

 

And there he is, inspecting all your luggage, and still insisting that you must have an I-pod or a laptop. Maybe he thinks you have them, but somehow made them invisible.

 

Is Thailand exporting the concept of logic?

[Guest Boxer]

Happenened to me at a Provincial International Airport in England two years ago laptop taken questioned for 30 minutes and searched but nothing on it and had a silly own fault Crash two weeks later so nothing left on it in any case. I put laptop in a large carry on bag now not a laptop case so its not visible.

[Gaybutton]

Judging by the number of people who responded to this thread and also had this sort of inspection happen to them, then I'd say there is enough of it going on, for whatever reasons, to take precautions as to what they might find on your computer. It seems clear that at least one of the profiles they look for are single men. I doubt it is limited to single men traveling back and forth from Thailand, but that might be a flag they look for.

 

The solution seems simple enough to me. Don't travel with a laptop that contains illegal or even questionable files on it. If you take digital photos that might be considered questionable, then E-mail them to yourself or upload them to a web site that stores photos, but do that from an Internet cafe, not from your laptop. Clear the flash or whatever storage media your camera uses.

 

It seems pointless to try to get through customs with any such files on your computer. Obviously the odds of being caught or detained are too great a risk. Also, I have a feeling that even if your photos are perfectly legal, but are boy photos, then your name might be placed on some sort of "check thoroughly every time" list and you'll be hassled every time you go through customs even if you're not carrying a laptop. I don't know if that would really happen, but in this day and age I think the chances that it would are greater than the chances that it wouldn't.

[Guest pgsp]

Anyone know how US Customs would react to sex toys in your bags?

 

I usually come back thru SF or Chicago, both of which (unlike Texas) don't have

any laws against sex toys, but maybe customs can prohibit things that are legal

even in the state you re-renter the states.

 

At the least, I'm sure if they find them, you can bet they will give the rest of your luggage

a very detailed search.

[Bob]

I don't have a clue about the sex toys but I'm not about to experiment (I really don't want the customs officer holding up a dildo asking me (in front of 50 other people) if it's mine!

 

Last summer, to visit a friend who was suddenly hospitalized in another city, I obtained a one-way airline ticket to go visit and also took with me a carry-on bag of clothes for my friend's wife which her mother packed. Unfortunately, I was the target - single male with a one-way ticket and was pulled out of line for special searching by security. I tried to use a little humor (when some ugly dude was patting me down and heading south of my belt, I asked if I could request a female officer for review of my southern zones) but that got me nowhere (I think humor requires a minimal IQ of 65 or thereabouts). When another unpleasant fellow bellowed out "are these clothes yours?!?", I answered (without thinking) "yes." Well, the dumbass at that point held up a rather funny looking pair of pink panties for all the world to see and it was at that time I unsuccessfully tried to become invisible.

Of course, that wasn't the end of it. I tried to explain the real deal and all I got was a stupid look and the inquiry as to whether I was carrying a bag I didn't pack. I almost missed the plane which left an hour later.....

[Guest GayPattayan]

Gaybutton queried:

"

 

QUOTE(Bob @ Jul 29 2006, 04:22 PM) *

 

I also heard - totally hearsay - that they are capable of adding a bug to your computer that either helps them find something a second time or (and I hope not) will allow them remote access once you're later connected to the net.

 

 

I would be very interested to hear a response to this from an attorney, if any attorneys are reading this. Can they do something like that, especially the part about remote access to your computer, and do so without your knowledge or consent?

 

I could understand that if they had sufficient reason to suspect terrorist activity, but even then I can't imagine them being able to do something like that without a court order.

 

But to clandestinely place software on someone's computer so they can later monitor to see if you are looking at porn on the net? I hope they are not wasting our tax dollars and their manpower on something as ridiculous as that. Can you imagine having the police suddenly burst through your door, yelling "Gotcha!" while you're sitting in front of your computer looking at a porn site? I thought that kind of thing is what the USA is supposed to be fighting against."

 

Although the US government has full rights to check things out AT THE BORDER ENTRY, putting in a bug or program letting them access it later would definitely be illegal, and anything they learned from getting later access to the computer would be an illegal search, and any evidence resulting from it would be tainted, and not usable in court. The right to inspect is AT THE BORDER ONLY; any later search would require a search warrant, and I cannot envision any court allowing a later search under such circumstances.

 

Allen -- G.P.

[Guest stef]

 

Although the US government has full rights to check things out AT THE BORDER ENTRY, putting in a bug or program letting them access it later would definitely be illegal, and anything they learned from getting later access to the computer would be an illegal search, and any evidence resulting from it would be tainted, and not usable in court. The right to inspect is AT THE BORDER ONLY; any later search would require a search warrant, and I cannot envision any court allowing a later search under such circumstances.

 

Allen -- G.P.

 

 

The best way to make sure your computer is safe is to simply search for the software or bugs that was installed while they searched the computer.

SpyHunter : http://www.enigmasoftware.com/products.shtml is an amazing one as well as Steganos security https://www.steganos.com/en/products/saspy2006/ . This only works on a windows system though.