[privacy] At U.S. Borders, Laptops Have No Right to Privacy

[<rms () bsf-llc com>]

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/24/business/24road.html?ref=technology
<http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/24/business/24road.html?ref=technology&pagew
anted=print> &pagewanted=print
 
October 24, 2006
On the Road

At U.S. Borders, Laptops Have No Right to Privacy 

By
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/s/joe_sharkey/in
dex.html?inline=nyt-per> JOE SHARKEY

A LOT of business travelers are walking around with laptops that contain
private corporate information that their employers really do not want
outsiders to see.

Until recently, their biggest concern was that someone might steal the
laptop. But now there's a new worry - that the laptop will be seized or its
contents scrutinized at United States customs and
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/i/immigration_
and_refugees/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier> immigration checkpoints upon
entering the United States from abroad.

Although much of the evidence for the confiscations remains anecdotal, it's
a hot topic this week among more than 1,000 corporate travel managers and
travel industry officials meeting in Barcelona at a conference of the
Association of Corporate Travel Executives. 

Last week, an informal survey by the association, which has about 2,500
members worldwide, indicated that almost 90 percent of its members were not
aware that customs officials have the authority to scrutinize the contents
of travelers' laptops and even confiscate laptops for a period of time,
without giving a reason. 

"One member who responded to our survey said she has been waiting for a year
to get her laptop and its contents back," said Susan Gurley, the group's
executive director. "She said it was randomly seized. And since she hasn't
been arrested, I assume she was just a regular business traveler, not a
criminal."

Appeals are under way in some cases, but the law is clear. "They don't need
probable cause to perform these searches under the current law. They can do
it without suspicion or without really revealing their motivations," said
Tim Kane, a Washington lawyer who is researching the matter for corporate
clients.

In some cases, random inspections of laptops have yielded evidence of
possession of child pornography. Laptops may be scrutinized and subject to a
"forensic analysis" under the so-called border search exemption, which
allows searches of people entering the United States and their possessions
"without probable cause, reasonable suspicion or a warrant," a federal court
ruled in July. In that case, a man's laptop was found to have child
pornography images on its hard drive.

No one is defending criminal possession of child pornography or even
suggesting that the government has "nefarious" intent in conducting random
searches of a traveler's laptop, Ms. Gurley said.

"But it appears from information we have that agents have a lot of
discretion in doing these searches, and that there's a whole spectrum of
reasons for doing them," she added. 

...

 

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