Is it safe to travel to the United States with your phone?
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I _feel_ like the administration would brag about blocking potential European terrorists or something of this was actually going on intentionally.
My gut tells me that the people getting blocked at the border are either running into extremely overzealous border guards OR are making some kind of ruckus anyway and complaining to the media after provoking guards somehow.
Still not acceptable behavior by border guards, but it’d be a far cry from a top down order.
I guess we’ll see how often these stories keep popping up.
But it could also be that the overzealous staffers feel like they want to impress the higher ups. So it could well be happening bottom up. The administration certainly isn't jumping in to fix it when it happens. If so, that's something you need to take into account if you want to travel here.
Many are going to boycott us entirely anyway, just because of how hostile the administration is to our erstwhile allies.
Yeah like meta killing their DEI programs to suck up to Trump.
I don't see a similar hatred of such programs here in Europe luckily. I work for an EU company that has a big footprint in Europe and they have no plans to reduce their inclusivity programs. I'm directly involved in those.
And really, no they are not about quotas at all. It's all about being "colourblind", to remove inherent bias, exactly what the Trumpians claim to want.
Or because Zuckerberg wanted to avoid “life in prison”
Which may be worse, actually.
https://www.cnn.com/2024/08/31/politics/video/smr-trump-zuck...
Besides, Zuckerberg has more than enough money to evade US law if he needs to (and that's if Trump can manage to make such BS into law!). Even Snowden has successfully done that and he wasn't even rich.
He's not really at risk of going "to prison for life".
Trump probably was just grandstanding there. He makes hundreds of meaningless threats per day, to make it impossible to tell which ones he means to carry out. But they do cause fear, because you can never be 100% certain. And not even other oligarchs are safe.
That’s why I’m going to wait to believe these stories until more time has passed.
If these were just a blip come a few months, then they were a fluke.
If it becomes a pattern… well it wouldn’t be surprising…
Because of that I don't think this comes from the top. But doing so would be entirely in character.
The problem is that normal US law doesn't apply at the border. They even held an American NASA employee with a security clearance and this was before Trump.
It does look like it's getting worse now though. I'm definitely not going to the US anymore even if my work asks me to.
https://archive.ph/zNMKP (NY Times) https://apnews.com/article/border-tourists-german-canadian-d...
Better to give always links to (reliable) sources to keep noise from shills and deniers low.
* New administration means people (including border guards) are now feeling emboldened to act in a certain way. This means people that already had that leaning, will be unabashed in their action, and middle-manager level will be less strict on stopping these behavior since it might backfire on them.
* Now suddenly the topic is interesting to the vast cohort of the population. Which means that in the media boardroom, where they decide what to cover, put out, etc, they take that in to account and report & investigate more of it. Sometimes, things that was already endemic but unnoticed get a huge bump in coverage and create a perception that it's top-down, while in reality there have always been the issue, but now it's more blatant.
Days after the Brexit vote, people went out of their way to vandalize non British business establishment. One Polish boutique was trashed and people now felt it was "ok" to leave graffiti in the form of "get out you're not welcome here". Those sentiment was always there and if you go to any immigrant community in any country and ask locals they usually have stories about it, but with the brexit vote many felt that was justified and did it in excess, which lead to media coverage. Did leave campaign say any of that, or instructed people to do anything similar? No. But part of the follower of that campaign already had the leaning to it, and it wasn't until the comparison to Kristallnacht started to pop up until the parties took a firm stance to it.
Probably same thing happening here. So the thing to watch out for is probably what would be the official reaction to it. a silent nod might just mean this is the new norm.
> Days after the Brexit vote, people went out of their way to vandalize non British business establishment. One Polish boutique was trashed and people now felt it was "ok" to leave graffiti in the form of "get out you're not welcome here".
That is also attributable to your second reason about the topic being interesting and reported in the media. The number of people who actually did things like that is tiny, but because it happened to people originating from the EU after Brexit it was newsworthy. When it happens to people from other countries or if it happened before Brexit it was not newsworthy.
We had racist stickers put on your door in the 1990s, and quite people had a lot worse happen to them in the 80s, but it was not newsworthy at the time unless it was extreme or happened to someone who was high profile or knew some jouranlists.
I don't know if there are many people who want to provoke guards, at the risk of being deported, or worse. Just for the fun of telling a nice story to the medias?
> it’d be a far cry from a top down order.
Trump has been sending a clear message that bullies were getting a free pass, for instance when he pardoned the rioters. It's not because there's not a top down order that the administration isn't directly responsible.
This is nothing new but maybe exacerbated by the current administration. From what I gather from the news and from a European citizen point of view what’s new are the detentions.
My default guess is Goodhart's Law.
The current administration expressly values 'tough' border enforcement, and it publicly uses removals and associated statistics to describe how 'tough' it is being.
Border agents respond to these incentives by looking for any excuse to deny or remove would-be entrants, minimizing the independent judgment and discretion that's an ordinary part of the job.
It's not a 'top down order', but it's an entirely predictable consequence of the administration's messaging.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ian_Kershaw#%2522Working_Towar...
You feel like, your gut tells you. And you land exactly where your beliefs are confirmed and where any response/call to action outside of the status quo is unwarranted.
If you ignored your feelings and took a look you could find the people responsible for these policies gleefully advocating to accelerate and enhance the abuses. It is easier to accept their self-serving lies and Kafkaesque legal machinations than it is to confront the realities of the world we face.
The threat is real and elevated.
I have 'nothing to hide' but free speech is not what Elon thinks it means (in many countries), including now, the US. I don't want to be arrested for something I said 10 years ago which was now mined, or hallucinated, by Palantir AI scanning my phone.
You write the data to it, delete the phone app which did that write, and once you are through, re-install the phone app and read your data.
Last time I went through the TSA scatter scanners and wand waving theatre the 3 implants I had were not detected.
I know my bank account PIN, and it's linked through Apple Pay. My other cards - credit x2, building society I have no clue. Those PINs are stored and given I'm never out without my phone I always have access to the numbers.
I was constantly stopped and quizzed by the TSA to the point I would wipe my macbook and phone before travelling. Using the NFC chips that had all the details I needed made sense.
What you should be able to do is wipe it, then pull down the backup image and get it back exactly the way it was.
Which you just...can't do AFAIK.
To do it without flashing you need to be comfortable modifying system software. Which for Android means authoring your own ROM. It's a hassle.
You'd download your image to the card, then reboot and it'd flash it.
Basically we could eliminate the hassle.
I've heard Russia uses Cellebrite devices at borders, which means cloud-storing an image of your entire device for foreign intelligence agencies to carve up later is possible.
I used to buy a local SIM card when I got to the airport. Next time I go overseas I might have to buy a new phone and SIM card.
Edit: from what others have said, I'll also be making sure my phone is shutdown before the plane lands.
I might also be looking very closely at GrapheneOS on a second hand pixel.
I think a better option is probably just to delete any app that might have critical comments on it, like social media etc. And then you can just say you've quit social media.
Free speech is literally the first right granted by the bill of rights. Criticism of our president has _always_ been allowed.
But I find that hard to believe - that someone in CBP would recognize what’s confidential government information, and then just deport him and not arrest him for spying…. I did find it curious though that the French guy himself never said it was for his messages about trump - only some people in the French government were saying that.
France is probably one of the most capable military intelligence centers in Europe, have a large amount of nuclear power and supporting infrastructure and is a Muslim stronghold in some areas. So clearly, something more than just surface level WWE-style drama is going on.
Maybe some of these stories shouldn't even be news... because the details that come later usually turn it into a nothingburger. Like of course someone is going to be detained if the government legitimately believes they could be connected to a terrorist, nobody is getting upset at THAT.
And if these news stories WERE actually something that was happening regularly, it wouldn't even BE news anymore. The mere fact that it's a headline is supposed to mean it's something NOT normal that's going on.
I wouldn’t want to be the next public target for Musk and Trump, either.
Moreover, the First Amendment is held (not just philosophically, but this is the legal theory behind its incorporation against the states under the 14th Amendment) to be declarative of a universal right (a right "fundamental to ordered liberty"). It is therefore monstrous to try to excuse its violation by the US government against any person subject to its power under any circumstances.
Lovely stance... Also, the headline question is if it's safe to travel there.
Sounds pretty unsafe to me.
https://time.com/7269604/el-salvador-photos-venezuelan-detai...
"US authorities accused the scientist of sending "hateful and conspiratorial messages" related to the Trump administration's treatment of scientists and scientific research."
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/french-scientist-denied...
That's dramatically different than going to the funeral for a terrorist leader, or making statements supporting terror-bringing organizations...
Namely that the US Government argues that the 1st Amendment "free speech" right only applies to US Citizens.
The deal to drop the extradition of Assange only came about after the UK Judge quizzed in on if Assange would be able to depend upon that protection, rather than simply assert it (and have it denied).
So I'd not be surprised at a French citizen not having "free speech" in the USA.
You get a burner and leave it there
AFAIK, almost every device is more secure BFU.
I don't think they're lying, after all if they did they'd lie about much more common mobile OSes too. But personally I wouldn't inform the public of my weaknesses if I were a 'security/forensics' company.
People should never use apps that sync to something else than their own servers.
Apps are sandboxed. I don't see how it's possible.
How many phone apps there are these days that are strictly local storage and don't communicate externally to anywhere? It's all cloud cloud cloud, which means it is most likely passing through one or more MITM points.
Also if the phone is on and was unlocked at least once, the encryption key is in memory somewhere and is vulnerable to regular old software exploits.
(Both of the above can be prevented by shutting down the phone before the search attempt)
Finally, if there’s a vulnerability that lets you reset the number of passcode attempts (which has to be loaded in memory somewhere, meaning a bootrom or kernel exploit could be used to modify it) and your passcode isn’t super long (4-digit PIN, some 6-digit PINs, pattern lock), it’s possible to make what is effectively a password guesser and use it to break the password lock within an hour or so.
There is a shortcut, however, on iOS to secretly put an iPhone into BFU mode - quick tapping the power button 5 times will lock the phone and erase the aforementioned in-memory keys so that it needs a password to unlock.
(EDIT: it does not actually put the iPhone into BFU mode. It just disables biometrics.)
It's safer to come with a phone that's completely empty of private information, and re-image it remotely once reaching your destination.
Which isn't to say that it hasn't gotten a lot worse in the US recently.
To elaborate, per the CBP (https://www.cbp.gov/travel/cbp-search-authority/border-searc...), if you refuse to unlock your phone or other electronic device it may be confiscated.
If you are a non-citizen, they can also use that refusal as evidence that you are not 'entitled to enter the United States.' In theory that alone is not sufficient to result in denied entry, but in practice it seems that border guards have a great deal of subjective leeway about things.
If you are a US citizen, they cannot deny you entry at the border. However, the device might still be confiscated.
What would be the best way to protect myself with a phone while still being able to do all of this? Having a burner smart phone with an ESIM so I keep my number (for communication), itineraries saved to device, and no account logins or apps?
That's what I would do anyway.
But technically it's not really without a Google account. Aurora just has a batch of common accounts it assigns randomly when you log in with the "anonymous" option.
I don't know why it says that there but it definitely has this function. Perhaps they don't want to draw too much attention to it due to its unreliability and resulting support issues. There have been periods of a couple of weeks where it didn't work at all due to Google blocking these accounts but lately they have backed down.
You can access some data remotely afterwards but I wouldn't restore it and make sure it doesn't stay cached on my devices. Better to connect to a remote desktop with credentials you know from memory. What you could do is find some recommendations for a good lawyer in the area you plan to go beforehands and have his number stored somewhere.
The EFF and ACLU have been fighting that belief for years. They're making progress but they're not quite there yet.
https://www.theregister.com/2023/05/31/us_border_phone_searc...
But generally speaking, don't bring your real phone to the USA. Bring a burner phone that's empty. Download whatever it is you need on the phone well after you've cleared the border.
Never seen their vehicles before.
Extremely disconcerting.
1. Why did you pull me over?
2. Am I being detained or am I free to go?
(If detained) 3. I plead the 5th.
4. Shut the fsck up
5. Continue to shut the fsck up but otherwise comply with lawful demands.
6. If you need to deny a request to search, clearly state that you do not consent to a search. Don't answer yes/no to the question because they might try to weasel word you.
7. Fight your battles in the court later with a lawyer if they do something wrong. Arguing on the street rarely works in your favor.
As a Canadian, I'm more concerned with the vast percentage of us who live within 100 miles of the US border.
https://www.aclumich.org/en/cases/all-michigan-warrantless-b...
https://www.aclumich.org/sites/default/files/field_documents...
They've made I-213 arrests as far inland as Grand Rapids and even Mount Pleasant, which is about as far from the lakes as you can get.
Records do show that only 1.5% of cases involve people with "Light" skin tone, so if you're white you're unlikely to be affected directly by this. It's not about Canada.
Of course, traveling is also a higher risk time anyway in terms of having your phone stolen or lost. So it's definitely not a bad idea regardless to consider workarounds. Used phones drop in value very fast for example while still being extremely powerful and useful given how the pace of improvements in smartphones has leveled off heavily in the last 5 years. Like an iPhone 12 or 13 Pro are still fully supported, likely will be for another 2-4 years, and still solid devices. Both can be readily found at this point for $250-400, something like 1/3 the price of a current gen. Depreciation in price is very fast vs depreciation in relative performance or features. So simply flat out having a phone for travel and not putting anything on it sensitive is an option, and then if something happens it can be abandoned with less concern.
Alternatively in some cases one could erase their main phone, set it up for travel, and then restore via VPN after crossing borders. This is more trouble then ideally it should be, and depends on either having a high bandwidth connection at your destination or some other workaround (mailing yourself a hard drive for example), but can let you stick to one main device.
But I'm glad it's getting more attention even from those who typically haven't thought about it. I hope it spurs demand for better technology answers as well. The more convenient privacy and security are the more adoption and the better for all of us.
At some point, the answer is to revert to pre-electronics travel--or just not travel. Or just decide that the individual risk is pretty minimal compared to all the other things that can happen if you leave your home.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-65314605
The French authorities did not like what a French publisher published about them. So they asked Britain to fuck about with one of the publisher's employees who was going to visit a book fair in London.
They arrested the employee on terrorism charges, because they demanded to search his phone when he arrived in the UK, and he refused -- that's a crime, because the UK is a shit nation with evil laws. That should not be a crime.
I see what you did there :D
But yeah. Other countries do it too and they should be called out.
The government at that time in the UK was the Tories though and they aren't really all that different from the Project 2025/Heritage Foundation guys. Also very conservative.
The specific issue of it being made illegal to not reveal your passwords/keys caused an enormous outrage in the UK, but the Labour government passed it anyway.
Activists sent Jack Straw, the home secretary at the time, encrypted files on disk, and said that because the files are now in his possession, they want to demand he decrypt them, and because he definitely cannot - he never knew the password - he should go to jail for two years under his proposed law.
Jack Straw's response to this was not "I see, what a stupid law, let me get rid of it". His response was to write into the law "this law doesn't apply to government ministers"
The UK is also on my list of "never travel to" countries anyway, it has been since Brexit and the xenophobic sentiments that empowered. Really the "taking back control" was really a euphemism for "less black faces on our streets". At least it seemed that way when I spoke to some of the more outspoken Brexit proponents in my circle. They turned totally rabiate anti-immigrant. All people that were decent before, by the way.
Obviously I will never go to the US again either. Though nobody has asked me to go there. I did get asked by work to go to some Google thing in London and I refused for that reason which was totally ok.
I think you need a better understanding of the UK. Brexit was a "fuck you" to the white Polish, Romanian and Bulgarian faces on our streets.
While the political right of the UK had been "Eurosceptic" since losing the 1975 referendum, and there was the Cambridge Analytica scandal... the massive popularity of UKIP that gave rise to the Brexit was backlash against the mass immigration from the poorer eastern European countries that joined the EU in 2004 and 2007.
The Labour government at that time imposed no constraints on migration while all other EU countries (save Ireland and Sweden) did. It was a deliberate choice, partly to boost GDP and partly to "rub the right's nose in diversity" (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8326501.stm)
And now that Brexit has happened, we have massively more immigration from (South) Asia and Africa. We replaced white faces with brown and black faces. Therefore, "taking back control" must have meant "we want more black faces on our streets"? (https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-...)
The British have always been stratified by class. They are more likely to look down on you for your accent than your skin colour.
For example, people who graduated from Oxford or Cambridge are less than 1% of the population, but are 44% of the newspaper columnists in national newspapers, and are 71% of senior judges: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/elitist-britain-2...
In fact, you can go back to the Norman conquest of Britain (1066); people with Norman surnames are more likely to be well-off in modern Britain than those with Anglo-Saxon surnames. Generation after generation has kept wealth and power "in the family": https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12110-014-9219-y
Effectively, there is a governing class of specific families and bloodlines that runs Britain; the middle classes aren't in it, the working class aren't in it, the colonies (when Britain had them) weren't in it, and foreigners definitely aren't in it. The USA had a little sniff of this classism, with the W.A.S.Ps that could trace their roots back to the original US colonies getting uppity about more recent arrivals and classifying them as "not white", but it's nothing compared to the UK.
Atop that you have religious sectarianism. Britain colonised Ireland first, murdered the Celtic chiefs, and installed loyalists to King Billy. What you're seeing with EU immigration and Brexit already happened in the 1920s-1930s in the Second City of Empire; read about the economic conditions that brought about the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glasgow_razor_gangs -- white (Protestant, native, working class) people feeling threatened by white (Catholic, Irish, deprived) immigrants looking for better economic opportunities
In fact, I often cross borders into/out of totalitarian countries. I usually uninstall all messengers, Firefox, financial and security apps and use Shreddit to wipe the free space. Then I restore everything after crossing the border. My laptop has a large movie file which is really a VeraCrypt volume where all the programs and data sit.