Amid the recent news of a U.S. citizen being asked to turn over his phone to authorities at a border crossing, Sophia Cope of the Electronic Frontier Foundation has tips on digital civil liberties.

Archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20250412154222/https://www.npr.org/2025/04/11/nx-s1-5359447/what-are-your-rights-if-border-authorities-ask-for-your-phone

Related, “Attorney representing a student protester detained by federal immigration agents”

When a man in Michigan was heading home on Sunday from a family vacation in the Caribbean, he was stopped in the Detroit Airport. Federal officers, border agents, detained him, interrogated him and pressured him to hand over his cellphone. The man is a U.S. citizen. He’s a civil rights and criminal defense attorney, and among his clients is an activist who has been charged in connection to a pro-Palestinian protest at the University of Michigan.

Archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20250410185452/https://www.npr.org/transcripts/nx-s1-5357455

  • gAlienLifeform@lemmy.worldOP
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    3 days ago

    I love the spirit of what you’re saying, but per the attorney’s advice in this article, they might seize your phone no matter what you say, password protection with no fingerprint or face scan unlock should ideally keep them out (note that law enforcement usually can take your picture or finger print you without needing a warrant or anything, but they can’t force you to tell them a password), but you will probably never get that device back and you could be detained indefinitely while they try to intimidate you into waiving your 5th amendment silence rights.

    So because citizens have an absolute right to reenter the country, they have a bit more leverage to, you know, deny a request or refuse to comply with requests to unlock their phone. But that doesn’t mean that there aren’t going to be consequences. They could be detained for several hours. Their phone could eventually be confiscated. So even U.S. citizens have to think about those potential consequences.

    [As for lawful permanent residents,] [t]echnically, they also have to be let back into the country, but as we’ve seen in sort of a nonborder contexts, the government and the current administration is pretty willing to question the status of LPRs. And so we always say that, you know, they should be especially kind of mindful and thoughtful about how they comport themselves at the border.

    I think your best strategies would be 1) just do not travel to the United States if it can at all be avoided; 2) if you must to travel to the US, don’t bring any electronic devices capable of storing media with you, purchase new ones after you are past the border, securely download what you need, then erase and destroy those devices before leaving; 3) if purchasing throwaway devices isn’t an option, just act as white as you possibly can and just hope you get lucky and they ignore you.

    • twistypencil@lemmy.world
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      3 days ago

      Face scan unlock is NOT enough. When crossing the border turn OFF the phone. Don’t just lock it, full off. The security protections from cellibrite attacks are much much much much stronger if it is off

        • twistypencil@lemmy.world
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          22 hours ago

          Even so, off is better. Disk is unencrypted when on, leading to potential extraction. When off, there is more protection

      • NotMyOldRedditName@lemmy.world
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        3 days ago

        It’s important it’s encrypted as well. Disk Encryption isn’t a default on option typically.

        If it’s disk encrypted and the device is powered off, only a valid password (not biometric) will unencrypt it from off.

        Edit: and a good device would encrypted it using a hardware module that will only work in that device for that hard drive, so they can’t clone the drive out and try a bunch of easier pins as it’d be missing the hardware piece. Easier pins would only work if done on your phones hardware.

        • shekau
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          3 days ago

          How is it possible to setup disk encryption on smartphone?

          Btw on Android you can enable an option, that your phone will be erased and restored to fabric settings, if you enter wrong password/pin 20 times. So its useful too

          • NotMyOldRedditName@lemmy.world
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            3 days ago

            It’d be a device by device thing. Looks like Pixels do it be default, but I wouldn’t assume all do. It’d be a setting if it’s not default.

    • Ep1cFac3pa1m@lemmy.world
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      3 days ago

      If you’re a US citizen they can only hold you for 48 hours without pressing charges. I no longer have faith that limit will be enforced, but it’s there in theory.

    • shekau
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      3 days ago

      Why can they detain and seize phone of US citizens that come back from different country back to the US? I thought they are only allowed to check the phone of foreigners that visit USA.