Quote:
Originally Posted by FatalError
Another interesting thing to remember is that any time you are traveling internationally, the US governement has the right to seize your laptop when you re-enter the country, and you have to give them all your passwords and information how to de-encrypt any files you have. They then either confiscate all your electronics or make a copy of your hard drive.
A lot of law firms or companies that do a lot of intellectual property work have stopped allowing their employees to fly into the united states with their actual laptops, and instead use blank workstations and VPN to their data.
I'm sort of surprised this hasn't happened to someone yet.
This is very true and very scary indeed...and it goes beyond laptops...they have the right, and have been excercising it very liberally recently, to examine any and all of your electronic devices, including your PDA, blackberry, iPhone, cell phone, and digital camera... they typically take a COMPLETE copy of your electronic device, if and when they become suspicious.... remember, if you do carry a large sum and they stop you, there is a chance they may think you are a mule of some sort (terrorism, drug trafficking, money laundering, etc.) and as such there is a good chance you would be subkect to such treatement....
and if they do take a complete copy of your laptop, which they typically do these days, that means they have access to all your passowrds (if you have them stored on your PC), browsing history, cookies, files, tax returns, and PORN (lol) and whatever else you decide to store on your laptop.... just another word of caution in these 'dangerous' times...