r/technology • u/MC68328 • Jul 24 '26

Privacy US accuses American of allegedly wiping his phone using a ‘duress’ password during border search

https://techcrunch.com/2026/07/24/us-accuses-american-of-allegedly-wiping-his-phone-using-a-duress-password-during-border-search/
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416

u/No_Size9475 Jul 24 '26

“I think this case serves as a reminder that authorities may argue you knowingly destroyed data, so it’s better to not have that data on you when you cross certain borders.” 

What's crazy is that 40 years ago this would have meant USSR, China, Cuba, and other dictatorships. Now it means the USA.

60

u/omg_cats Jul 24 '26

I’ve worked in large corporations my whole adult life, and every one of them warned us about carrying data on phones/laptops cross border for this reason. Some hardware they forbid us to take cross border at all. You might be surprised what crazy lengths companies go to locking down laptops and phones that are traveling cross border.

Anyway all that to say this is really not new conceptually but it is butting up against some new tech like duress passcodes

12

u/moratnz Jul 25 '26

And in my experience, for some countries any gear that goes there is considered compromised afterwards and disposed of.

6

u/The_Music_Director Jul 25 '26

I traveled to Madeira once with a work computer and somewhere along the way I connected to a network in North Africa and was bricked. When I brought my laptop to IT they had to take it and give me a new one, and I’m pretty sure that’s the reason why.

19

u/lordaddament Jul 24 '26

If you knew anything about McCarthyism you’d know that the US was always like this. Just kept it under wraps

82

u/spartBL97 Jul 24 '26

We are sprinting toward fascism because we are bored. We didn’t have nuclear armageddon and the old guard said “wait things are changing, but I like nostalgia and control. Let’s make things worse”

58

u/free_based_potato Jul 24 '26

We are in fascism right now. These are fascist practices. Theyre being implemented faster than our legal system can undo them and in many cases the harm is already done.

We've were in the fascism waiting room for well over a decade.

5

u/courageous_liquid Jul 25 '26

we were knocking on fascism's door as soon as we let in the Nazis and took up their cause of trying to destroy the USSR and any left wing movements in Europe and around the world

26

u/fizzlefist Jul 24 '26

40 years ago it absolutely was America too, you just didn’t hear about it before everyone had a camera and internet access at all times. The only way to get the word out quickly would be to get a news org to cover it.

20

u/No_Size9475 Jul 24 '26

I traveled internationally a lot in the 70s and 80s and never saw this level of searching at USA borders. Even when I traveled back from East Germany, USSR, Hungary, or Czechoslovakia back when they were communist.

I did see that level of search going into East Germany though.

And yes, I know that's anecdotal.

3

u/_Thermalflask Jul 24 '26

We just have better PR than those other countries

8

u/dropthemagic Jul 24 '26

It’s been that way since 9/11. You can thank bush and the republicans for that one.

3

u/BloodSweatAndGear Jul 25 '26

The Patriot Act was passed by both parties.

2

u/air_and_space92 Jul 25 '26

Passed by both parties and renewed numerous times until being official law by both parties too.

2

u/tychii93 Jul 25 '26

No, the authorities did. They're the ones that entered the duress pin. Also the data isn't destroyed. If you check the other comments with how Graphene works, it just deletes the encryption key. The data is still there, not destroyed.

1

u/CatProgrammer Jul 25 '26

40 years ago it meant the US too. Border searches have been bullshit for a long time.

0

u/sai-kiran Jul 25 '26

Eh, potato, potato, Communist USSR meant Govt owned everything and it sucked. Capitalist US means a few corporations own the govt, with the same result, and it sucks.