Case Appealed Because Jurors Were Allowed To Use Prosecutor's Laptop

from the that-doesn't-seem-very-smart dept

We've been seeing all sorts of odd issues in the courtroom as the court system comes to grips with modern technology like mobile phones and the internet, which introduces some new challenges. However, this one is really strange. Michael Scott points us to a story of a trial where the defendant appealed because the jury was allowed to use the prosecutor's laptop to review evidence without supervision, leading to questions of whether or not the jury was able to view other material that had not been entered as evidence in the case. The case itself involved a fight at a gas station, and the evidence on the laptop was the surveillance camera video taken of the fight. In an odd exchange, the prosecutor said he was fine with having the jury look over the laptop, he admits it's actually his son's laptop and probably didn't have anything else on it, other than his son's political science notes. For that reason, the appeal didn't get far, since the original court and the prosecutor had established on the record that there was nothing else related to the case on the laptop, but it still makes you wonder why the jury was allowed to use the prosecutor's laptop without supervision. Why not get another laptop? Also odd, is that I don't quite understand what the prosecutor means when he says he can't just take the CD with the video out of his laptop:

Your Honor, the CD is in my laptop. If they want to watch it, I don't have any problem with the CD they can't obviously watch anything without the CD. My concern if I take it out, shut down the computer I am not here there is no one to gather it back up. So I would suggest we leave it here in the event they want to look at it they come back and look at it.

Why couldn't they take the CD out and put it into another laptop?

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Homeland Security Still Plans To Search Laptops At Borders With No Probable Cause

from the ain't-no-due-process-at-the-border dept

There's been plenty of concern over the past few years with regards to Homeland Security's claims that it has the right to inspect the contents of your laptop at the border, even without any probable cause. While it may be well established that the 4th Amendment doesn't apply until you're actually in the country, that doesn't mean there aren't some serious questions raised. I, like many others, have no problem with border searches of actual physical containers and luggage at the border. That makes perfect sense, because it's physical goods that you're purposely trying to bring directly into the country. You packed them with the specific idea of bringing them into the country.

But stuff on your laptop is different in two very important ways:

1. You mostly store everything on your laptop. So, unlike a suitcase that you're bringing with you, it's the opposite. You might specifically choose what to exclude, but you don't really choose what to include.
2. The reason you bring the contents on your laptop over the border is because you're bringing your laptop over the border. If you wanted the content of your laptop to go over the border you'd just send it using the internet. There are no "border guards" on the internet itself, so content flows mostly freely across international boundaries. Thus if anyone wants to get certain content into a country via the internet, they're not doing it by entering that country through border control.

Thus, it makes little sense for border control to search the contents of your laptop other than if the gov't wants a random "free pass" at checking out some content about you. DHS' insistence that it needed the right to search laptops at the border made little sense, and some of our elected officials pushed out bills to curb such border searches, though none have passed.

Instead, the new head of DHS has "revised" the rules for laptop searches, but they're only slightly better in that the old rules were "anything goes," while the new rules are "we're still searching laptops, but we have a few rules." The main components of the new rules are that you're allowed to be present in the same room as your laptop, phone or device as it's being searched -- but not necessarily to see what border patrol is doing. Also, they can't keep your laptop for more than five days, which seems pretty damn long to me. Though, as some note, this basically means that you should make sure any encryption on your laptop takes more than five days to crack.

DHS boss Janet Napolitano's reasoning for the searches is hardly compelling:

"Keeping Americans safe in an increasingly digital world depends on our ability to lawfully screen materials entering the United States,"

Um... right, but, again, the contents of the a computer laptop can easily enter the United States via the internet with no border control process whatsoever. The whole claim that this has anything to do with screening materials entering the US is totally bogus.

On top of this, the other thing that's not at all clear is how far the "search" can go. With a growing number of "cloud" based services in use, many of which act as if they're local, can the border patrol search those as well? For example, I use Jungledisk, which gives me a virtual drive that shows up in my file system as if it were a local hard drive, even though it's hosted in some data center somewhere. It looks like a local drive... but it's not actually on my laptop. Would border patrol have the right to search that, even though the contents of that drive are not actually traveling across the border?

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Forget Just Locking Your Laptop's Wireless Modem, Now Operators Can Lock The Whole Machine

from the more-bars,-but-not-the-good-kind dept

Mobile operators are increasingly looking to sell non-phone devices like laptops and netbooks with embedded or add-on wireless modems as a way to boost their subscriber figures and generate extra income. Typically, consumers buy the device at a discounted upfront cost, then get tied in to a long-term contract for monthly data service (2 years at $60 per month seems to be the norm in the US). If users quit paying their bills, in theory, they've gotten a laptop on the cheap, though of course they're still subject to the terms of the contract, and damage to their credit, and so on. But Ericsson, which makes a lot of the embedded modems, has announced some new technology it's calling a "kill pill" that allows mobile operators to remotely lock a laptop by sending a signal to it over their network. The company says it's ideal if a data user quits paying their bills, but it's not hard to imagine mobile operators coming up with more nefarious uses for the device -- like shutting a machine down if a user closes their account, even if they've fulfilled their contract.

Carlo Longino is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Carlo Longino and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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After Being Educated About Negative Effects, Students Stop Using Laptops In Class

from the education-works?-imagine-that! dept

A while back, we noted that some professors at my school, Georgetown, were joining the trend of banning laptops in classrooms, pointing out that it was probably a futile attempt to force students to pay attention -- distracted, disinterested students have been and always will be a fact of life. However, one professor at the University of Colorado at Boulder has decided to actually educate her students about why using laptops in classes is a bad choice. Diane Sieber noted which students used laptops the most and, after their test, informed them that they had done 11 percent worse than analog-only students. The number of laptop users dropped and their scores went up. While Professor Sieber could have just as easily banned laptops, by treating her students like capable adults, she has produced a win-win.

Kevin Donovan is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Kevin Donovan and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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Bills Introduced To Protect Laptops At Border Searches

from the restoring-the-4th-amendment dept

As was widely expected following earlier statements from politicians such as Russ Feingold, legislation has now been introduced that would curb Homeland Security's ability to randomly search laptops at the border, instead, requiring them to have a "reasonable suspicion" of illegal activity before they can search or copy a hard drive. This would be a huge step forward in terms of reasonable levels of privacy at the border. While defenders of the random search program claim that it's necessary, they give little proof. You can tell because their arguments could equally be applied to searching a random person on the street as well, as they just give vague platitudes about protecting the country from harm. Yet our country has privacy rights and probable cause for a very good reason. It's nice to actually see some politicians standing up to make sure that Homeland Security live up to those ideals.

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HP And Walmart Get Rid Of Laptop Box; Buy The Computer And Get It In A Messenger Bag

from the about-time dept

Having bought my fair share of laptops over the years, I've noticed that the packaging has gotten smaller. I remember years ago buying a laptop and receiving a huge box with the actual laptop suspended in a styrofoam suspension system. More recently, I've seen laptops coming in much smaller boxes. However, Wal-Mart and HP have apparently decided to try ditching most of the packaging altogether, and letting you walk out with your new laptop in a messenger bag, rather than a box. Yes, there are still boxes from when the machines are shipped from HP to Wal-Mart, but the company can now fit 3 laptops to a box, significantly reducing packaging and making life easier on customers in the long run.

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TSA Vendor Who Lost Laptop Apologizing To People Who Didn't Even Apply

from the good-record-keeping dept

We recently wrote about how TSA-approved vendor, Verified Identity Pass, had lost a laptop containing all sorts of unencrypted data on people who had applied to be a part of the TSA's "fast pass" Clear program (letting you skip the long security lines for a $100/year). While the laptop was eventually found (in the same place it was lost), the company insists that no data on the laptop was compromised, and has sent out emails to applicants for Clear. But, it appears that at least something is amiss as David Weinberger received one of the emails despite never having applied for the program. So apparently they're just informing people at random now. Or someone else applied in Weinberger's name. Makes you feel very secure, doesn't it?

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Is Taking A Laptop On Vacation Stupid?

from the well,-that-depends... dept

More than five years ago, we first discussed whether or not it made sense to take a laptop with you on vacation. Many people do so, and say that it's actually quite useful, because it allows them to stay caught up with work with just a little bit of effort. The end result is that when they get back to work, they're not overwhelmed with everything they missed. Now, however, a psychologist in the UK insists that taking a laptop on vacation is "stupid" and can break up your family. Seems a bit extreme. Having done vacations both with and without my laptop, I'd say that it actually depends quite a bit on the person, the job and the vacation (well, and the other family members). Mike Elgan, over at Computerworld does an excellent job shredding the psychologist's faulty logic:

Clearly he's not talking about attention itself, but diverting attention using a computer. Cooper's clear assumption is that work is "bad" and that leisure is "good," that technology (a laptop) is "bad" and non-technology (a book) is "good."

Cooper also makes a host of other assumptions. For starters, he assumes that you're disconnected from your own family all year, and need to "commune again with your family, connect with your children." So that's his advice? Become alienated from your own family, then "commune" with them for only two weeks a year? Why does he assume alienation in the first place?

Cooper assumes that you're some nine-to-fiver who doesn't do creative work. As an opinion columnist, good ideas can strike me anytime, anywhere. That's true for a lot of different kinds of people. For many, a laptop is merely a writing tool, and a source of information and inspiration.

An increasing number of digital nomads are traveling without taking time off. The laptop *enables* travel and time away with family rather than creating a problem while traveling.

It appears to me that Cooper is making a lot of assumptions, and using his credentials to give credibility to his anti-technology bias.

Indeed. There are both good things and bad things about taking laptops on vacation, but it's a choice that each person should make for themselves -- and if it makes sense for them, it's hardly "stupid."

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Feingold Points Out That DHS's Chertoff Is Misleading On Border Laptop Searches

from the reasonable-cause? dept

Following the release of Homeland Security's policies for searching laptops at the border, where the rules are, effectively, "anything goes," DHS boss Michael Chertoff claimed that laptop searches were only done when the border guard had a "suspicion" and placed that individual in "secondary inspection." However, Senator Russ Feingold has now hit back, pointing out that the official DHS policies say absolutely nothing about there needing to be a suspicion or that laptop searches only happen on secondary inspection. If Chertoff were being honest, why wouldn't those things be in the official policy? And, if Chertoff insists that DHS will only do searches when there is a real suspicion, what's wrong with following the "probable cause" standard that it insists it should be allowed to ignore? It's nice to see Senator Feingold asking these questions.

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Will DHS Border Search Logic Be Used To Allow Gov't Screening Of All Internet Traffic?

from the bad-potential-precedent dept

We've already explained how ridiculous it is for DHS to say that border patrol agents need to search laptops to prevent dangerous information from getting into the country. Obviously, if that was the intent of the individual, they'd just send the info electronically and not have to deal with any customs agents. Slashdot points us to a blog post by Steven M. Bellovin where he takes that same thought and flips it on its head, noting that, based on the DHS's statements, DHS may believe that it also has the right to scan any data entering or leaving the country. On top of that, he points out that this could potentially mean that if you encrypt that data you send over a border (say, via a VPN), you could potentially be violating laws that bans "hiding" goods that you send over the border. While the courts have not at all ruled in this way, you could pretty easily see the government making this sort of case.

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TSA Loses Laptops With 'Verified' Flyer Details

from the your-middle-name-is-what-now? dept

The concept of a "trusted" or "verified" traveler program at airports has been shown as not particularly secure for years -- but it didn't stop the TSA from aggressively rolling out the program. There's no doubt that, for frequent travelers to locations participating in the "Clear" program, it's wonderful. You pay $100/year and you get to bypass all the security lines, and head to a special faster security screening line, supposedly because your background is already "cleared." As Bruce Schneier writes in the above link, in terms of security, all this really does is give those looking to break security a better target. Get some "terrorists" on the list, and you've just made life a lot easier.

Either that, or pretend to be someone on the list.

And what better way to do that then to get your hands on the details of everyone on the list. Well, it appears that the TSA has forgotten its middle name, and failed to protect its own laptop carrying the (unencrypted, of course) details of 33,000 people on the clear list (Update: to clarify, the laptop was actually lost by a TSA vendor, but considering these were applications made to the TSA, it's not clear that the difference here really matters). While it certainly may have just been lost or stolen by someone who wanted a free laptop, whoever has that laptop now has the names, addresses and driver's license or passport numbers of 33,000 applicants. It's unclear if it indicates which of those applicants were approved, but I would still imagine that info would be useful to someone looking to bypass airport security.

The company that runs the program, Verified Identity Pass, issued statement that isn't particularly comforting:

"We don't believe the security or privacy of these would-be members will be compromised in any way."

First of all, that's not true. If you've exposed people's names, addresses and driver's license or passport numbers, their security has certainly already been compromised. But, more importantly, rather than those individuals' security and privacy, I would be worried about overall airport security, which has now been compromised. Update: So, this is weird. The laptop has been found. Where was it? Right where it was last seen. Not clear if it was actually lost or someone just got confused or what -- but still not particularly comforting.

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DHS Reveals Policies For Searching Laptops At The Border: Anything Goes

from the privacy-schmivacy dept

After courts repeatedly have ruled that border patrol customs agents can look through your computer hard drive, or even confiscate your computer, with no reasonable cause whatsoever, pressure from groups like the EFF have convinced Congress to investigate. As part of this process, the Department of Homeland Security has revealed its policies for border searches of electronic devices, and as you'd imagine, the policies are basically: "border patrol can do whatever it wants."

It does not need any reasonable cause. It take away your laptop for as long as it wants. It can copy the contents of your laptop and even share it with both other federal agencies and private entities for "language translation, data decryption or other reasons." Other reasons seems a bit broad.

We already explained how ridiculous the defense of this police was last month, by noting that it's not as if stopping this content at the border will actually prevent it from getting in the country. At that time we also pointed out how silly it was for a DHS supporter to claim that reasonable cause shouldn't be necessary because that's just not practical. That guy was unable to explain why it is practical throughout the rest of the country not to randomly search laptops, but at the border, suddenly it's not. However, this article now includes another defense from a customs official, saying that these searches "do not infringe on Americans' privacy." How do we know? Apparently, we just have to trust the DHS.

Luckily, this appears to be getting some attention from Congressional representatives who find the whole thing troublesome. The article notes that legislation to stop such searches will be forthcoming soon.

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Fuel Cell Hype Back Again

from the and-it'll-disappear-again-as-well dept

Every few years the press gets excited about the potential for fuel cell-powered laptops. And then the concept goes away. We wrote about in 2003, explaining why it wasn't a big deal, and again in 2005. So here we are in 2008 and, once again, we're hearing stories about new fuel cells for laptops that are going to be demoed (not, of course, actually put into production). The benefits of a fuel cell-powered laptop are that on a single cell, a laptop can last a lot longer (usually the estimate is about 10 hours). That sure beats the 3 to 5 hours most laptops get on traditional lithium-ion batteries today.

But... there's a huge problem with fuel cells that almost never gets discussed in the press: you need to keep buying replacements and then you need to carry those replacement fuel cell cartridges with you. It's like back to the bad old days when your consumer electronics products all had non-rechargeable, disposable batteries. It was a huge pain. That's why everyone switched to rechargeable batteries. When you switch to disposable fuel cells, then you're adding an ongoing expense (much greater than electricity) and forcing users to keep carrying around spares. Yes, for some folks that ability to go for a longer time without plugging in will be worth it -- but for plenty of people it seems like the "cost" is a lot worse than the benefit.

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Is This The Best Homeland Security Can Do In Defending Laptop Searches At The Border?

from the probable-cause-is-so-last-millennium dept

The courts have said that US Customs officials do not need probable cause to search laptops. While some Senators are questioning why Department of Homeland Security is searching laptops without probable cause, the administration is working hard to defend such searches at the border as reasonable. However, they're not making very much sense. The article trots out James Jay Carafano from the Heritage Foundation with a couple of interesting statements. Let's take them in order. First:

"The idea that we would create some kind of sanctuary for criminals and terrorists to carry things across the border to me is absolutely ludicrous."

Well, that's not just an exaggeration, it's wrong. Does Carafano actually believe that someone manually walking a laptop across the border is the only way that data gets across the border? Of course that's not true. Data flows across borders via the network all the time -- with no customs review whatsoever. No one is walking across the border with a laptop thinking that's the best way to get some data across the border. Then there's this statement:

"It's also unrealistic to require probable cause when you think about the millions of people a day who come in and go out of the country."

Let's just change a few words in that statement and see how Carafano feels about it: "It's also unrealistic to require probable cause when you think about the millions of people a day who walk up and down the streets of America." Yet, we don't hear Carafano pushing for a removal of probable cause for searches on the street, do we?

The border searches of laptops issue is a ridiculous one. Yes, it makes sense to search through what physical goods you might be bringing into the country -- because you specifically chose to bring those goods into the country. But the digital things you have stored on your laptop are an overall archive. You didn't choose to bring those specific things across the border -- and it's not like going through a border crossing is the best way to move that content across the border. There's simply no reason for why laptop searches should be allowed without probable cause.

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Hard To Believe: Computer Makers Giving In To RIAA Pressure, Disabling Sound Recording?

from the can't-really-be-true,-could-it? dept

A whole bunch of people are submitting this, though, the explanation is not passing the sniff test. The story is that a bunch of laptop owners (mainly from Dell) are frustrated after discovering that their laptop soundcard configuration blocks the recording of audio, even though it's possible to enable it with a few tweaks. In other words, recording has effectively been turned off by the computer manufacturers. It didn't take long for rumors and speculation to assume that somehow the RIAA has been pressuring these computer makers to turn off sound. Of course, with the entertainment industry, sometimes it seems that no concept is too evil to believe that the industry wouldn't endorse. However, there seems to be no evidence whatsoever that the RIAA had any part in this. On the whole, it sounds like someone just made a bad decision in terms of how to configure certain sound cards. If someone can provide any evidence that the RIAA actually had a role in this, we'll post an update, but there's no reason to jump to conclusions without any evidence. That's what the RIAA does.

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Senators Not Thrilled About Laptop Searches At The Border

from the back-off,-customs dept

It would appear that the EFF's efforts to get Congress to look into laptop searches at the border has worked. This is over the question of whether or not it's legal, with no suspicion of wrongdoing, for customs officials to take your laptop and search through the contents. Even if the courts have said it's legal, it still seems quite troubling to many people who believe it's an unreasonable search. Some Senators have now asked Customs to reconsider its stance on this, with Senator Russ Feingold noting:

"If you asked [U.S. residents] whether the government has a right to open their laptops, read their documents and e-mails, look at their photographs, and examine the Web sites they have visited, all without any suspicion of wrongdoing, I think those same Americans would say that the government has absolutely no right to do that. And if you asked him whether that actually happens, they would say, 'not in the United States of America.'"

Somehow, I doubt that these hearings will lead to much, but at least someone in DC is concerned about this issue.

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EFF Asks Appeals Court To Rehear Case On Laptop Searches At The Border

from the let's-try-this-again dept

Back in April, we noted that an appeals court reversed the one lower court ruling that found that customs agents at the border were overstepping their bounds by searching and confiscating travelers' laptops without probable cause. This brought the 9th circuit into alignment with our circuits, so that, generally speaking, it appeared our judicial system had decided that your 4th Amendment rights do not apply at the border. This is particularly problematic for laptops, because unlike tangible goods that you pack, you don't choose to "pack" all the data on your laptop. In other words, with most tangible goods you bring across the border, it's done as a proactive choice. With the data on your laptop, it's the opposite. Unless you proactively delete it from your computer, it's there.

The EFF already has demanded Congress look into this issue, and now it's urged the full appeals court to review this latest decision. Given that all the other circuit courts have also ruled this way, it may be difficult to get the court to agree to rehear the case (or, if they do, to change the decision). At some point, it's likely this issue will get appealed to the Supreme Court as well -- though it will be interesting to see if the Supreme Court takes the case without a seeing a split in the lower courts.

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As Expected, Court Says Customs Can Search Your Laptop

from the you-have-no-privacy-at-the-border dept

As was widely expected, an appeals court has ruled that customs agents have every right to search the content of your laptop, reversing the only court case that had ruled otherwise (a few others had previously said such searches were just dandy). The court found (just like the other rulings) that there's an "exception" to the 4th Amendment against unreasonable search and seizure at the border. The government, of course, claims that it needs to be able to search laptops to keep people safe -- but it doesn't explain why it needs the ability to search any laptop even if there's no suspicion or reason to do a further search. The lower court had noted, correctly, that there's so much data and information on a laptop, that it's effectively an extension of your brain. This makes sense. Since so much is digital today, you don't pack up your computer like you pack your suitcase. Everything is already on it. So while you can understand why it's okay to search your suitcases at the border, giving full access to a laptop seems to go beyond reason... unfortunately, the courts disagree. In the meantime, if you're traveling into the country, consider anything on your laptop fair game... unless, of course, it's encrypted. In that case, at least one court says you don't need to give up your encryption key.

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Woman Sues Best Buy For $54 Million Over Lost Laptop

from the some-attention-please... dept

It's tough to value a lost laptop. After all, there are often all sorts of private information and content of sentimental value on a laptop. So, when a woman discovered that Best Buy had lost the laptop she gave them to fix (after repeatedly lying to her about how soon the laptop would be fixed), she decided to sue the retailer for $54 million (found via Engadget). She admits that she's not really expecting to get the $54 million, and simply chose that number to get media attention (it's working), but given the run around that Best Buy gave her, it's not too surprising that she rejected its last offer of $2500, a $900 gift card and a refund on the laptop. Originally, the company had just offered her the gift card (less than the cost of the computer). It wasn't until she filed the lawsuit that Best Buy seemed willing to offer something more. The woman also had some friends contact the store manager of the store that lost the laptop, and he responded to them by saying "we strive to deliver the experience that every customer deserves to receive" and "not every customer can be satisfied." That seems like a pretty weak response to having completely lost someone's laptop you were supposed to repair.

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EFF Asks For Details On Border Laptop & Mobile Phone Searches

from the guidelines-please? dept

Last month, we wrote about how more courts have been saying that customs agents could search the content of your laptop or mobile phone upon entering the country. For many, that's a pretty scary thought, considering the amount of personal or confidential information that people often have on their laptops and phones. It's even scarier when customs agents make a copy of that data, as it's not clear what they actually do with it or if they ever delete it. In response, the EFF, along with the Asian Law Caucus, are filing a lawsuit to force the government to give details and guidelines that explain its policies on these searches and what's actually done with the data. It seems like a totally reasonable question -- but given our government's belief in secrecy over all else, expect to find out that this cannot be revealed for "national security" purposes.

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