Ethics, Society & Politics
Protecting Your Privacy at the Border
Traveling with Digital Devices in the Golden Age of Surveillance
December 29, 2017
6:30 PM – 7:30 PM Add to calendar
6:30 PM – 7:30 PM Add to calendar
Saal Adams
Our lives are on our laptops – family photos, medical documents, banking information, details about what websites we visit, and so much more. Digital searches at national borders can reach our personal correspondence, health information, and financial records, allowing an affront to privacy and dignity which is inconsistent with the values of a free society. While privacy and security is important for any traveler, this has become a critical issue for international conferences and their attendees, who shouldn’t need to trade off an invasive search for participating in important conversations. This talk will discuss the both the legal and policy issues with border searches, as well as technological measures people can use in an effort to protect their data.
This talk will begin with an overview of the legal and policy issues surrounding border crossings, where many countries will conduct more invasive searches than their constitutions would otherwise allow. The discussion will include examples of countries that can require you to enter passwords to decrypt data on your laptop and will examine your social media and cloud data, and provide advice on which countries may require more extensive precautions. This includes the challenges of entering the United States in the time of Trump, discussing the recent changes to policy for visitors entering the country, what your rights are as a visa holder, and details about EFF’s lawsuit to challenge the policy.
Turning to the practical, the talk will discuss techniques to help protect your data, from basic precautions like backups and externally stored data, to more advanced advice about encryption and password strategies, secure boot processes, as well as data hygiene - how to travel clean, and still have access to important information on the other side. This will cover what border agents are theoretically capable of doing to compromise devices, and what precautions you can take to secure your data before this interaction occurs. The discussion will include advice about laptops, mobile phones, flash drives, digital cameras, and other common digital data devices. While critical, technological protections are not enough, so we will also discuss the practicalities of interacting with border agents.
Finally, we will discuss what people can do to keep themselves informed, and stay active in the fight for a better future.
Additional information
| Type | lecture |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
More sessions
| 12/27/17 |
In der EU wird gerade über eine Verordnung verhandelt, die für die Vertraulichkeit der elektronischen Kommunikation verbindliche und zeitgemäße Regeln schaffen soll. Diese „ePrivacy-Verordnung“ könnte in absehbarer Zeit die letzte Möglichkeit sein, dem informationellen Kontrollverlust EU-weit politisch etwas entgegenzusetzen.
|
| 12/27/17 |
The Joint Threat Research Intelligence Group (JTRIG), a unit in one of Britain’s intelligence agencies, is tasked with creating sockpuppet accounts and fake content on social media, in order to use "dirty tricks" to "destroy, deny, degrade [and] disrupt" enemies by "discrediting" them. In this talk, we reveal some of that content, in relation to infiltrating activists groups around the world, including during the Arab spring and Iranian revolution.
|
| 12/27/17 |
In 2014 China’s government announced the implementation of big data based social credit systems (SCS). The SCS will rate online and offline behavior to create a score for each user. One of them is planned to become mandatory in 2020. This lecture will review the current state of governmental and private SCS and different aspects of these systems.
|
| 12/27/17 |
Deutschland hat gewählt, man weiß nur noch nicht, wer regieren wird. Bis Weihnachten könnte ein Koalitionsvertrag verhandelt worden sein, vielleicht auch später. Was sind die zu erwartenden großen Debatten der neuen Legislaturperiode?
|
| 12/27/17 |
France is part of the top countries trying to destroy encryption, especially through backdoor obligations, global interceptions, and effort to get access to master keys. French law already criminalises the use of encryption, imposing heavier penalties on people using it or regarding them as general suspects. How can we oppose this trend? What political role for developers?
|
| 12/27/17 |
Software vendors like to claim that their software is secure, but the effort and techniques applied to this end vary significantly across the industry. From an end-user's perspective, how do you identify those vendors who are effective at securing their software? From a vendor's perspective, how do you identify those techniques which are effective at improving security? Presenting joint work with Sarah Zatko, mudge, Patrick Stach, and Parker Thompson.
|
| 12/27/17 |
Der NSA-BND-Untersuchungsausschuss des Deutschen Bundestags ist zu Ende. Da bietet es sich an, nun auf die gesammelten Geheimdienstskandale und die Reaktionen auf die Enthüllungen zurückzublicken.
|
