What if we just say I always forget the code and use the built-in too many tries wipes the data setting?

If you forgot the code can you offer to let them have it? Then you could wipe it remotely?

Trying to understand what would happen if you really forgot the passcode.

Unless you suffered some traumatic brain injury, nobody is going to believe you can’t unlock your phone after being in detention for 24 hours.

It would probably be treated as an intentional wipe.

Perhaps the trauma of being in detention made you unable to remember it? It’s really up to the prosecution/accusers to prove it, isn’t it?

In that case, you can argue you gave the duress password by accident, too.

Don’t lie, just don’t talk.

There’s already precedent that you cannot be forced to give up your passwords. It’s a 5th amendment violation. But I’m not sure if it applies to this case or not.

Yeah, there’s reading the bill of rights, understanding what it means and how it was intended, and it’s another thing to understand how it’s been thoroughly chipped away at, year by year, state by state, decision by decision. You would legitimately be shocked and horrified at how many exceptions there are, and this MAY fall within one of them the–the border exception.

Just don’t provide it.

what would happen if you really forgot the passcode

I believe the threat here was: Tell us the access code or we confiscate your phone, which we’ll hack into at our leisure.

That privacy was already long gone by the time of this case.

www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2232

(a)Destruction or Removal of Property To Prevent Seizure.—
Whoever, before, during, or after any search for or seizure of property by any person authorized to make such search or seizure, knowingly destroys, damages, wastes, disposes of, transfers, or otherwise takes any action, or knowingly attempts to destroy, damage, waste, dispose of, transfer, or otherwise take any action, for the purpose of preventing or impairing the Government’s lawful authority to take such property into its custody or control or to continue holding such property under its lawful custody and control, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 5 years, or both.

If he hadn’t used duress and had just refused, he’d have been fine. Graphine is secure and would have had his back

If he hadn’t given them the code and instead left it in his wallet, and they did it themselves, he’d have been fine.

All he had to do was plead the 5th.

He’s going to get hit with a felony for destroying data to prevent a search. There are tons of precedents in the 11th Circuit for searching without a warrant.

A duress password is only useful if what you’d be facing is worse than 18 U.S. Code § 2232a, and then only if they don’t have enough to convict you already.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2rokxux5cU___

Dude is just protesting the construction of a large cop training facility near him. I don’t know what the fuck he did to get on the FBI radar, but I wish him good luck; he’s gonna need it.

I don’t know what the fuck he did to get on the FBI radar

….

Dude is just protesting the construction of a large cop training facility near him.

That is what did it.

i mean, the broad strokes are obvious, but if they went after every person who was vocal about something being build in their backyard, they’d need the whole of ICE to staff themselves. He must have been saying some shit to an insider. Come to think of it, I bet they have a pretty fucking big online presence for that purpose.

He associated with Defend the Atlanta Forest, which due to being against Cop City, has been flagged as a terrorist organization by the fascists in charge.

There is literally no other reason to be found.

His lawyers have already found (through internal CBP emails) that they flagged him for suspected terrorism because he was associated with Defend the Atlanta Forest.

They internally categorized the group as anti-government, anti-authority, and a violent extremist group.

He protested against Cop City and associated with a non-violent, peaceful org that also protested against Cop City. Thats it.

I think the application of that law depends on whether a seizure is valid (aka legal), which is kind of up in the air, as your video points out.

It’s unfortunately a border entry. They can do whatever they want regarding searches in that jurisdiction. He won’t get away with it being an illegal search.

There are still outs, but they are not super likely :/

I don’t think ordinary citizens should be required to know the law in lawyer-like detail when they travel.

I think in the broad strokes, you’re probably right about his legal situation, but it suuuuuucks and it’s not what I think of when I hear the word “freedom,” for sure.

Freedom, lol. How many prisoners per capita again?

The freedom to enslave, silly.

I don’t think ordinary citizens should be required to know the law in lawyer-like detail when they travel.

It becomes a slippery slope. He is unfortunately going to be a martyr that teaches us

If he hadn’t used duress and had just refused, he’d have been fine. Graphene is secure

Graphene devs fucked over this guy. They should apologize

When Graphene is serious, the duress passcode will QUIETLY wipe your phone and leave it looking normal, preferably with normal-looking innocuous photos, media, etc.

This is what happens when devs aren’t really thinking about the real world use case.

They shouldn’t apologize, the dude should of known that destroying evidence during an investigation is going to land you in jail.

No. If you make and distribute security-related software, you should consider the safety of your user.

Your threat model absolutely should include this exact scenario. And you should know enough to understand and implement principles like plausible deniability and repudiation.

There was no investigation, no evidence, and no jurisdiction

Can’t Graphene be used like this already? Dude may not have known, or may not have bothered to set up multiple profiles. But I’m pretty sure it can be done.

Point is that when graphene gets the distress code, it makes it really clear that it’s wiping the phone.

That’s the Stupid Part

Something designed like SAmsung Knox would be much better. the rest of the phone/apps are still fine.

If they found a duress password in his wallet, and used it, they would 100% prosecute for that.

They would, but he’d have a significantly better chance at winning. Having a duress setup/password isn’t illegal. if you plead the 5th on what that pin code is, i don’t think they’d have a leg to stand on.

I don’t know if it would win or not. But the cops could argue that you put that piece of paper as a premeditated trap designed to wipe evidence and interfere with their investigation, if they caught you. Especially if you wrote any of that down and they found it. Honestly I’m not sure what the jury would agree with in this country.

So what? Yes, that’s what the paper note is for. If someone wants to get unauthorized access, they will likely try it and wipe the phone. You have zero obligation to warn them not to do that. You didn’t authorize access.

I think you’re on the right track. You could say the note was for cell phone thieves or something and you didn’t expect the police to use it. Plausible deniability.

Even if you did expect the police to use it, you aren’t obligated to front that information to them. Anything you say or do may be used in against you in the court of law. So, the safe option is to say and do nothing at all, let them dig their own grave.

I’m talking about in the court of law, when they’re claiming you tampered with evidence by leaving the note. Your lawyer could tell the jury that there were many reasons someone might have a note with a pin that erases the phone, including theft. Their client (you) invoked their right to silence, and you had no obligation to prevent the police from erasing your phone.

That would have been a completely different situation though. Even if the pass was written in a note inside his phone case, it’s not illegal to have it, right? If your computer has a button that wipes it and a cop presses it, you aren’t liable, right?

The issue here is that he told the cop that that button switches the computer on, which is a lie and it shows intent on destroying evidence.

There’ll be a chorus of people inexplicably arguing that police get to do whatever they want, until we’ve lost so much of our humanity it’s become illegal to breathe

The issue I’m seeing with the whole case is they siezed his phone, they kept his phone, the seizure of his property happened successfully. A person later entered something they believed would open it but instead it wiped it. The end user didn’t wipe it, and didn’t lie to the agents of the state because a duress PIN is still a PIN, I’m willing to wager they didn’t specify that they wanted his ‘unlock PIN’ and instead just asked him for a PIN (personal identification number), which he gave.

That’s court fodder, and unfortunately, I don’t believe it’ll pass.

Yeah, sadly I don’t think it will either, I’m just hoping the jury decides the precedent they truly want to set.

Here is my problem with this interpretation…

Is data property? Sure, ideas, concepts, photos, etc can be trademarked/copy-write protected and have some degree of ownership, but I’m talking at a much lower level here… Is the particular configuration of memory on your phone a piece of property? If no, then no property was destroyed by wiping the phone. All of the storage and memory is still intact and functional. If yes, then we must look further…is the position (not the switch itself) of a binary switch (like a light switch) a physical thing that you can own? Would you consider it destroyed if it was switched away from it’s original position?

I don’t think you could charge him with destroying property… Destruction of evidence maybe, but the property is undamaged and functioning normally.

Other arguments. The cop actually destroyed the data. Or, defendant claims he did not know the cops would use the pin to wipe the phone, and that they just wanted to know what the PIN was.

I wouldn’t say there is enough evidence here to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that this guy destroyed any property in response to a search. He didn’t destroy anything, what was destroyed is arguably not property, and he may not be aware that his duress pin was going to be used on the device in the first place.

None of that would hold up in court.

Bucees just successfully argued in court that a beaver and an alligator are visually indistinguishable to the common man…

So far, every time I’ve been outraged about Buckees, they’ve sued a small business that’s trying to file their own trademark. And while I don’t like it one bit, trademark law is more or less designed for that exact purpose. Logos don’t have to be close, they could just vaguely remind you of another established trademark. The barrier to winning is extremely low, and the fault lies with the shitty, overly vague trademark law that attempts to make trademark owners fight any possible contender.

I don’t know if these guys were or were not trying to file a trademark, but I do know the three I looked at so far were begridgingly acceptable by trademark standards.

The video I provided covers this. There are plenty of statutes and precedents. There’s a tiny little bit of unsettled case law to be decided here that will, at best, lower his sentence a bit.

I strongly suspect an imminent plea bargain, unless they want to use him as an example.

If yes, then we must look further…is the position (not the switch itself) of a binary switch (like a light switch) a physical thing that you can own? Would you consider it destroyed if it was switched away from it’s original position?

the light switch is not something intended to store data, but the memory in your phone is. wiping the data destroys all the photos, media, logins, configuration on your phone, making them permanently and irreversibly inaccessible. and all of that is my property.

Light switches can store data. You can have open equal 1, and closed equal 0. Tada! You’re storing data on a light switch. All you need to do, is allow an electrical signal to control the position of the switch, and you essentially have 1bit of data storage right there.

anything can store data in some abstract sense, I don’t think that is a valid argument here

All you need to do, is allow an electrical signal to control the position of the switch, and you essentially have 1bit of data storage right there.

besides, most light switches cannot do that

anything can store data in some abstract sense, I don’t think that is a valid argument here

You know that hard drives don’t literally store the number 1 or 0 right? We arbitrarily assign a value to a specific configuration of a material or circuit.

besides, most light switches cannot do that

Most hunks of silicon can’t do that either.

You know that hard drives don’t literally store the number 1 or 0 right? We arbitrarily assign a value to a specific configuration of a material or circuit.

that’s besides the point. hard drives are very commonly used for large scale data storage. that is its intended use, and people are storing legible data on it, in practice. light switches? who the hack stores data on light switches, bit by bit?

this discussion is not productive. you have already decided that destroying user data is a nothingburger.

that’s besides the point.

It’s not besides the point. It exactly is the point. Functionally, computer storage is a stable binary state circuit, just like a light switch. When we wire billions of them together and automate the switching process, and throw in a few layers of abstraction, you get functional data. Changing the state of those switches does not destroy them, therefore changing the state of those switches is not destruction of property, unless by extension, flipping a light switch counts as destruction of property. It may be destruction of evidence, as the state of that memory or the position of the switch could be considered evidence, but it is a far cry from actual destruction of property.

who the hack stores data on light switches, bit by bit?

This is exactly how early computer programs were stored/written.

you have already decided that destroying user data is a nothingburger.

Correction: I am arguing that the alteration of computer storage is not destruction of property as written in the law that prevents you from destroying property to in response to or as the result of a lawful search.

good. get back to me once people are using light switches to store data.

This uses 7 services to store a base-10 numeric value on a 7 segment display.

electronics-tutorials.ws/…/7-segment-display-tuto…

Here is a picture of a power switch for a power strip

upload.wikimedia.org/…/500px-Socket_5.jpg

It’s can store any two data values people assign to it. In this case, power on, or power off.

We’re using binary switches (literal just different types of light switches) to store data all the time. That’s the whole fucking point. You’re having trouble differentiating between the two because the data they store the same fucking thing just at different scales.

sure, people are storing images and passwords on light switches and power strips. you have lost your fucking mind.

You absolutely can though. A 16x7 grid of light switches can store any 16 character password that uses the ASCII character set. Images would require many more switches (depending on the color quality and resolution) but it’s the same thing. Like I said, earlier, you are having an issue making a point to differentiate between the position of a binary switch and a single bit of data because there is no fucking difference in the first place.

You make it sound ridiculous, but we’ve stored data as a magnetic polarity for decades at this point, we’ve stored data on rocks, laser etched as dots and dashes at a microscopic level on thin bits of foil. Whole programs have been written and stored on stacks of cards. Heck, the programs to get a spacecraft to the moon were written on paper and then literally knitted into the onboard computers. Regardless of the medium chosen, (almost) all computer memory and storage is simply the representation of an array of binary states, something that can be done, and has been done with a simple array of light switches.

like I said,

good. get back to me once people are using light switches to store data.

in practice. on the daily.

you are trolling. I’m out.

Exactly!

Maybe you finally get it. The premise that altering the position of a switch is legally destruction of property is patently ridiculous. Altering the position of a 16x7 array of switches and calling it destruction of property is also ridiculous. So why is altering the position of an array of billions of tiny switches suddenly destruction of property?

lets demonstrate why. Because I would alter the structure of your atoms, and that would not be criminal, because why would it be. I would alter the structure in a very specific way, but that’s not a crime.

Because I would alter the structure of your atoms, and that would not be criminal, because why would it be.

On it’s bacsic premise, no, you’re allowed to move my arms or person (to the extent that it is not assault, kidnapping, etc) but say, altering the state of my atoms in a way that ends my life or does me physical harm is criminal.

So your point is not explicitly correct there, more detail is needed. You’ve also (either knowingly or unknowingly) built and argued against a strawman. My claim is that altering the position of a switch is not destruction of property, and that as the law as written explicitly criminalizes the destruction of property in response to a lawful search. Altering the position of a switch could be considered destruction of evidence, and by extension so would wiping the phone. I don’t know if there is a law that explicitly bans the destruction of evidence during a lawful border search though. So it could still be criminal, but there is significant reasonable doubt that any property was actually destroyed.

On it’s bacsic premise, no, you’re allowed to move my arms or person (to the extent that it is not assault, kidnapping, etc) but say, altering the state of my atoms in a way that ends my life or does me physical harm is criminal.

see! there’s nuance! not everything is a useless sea of light switches. there is no problem with squishing a grape, but there is a problem with causing similar physical harm to living beings

My claim is that altering the position of a switch is not destruction of property,

switches are like grapes. digital storage in your phone is like living beings. something that is not easy or possible to reproduce the same way it was before the damage.

No, digital storage in your phone is like ghosts playing a interdimenional clarinet when you look at the quantum tunneling aspects of an infinite universal wrap-up around rejected improbabilities of unstable bilateral states.

What if you set a durress password to something simple like 12345, plead the 5th, and the cops try to brute force your device? Would it still be your fault or is it the cops fault since they are the ones who entered the password while trying to bypass your phone’s security measures?

Also, what if you explicitly tell them there is a durress password, but refuse to tell them what it is? Surely if they were informed of the risk and proceeded regardless the blame would fall squarely on them for risking a process that might “destroy evidence”

They’re there because you’re being watched already. You’re coming in from an international flight to the 11th district so they have unreasonable search and seizure rules.

Graphine is clean enough that they can’t sidestep it. Just plead the 5th and leave it at that. They’ll probably confiscate it in hopes they’ll eventually be able to break it on a zero day.

Telling them the duress password is the unlock code will def get you fucked.

Pleading the 5th and then them entering a password found in your wallet that wipes it will get you dragged into court, but probably in a defensible position; those lawyer fees are going to be immense.

Pleading the 5th and having your duress as 1234, which they try, would also put you in a defensible position with 10s of thousands in lawyers’ fees.

The duress password isn’t illegal. The knowing destruction of data is. If you set it up so they’re likely to destroy the data in attempting, you’re going to get served.

Don’t go through a border with a phone full of questionable personal data. Legal or not.

Advice: if you know you don´t want your phone searched going through customs, don’t bring it! Or wipe it before you go through. I’m 100% on this guy’s side, but we’re not exactly living in a free and open society.

Seriously. Wipe it, claim it’s new to you or whatever, put your stuff back on later if you need to. I’m sure you can find somewhere or someone you trust to get you that data back whenever you actually need it.

It brings up an interesting question: if wiping your phone after being requested access to it is illegal (?), would wiping your phone in anticipation of access being requested also illegal? Are we effectively required to give the federal government access to every private account in order to travel?

My understanding is that if you knew a search was going to happen, it’s illegal. But good luck proving that you knew it would happen.

I think you might be thinking of spoilation--https://…uslegal.com/…/spoliation-of-… --which is destroying evidence you think might be subpoened. I don’t think it would apply in this scenario.

Your linked source only applies to civil matters (think lawsuits for a slip and fall). It even says:

Under Federal Rules of Civil Procedure Rule 37

That basically arises out of the Fifth Amendment, which reads:

No person shall . . . be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law

In the criminal conrext, the Fourth Amendment rules, which reads:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

All that “probable cause”, “stop and frisk”, and “reasonable suspicion of wrongdoing” stuff arises from the “unreasonable searches and seizures” bit.

Your linked source only applies to civil matters (think lawsuits for a slip and fall).

Yes.

This was a custodial search by a police force, so civil procedure doesn’t apply.

Correct.

As long as you aren’t doing it during an active investigation, no it wouldn’t be illegal. That’s the problem. Guy thought he was sneaky, and got busted. If you come in to investigate and suddenly you are deleting all the records, you are going to have a serious problem.

In the regular world, you can delete something to keep the cops from knowing about it as long as it’s not covering up a crime. You won’t find a charge of “destruction of evidence” without an investigation of an explicit crime with probable cause.

If they had probable cause to search his phone, they would have used it when he was in Georgia, not waited for him at the airport where he had fewer rights.

This isn’t new. Journalists coming into the US in the aughts would be harassed by CBT and DHS, forced to open and unlock their laptops (and then delete whatever the officers found unsavory.

So they’d come in with their computers fully encrypted and wouldn’t have the pass key, themselves, so it was impossible to unlock them. If they were detained unreasonably, that became a new story the next morning.

Once through customs, correspondents would call their office and get the key.

But it sucks if you don’t have a whole news agency to back your rights.

Interesting. Could they hold the device, though, until it’s unlocked? I think this might be the Bad Press exception, not a legal right that would work for anyone else. Because if I gave the encryption key to a friend, they would just tell me to call the friend and get it… and if they refused to give it to me, it would because I instructed them not to…

No, they would just refuse you entry to the country.

Yes, if you’re not a citizen they can do that. If you are a citizen, they can not deny you entry.

If you are a citizen, they can not deny you entry.

But they can detain you at the border

Yeah, and in a very cold room and for a very long time. But legally they have to let you in at some point.

This isn’t new. Journalists coming into the US in the aughts would be harassed by CBT and DHS, forced to open and unlock their laptops (and then delete whatever the officers found unsavory.

So they’d come in with their computers fully encrypted and wouldn’t have the pass key, themselves, so it was impossible to unlock them. If they were detained unreasonably, that became a new story the next morning.

Once through customs, correspondents would call their office and get the key.

But it sucks if you don’t have a whole news agency to back your rights.

I’m replying to what I’m designating as the duplicate comment.

I think what he did was brave and I think there’s a good chance he loses this, and I think the guilty verdict will be really unpopular

Jury nullification is a thing for reason.

Someone has to fall on their sword to get important issues brought before the supreme court but I wouldn’t get my hopes up with this court.

I’m inclined to think he’s going to get away with it, but more because of the circumstances under which he provided the password, as in prolonged detention where he was specifically denied access to a lawyer.

That would (very pleasantly) surprise me in the current political climate

What if you don’t wipe it, but a different password sends the user to a virtual instance with unremarkable accounts.

I believe there is a child profile to allow them to play with your phone and not download or delete important stuff. I do wish there was a travel profile where you can put mock data and photos on it. Then have parameters whereas if the code is inputed (not bio) multiple times at an airport then it wipes the normal profile in the background and keeps the ‘travel’ profile.

Geofence the phone. Within 5 miles of the airport, it only shows the sanitized profile.

Outside that zone, it unlocks the encrypted data and shows you the full phone.

Would that be through IFTTT or Tasker?

GrapheneOS team had already said they won’t add this as it’s significantly less secure than keeping the phone locked or wiping the data

You know, since we are entering into a lot of legal weirdness here, how about this:

You give the cops TWO passwords. You tell them one is the duress password, and the other is the password that will unlock the phone.

Desperate and without a warrant, they try one. Wrong try! Phone is wiped.

In reality, both are duress passwords but they would have to prove that. (GoS only currently supports one duress password)

Yes, it’s ridiculous, but everything about this is ridiculous.

And what about maybe also adding in a friend or relative that’s with you so that you can inform the cop that one of you tells only truths and one of you tells only lies. I think we’re onto something here. ‘Dispatch, I’m gonna need the Riddlemaster to come down here. We got another one.’

xkcd.com/246/

And xkcd.com/538/.

Yup, you’re ok if they use the rubber hose. They likely need to produce you again at some point. If they use the wrench, they don’t care what you look like.

Nah, write the duress password on a piece of paper and keep it in your phone case. Then keep your mouth shut. Let the cops find it and try it themselves.

Yes! Or even better, make it 1234 or your birthdate and let them guess it on their own.

I have two different PINs I use for different debit cards. One of those is also my phone PIN, the other is my Duress PIN.

It would be really easy for to forget which is which when in a stressful situation.

Then you sue them for destroying your data. They took your phone and wiped it…

This is actually a really good idea. It would also work if your phone got stolen.

aand it would make the stolen phone ready to use by the thief, because I guess graphene os does not implement factory reset protection, because that traditionally relies on login to a google account

The guy in the story we’re discussing found a way to make a duress password work using graphene.

“found a way” it is a feature, you can set it up in the settings. there is not much figuring out in that. but if you turn that on, and your phone legitimately gets stolen, now the thief can sell it for good money, because it is still usable. there is no easy toggle for that in the settings.

Well yeah the thief can sell the hardware, but the data is wiped. Not expecting it to be a self destruct feature.

my point is this feature does not work that well against actual petty thieves, because all other phones actively disincentivize phone theft by making it very hard or impossible to make usable without access to the owner’s real account, and this one doesn’t. if you as a thief know that a pixel phone runs grapheneos, it is more valuable than others because you know you can just wipe it and it is usable again.

Labeled “phone password” for good measure.

Nope. Now it’s intentionally misleading. You don’t want that.

It pretty much makes privacy illegal.

There’s an easy legal loophole.

When you seize their phone, tell them your passcode is explicitly not the destruction code, and do not answer any more questions besides insisting this.

When they inevitability try to put in the only thing you mentioned, its entirely their fault for the erase.

Your milage may vary depending on financial class.

When you seize their phone, tell them your passcode is explicitly not the destruction code, and do not answer any more questions besides insisting this.

I feel like there might be a couple of things you have the the wrong way around in this sentence.

The destruction code: 4321

“Well, the code definitely isn’t 4321”

Exactly.

always use a burner phone, burner accounts when doing something like this.