<story><title>Most Electronics Being Banned on Certain US-Bound Flights</title><url>https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-03-20/some-electronics-to-be-banned-on-some-us-bound-flights</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>mgbmtl</author><text>As someone from Canada, that guy was being a total dick, very aggressive, mansplaining the agent, which isn&amp;#x27;t surprising that it would trigger the customs agent. He would have had the same response from an agent at the border in Canada.&lt;p&gt;Ex: &amp;quot;what shops are you planning to go to&amp;quot;. It&amp;#x27;s fine to answer &amp;quot;I don&amp;#x27;t know yet&amp;quot;. They&amp;#x27;re just testing behaviour. If you start being defensive or aggressive, pretend to know their jobs better than they, etc, it&amp;#x27;s suspicious. Although yes, in general, the US agents are really bad at doing behaviour testing.&lt;p&gt;Anecdotal: Last year, I crossed the border a few times by car, visiting a friend I met on Tinder. I completely got away with it, giving honest answers at the border. Recently met someone else (a girl) who was stopped and accused of prostitution for doing the exact same thing. :&amp;#x2F;</text></item><item><author>emanreus</author><text>I have to admit some border crossing incidents[1] are what I would imagine entering North Korea would be like, not the US.&lt;p&gt;[1][10min audio] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.youtube.com&amp;#x2F;watch?v=MDYMw1p8s9M&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.youtube.com&amp;#x2F;watch?v=MDYMw1p8s9M&lt;/a&gt;</text></item><item><author>akie</author><text>This is already happening. I&amp;#x27;m in Europe and I&amp;#x27;ve heard quite a few friends (mostly academics) state that they&amp;#x27;re actively avoiding traveling to the US.</text></item><item><author>GuiA</author><text>This. And also people not having devices on their person means they can&amp;#x27;t quickly text friends&amp;#x2F;family if they get detained&amp;#x2F;mistreated&amp;#x2F;etc.&lt;p&gt;It seems like we&amp;#x27;re getting closer and closer to being in a situation where people who can should avoid going to the US at all, and make their reasoning known. Ie, refuse to give talks, attend conferences, etc. in the US.</text></item><item><author>KirinDave</author><text>I see many people here trying to puzzle out why electronics are under a partial ban &lt;i&gt;from cabins but not from checked baggage&lt;/i&gt;. It&amp;#x27;s a good question, since if there is a fire or explosion hazard on a plane the last place you want it is wrapped in a wad of flammable cloth and synthetics, even if it is oxygen starved.&lt;p&gt;The only motivation I can imagine is: They want these devices in checked luggage because checked luggage can be inspected without recourse by customs, and without an on-site confrontation. With care, it can be done without even notifying the people who are being checked.&lt;p&gt;And given the pushback on social media credential disclosure and the reveal that the CIA (and presumably FBI and other agencies) have physical access exploits (probably via USB or DisplayPort) for most of these devices, this seems like a move who&amp;#x27;s only logical motivation could be easier digital inspection.&lt;p&gt;Remember, it&amp;#x27;s the position of the TSA and CBP that non-citizens don&amp;#x27;t have rights of any kind until they&amp;#x27;re allowed through customs, and by simply inspecting devices they&amp;#x27;re interested in quickly and without publicity or confrontation they will certainly be more effective at it.&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;m going to start putting a USB nuke stick in my luggage in an envelope. Just for fun. Maybe I&amp;#x27;ll label the envelope something nonsensical like &amp;quot;12-16&amp;quot; just to make sure people know it&amp;#x27;s useless. And in case I (or someone investigating my luggage) needs to plug something into a USB slot.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>KirinDave</author><text>Yes, well...&lt;p&gt;You may not understand quite how much most Americans hate CBP. I use &amp;quot;hate&amp;quot; here deliberately. It represents the worst part of our government and a codification of our racist laws and culture even at the best of times.&lt;p&gt;They find a way to weaponize ignorance and shame people who are different at every turn. They have tackled people and held them at gunpoint for LED shirts, they&amp;#x27;ve publicly shamed women for having vibrators in their luggage, they&amp;#x27;ve delayed flights because people speak Tolkien&amp;#x27;s elvish leaving comicon.&lt;p&gt;And their definition of sincere risk? Brown people or people who are different. They can detain Americans and non-Americans alike without due process and stories report they do just to make a point.&lt;p&gt;And the worst part? They are bad at their jobs. The FBI is a problematic institution as well, but at least they can point to data that suggests they&amp;#x27;re doing things here and there to actually foil people who genuinely want to cause domestic problems.&lt;p&gt;Even conservative Americans hate the TSA and CBP face to face. We&amp;#x27;re all scared of them, because we know they&amp;#x27;re stupid and bad at their jobs but terribly powerful.</text></comment>
<story><title>Most Electronics Being Banned on Certain US-Bound Flights</title><url>https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-03-20/some-electronics-to-be-banned-on-some-us-bound-flights</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>mgbmtl</author><text>As someone from Canada, that guy was being a total dick, very aggressive, mansplaining the agent, which isn&amp;#x27;t surprising that it would trigger the customs agent. He would have had the same response from an agent at the border in Canada.&lt;p&gt;Ex: &amp;quot;what shops are you planning to go to&amp;quot;. It&amp;#x27;s fine to answer &amp;quot;I don&amp;#x27;t know yet&amp;quot;. They&amp;#x27;re just testing behaviour. If you start being defensive or aggressive, pretend to know their jobs better than they, etc, it&amp;#x27;s suspicious. Although yes, in general, the US agents are really bad at doing behaviour testing.&lt;p&gt;Anecdotal: Last year, I crossed the border a few times by car, visiting a friend I met on Tinder. I completely got away with it, giving honest answers at the border. Recently met someone else (a girl) who was stopped and accused of prostitution for doing the exact same thing. :&amp;#x2F;</text></item><item><author>emanreus</author><text>I have to admit some border crossing incidents[1] are what I would imagine entering North Korea would be like, not the US.&lt;p&gt;[1][10min audio] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.youtube.com&amp;#x2F;watch?v=MDYMw1p8s9M&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.youtube.com&amp;#x2F;watch?v=MDYMw1p8s9M&lt;/a&gt;</text></item><item><author>akie</author><text>This is already happening. I&amp;#x27;m in Europe and I&amp;#x27;ve heard quite a few friends (mostly academics) state that they&amp;#x27;re actively avoiding traveling to the US.</text></item><item><author>GuiA</author><text>This. And also people not having devices on their person means they can&amp;#x27;t quickly text friends&amp;#x2F;family if they get detained&amp;#x2F;mistreated&amp;#x2F;etc.&lt;p&gt;It seems like we&amp;#x27;re getting closer and closer to being in a situation where people who can should avoid going to the US at all, and make their reasoning known. Ie, refuse to give talks, attend conferences, etc. in the US.</text></item><item><author>KirinDave</author><text>I see many people here trying to puzzle out why electronics are under a partial ban &lt;i&gt;from cabins but not from checked baggage&lt;/i&gt;. It&amp;#x27;s a good question, since if there is a fire or explosion hazard on a plane the last place you want it is wrapped in a wad of flammable cloth and synthetics, even if it is oxygen starved.&lt;p&gt;The only motivation I can imagine is: They want these devices in checked luggage because checked luggage can be inspected without recourse by customs, and without an on-site confrontation. With care, it can be done without even notifying the people who are being checked.&lt;p&gt;And given the pushback on social media credential disclosure and the reveal that the CIA (and presumably FBI and other agencies) have physical access exploits (probably via USB or DisplayPort) for most of these devices, this seems like a move who&amp;#x27;s only logical motivation could be easier digital inspection.&lt;p&gt;Remember, it&amp;#x27;s the position of the TSA and CBP that non-citizens don&amp;#x27;t have rights of any kind until they&amp;#x27;re allowed through customs, and by simply inspecting devices they&amp;#x27;re interested in quickly and without publicity or confrontation they will certainly be more effective at it.&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;m going to start putting a USB nuke stick in my luggage in an envelope. Just for fun. Maybe I&amp;#x27;ll label the envelope something nonsensical like &amp;quot;12-16&amp;quot; just to make sure people know it&amp;#x27;s useless. And in case I (or someone investigating my luggage) needs to plug something into a USB slot.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>tonyarkles</author><text>No doubt! My general strategy for crossing borders is to expect to be hassled a little bit, and to accordingly make sure that I have a good amount of patience stored up ahead of time. It took him about 3 seconds to get irritated.</text></comment>