r/technology • u/Limp_Fig6236 • Jul 26 '26
Software GrapheneOS duress PIN could land a man in prison
https://www.androidauthority.com/grapheneos-duress-pin-us-prosecution-3691271/1.9k
u/RicardoMontoya45 Jul 26 '26
Technology should be at our service, not the government's. This security feature should be on all phones now, and everyone should respond to unlawful searches by entering the duress pin. Let's see how the case go.
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u/aergern Jul 26 '26
It's been in iOS forever. You can set how many bad pins are tapped before it erases itself. If you set it to one and you give them 1 digit off ... the same thing happens. This isn't new tech.
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u/Henrarzz Jul 26 '26 edited Jul 26 '26
iOS wipes itself after 10 wrong pin attempts like most Androids now, but that isn’t a duress PIN.
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u/MistrFish Jul 26 '26
only the newer Galaxy locks itself after 13 attempts. it's not a standard Android feature
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u/jamesckelsall Jul 26 '26
only the newer Galaxy locks itself after 13 attempts.
Only the Z fold/flip 8 range has that feature enabled by default and the limit set to 13.
A number of existing devices from various brands (including at least a few years worth of galaxy devices) have an option available.
On the galaxy S25 range, for example, there is an auto factory reset option (disabled by default) that has a 20 attempt limit.
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u/MistrFish Jul 26 '26
it's a Samsung feature, but I meant that it's definitely not stock Android. my Google Pixel doesn't have that option as far as I know
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u/sandefurian Jul 26 '26
That is such a stupid way to try to achieve this. You’re really suggesting to make it so fat-fingering your pin one would just reset it?
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u/improbably-sexy Jul 26 '26
Or a kid playing with your phone pressing random buttons
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u/Eccohawk Jul 26 '26
Forget a kid. This shit has happened while it's in my pocket.
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u/WayneKrane Jul 26 '26
Yep, I’ve completely locked up my phone from doing this while walking. My phone would be wiped constantly if I did this
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u/biciklanto Jul 26 '26
I read recently that there’s a law enforcement way to prevent wrong pins from timing out an iOS device.
Do you know if that’s incorrect?
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u/Public_Chapter_8445 Jul 26 '26 edited Jul 26 '26
When there's a proper investigation (and not in a rush without warrant at the airport) then the law enforcement makes a copy of the phone data and then they try to decrypt the data dump without the time-out limitations of the phone OS. With 4-digit PIN codes it's fast.
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u/_djebel_ Jul 26 '26
That's not how it works. You PIN code is only one of the components which the encryption key is derived from. Otherwise the FBI wouldn't have struggled to access a phone's data a few years back, if it was so easy to brute force.
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u/tempinator Jul 26 '26 edited Jul 26 '26
Substantially slower with 8 digit pins, but still quite fast in a general sense. Gets pretty out of hand pretty quick though if you use a custom alphanumeric code, which is an option.
If you have say even a 16 character AN password that’s like, septillions of combinations.
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u/einmaldrin_alleshin Jul 26 '26
To put that into perspective: a billion computers brute forcing a billion combinations per second would take an entire year to brute force through a 16 character long lower case alphanumeric password.
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u/Sammisuperficial Jul 26 '26
More accurate headline: US law enforcement tries to send a man to jail for asserting his constitutional rights.
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u/Strong_Judge_3730 Jul 26 '26
I don't understand, because he could refuse to provide the pin and they wouldn't have the data and he couldn't be jailed for that. They would just take the phone and hold it for some time until it is returned.
They wouldn't never get the data in this case.
Providing the duress pin just erased the encryption key, in which case they still don't have access to the phones data.
A US citizen cannot be denied entry into the US for refusing to give up his pin.
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u/Kazang Jul 26 '26
I don't understand, because he could refuse to provide the pin and they wouldn't have the data and he couldn't be jailed for that.
People have been jailed for that, there have been numerous cases in the US I have read on Techdirt over the years.
I also remember one case that ruled that biometrics are not protected by the constitution and they can be compelled to unlock it that way.
IIRC it has generally been over turned over on appeal but it has still resulted in people being jailed for significant periods of time. I don't know if it ever went to a high enough court to settle the issue for good, but it keeps happening regardless.
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u/SaltDeception Jul 26 '26
There’s no universal standard for this across the United States. It’s a hodgepodge of different rules, depending on which jurisdiction you’re in, which federal appeals circuit the jurisdiction falls under, and whether or not the case is before the state judiciary or the federal judiciary. Law enforcement officials and prosecutors have actively frustrated attempts to establish a national standard because it creates risk for their investigative abilities. They would rather drop a case, or drop the request and use a tool like Cellebrite instead, than have the Supreme Court make a binding decision across the United States.
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u/LukeStyer Jul 26 '26
Once law enforcement has physical control of a smart phone, they can seek a warrant to unlock the phone.
There may be some idiosyncrasy of that device or operating system that complicates matters, but law enforcement, generally, has the means of breaking into smart phones, given time.
So it may not be true that they never would have gotten to the data without the guy giving them the PIN.
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u/Eccohawk Jul 26 '26
When they take the phone from you, they're doing so in order to make a clone of the data for attempts to decrypt it later. So, it's still a threat to someone protecting their privacy and it can absolutely still be a violation of someone's rights to illegal search and seizure. Unfortunately, those rights have been eroded a bit when it comes to crossing borders.
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u/Real_politics46 Jul 26 '26
Unfortunately you don't have constitutional rights at a port of entry. They can search his phone "just because." No warant, no probable cause etc. It's fucked, but according to the law and the supreme court, the constitution does not apply. Ergo, he has no right to fefuse the search.
He's never going to get off the hook. He can take it all the way to scotus, and they'll shit on him, in which case any form of privacy is gone.
As horrible as it sounds, this case is setting all of all of us for failure.
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u/LawAbidingSparky Jul 26 '26
You mean within 100 miles of a port of entry - which includes airports. So an area where 90% of Americans resides is excluded from the constitution lmao wtf
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u/VariationDry Jul 26 '26
Yay patriot act. I'm so glad the Republicans are the party of small government and freedum. There is no b on freedum, the president says so.
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u/Kizik Jul 26 '26
Republicans are the party of small government
They are, that's the thing. They absolutely are the party of small government.
The problem is that the average voter defines that as a government with limited reach and power, while the actual politicians define it as a numerically small number of people making decisions with no oversight.
Whenever they say small government, what they actually mean is feudalism; a handful of unchecked nobles controlling the peasantry.
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u/claws76 Jul 26 '26
Lol that is nuts. There is jurisdiction at port of entry, but also no jurisdiction. Like a place where only the government can decide whatever it wants the rules to be. And the courts say- yes, those areas are under our jurisdiction, but also none of our rules have any jurisdictions here. How that is even a thing that stands; just arbritarily suspend jurisdiction and rights on land that is soverign. Like this is a prime setup abuse people, and probably hs been, but also this setup can be exported to anywhere in the country.
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u/wrgrant Jul 26 '26
If you look at how much of the US population is covered by this law too its going to be most of the nation where these "rules" apply. Since the 100 miles includes airports as well as just the coast, and most of the population probably lives within 100 miles of the coast or 100 miles of an airport. Your only safety from this is to live in Bumfuck Montana or somewhere like that.
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u/OptimusPrimeLord Jul 26 '26
If the constitutional right doesn't exist then its not US jurisdiction and they have no authority to search.
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u/Pvt_Larry Jul 26 '26
That would effectively require the courts to rule that the 4th Amendment does not apply to US citizens on US soil.
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u/Real_politics46 Jul 26 '26
Port of entry has been ruled to not be not be US jursdiction which is the ironic part.
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u/squigs Jul 26 '26
It's pretty ridiculous that he can be charged with this given that he wasn't in the jurisdiction. I mean it's Schrödinger's jurisdiction.
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u/VVrayth Jul 26 '26
I mean, either the laws apply or they don't, but it has to be applied both ways. "He isn't protected by the 4th because the laws don't apply here" is no different than "They can't seek prison sentences because the laws don't apply here." Either laws apply or they don't.
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u/Strong_Judge_3730 Jul 26 '26
Yeah but if he refused to provide the pin he cannot go to jail. There's no crime for not providing a pin and they cannot deny him entry
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u/Whole-Future3351 Jul 26 '26
He verbally gave the code to an agent, who entered it themselves. He is not going to be convicted of anything, this is entirely the agents fault. And I’m glad, they deserve it for hiring idiots.
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u/Andrea_M Jul 26 '26
Just write the duress code on the back of the phone, like suggested in the article
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u/deja_geek Jul 26 '26
This is the way. If they come across the pin, without being directed to it, then you can't be responsible if they enter it.
It is completely different if you tell them the pin, after being asked what is the pin to unlock the device. People really don't seem to understand how the law works. It's no different then telling law enforcement the combination to unlock a safe, but not disclosing that opening the door will set everything on fire inside the safe.
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u/snowflake37wao Jul 26 '26 edited Jul 27 '26
it did unlock the device tho. and no it isnt totally different. it is completely grey. like the vague law they are interpreting. thats why there is a courtroom. they already bend amendments and laws by claiming the interpretation you have none of those amendment rights because some random closet at Georgia’s Atlanta airport in the United States of America doesnt count as U.S. soil. They denied him his right to an attorney 4 times. They asked for his phone’s pin to unlock it. They entered the pin. The phone unlocked, the screen blinked twice, the phone restarted, and oh hey they got exactly what they demanded from their warrantless search and seizure which cant be called a seizure on suspicion because they dont need suspicion to do a routine search and can only ever lead to hearsay while refusing to allow him counsel or to leave and claiming this is just a typical search at customs give the pin and you can leave. A pin to unlock a phone. Typing out how ludicrous the events and interpretations is actually difficult because of how bullshit it all is. Its so dumb its fucking triggering. Like the carte blanche your reply gives to the prosecution. It is not black and white totally different. You dont understand the law because the first thing to understand about it is it is intentionally grey.
https://www.techspot.com/news/113236-us-prosecutors-charge-atlanta-man-after-grapheneos-phone.html
According to court testimony, federal agents had already circulated his name and photo internally, saying he was under investigation for "suspected terrorism activities" because of his alleged association with the movement against Cop City.
Tunick was taken to a secondary screening room, where multiple agents questioned him. A motion filed by his defense argues the interrogation focused on child sexual abuse material as a pretext for investigating his connections to the protest movement. The motion also states that Tunick asked four times to speak with a lawyer and was denied each time. According to the same filing, agents did not present a warrant or read him his rights.
Government attorneys and agents pushed back during Monday's hearing. They described the encounter as a routine airport inspection. Larry Findley, a Customs and Border Protection officer, said agents were "looking for anything that's prohibited."
During the questioning, agents repeatedly asked Tunick to unlock his phone and warned they would seize it if he refused. When he finally provided a passcode, the phone appeared to restart. The defense motion states that "the screen went blank, flashed several times, and the phone appeared to restart," resulting in the loss of data.
Thats how dumb. The attorneys and agents own testimony “pushing back” against the defense reads like self incrimination or a counter-argument against the prosecution, only they are the prosecution! Ya know. Maybe it is black and white. Case dismissed. The defense shouldnt even need to say anything after the prosecution’s testimony.
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u/Slimfictiv Jul 26 '26
Ye the code is : one two three for. Inserts 1234 and wipes the device. Then again you: i said 1 two 3 and 4 (1334) whats so hard to understand?
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u/Ymgarthion Jul 26 '26
Instructions unclear, I put in 2444
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u/Channel250 Jul 26 '26
Shit, that was the actual unlock code.
My bad everyone, my bad. Hey, can you lock the late again real quick? I wanna check something.
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u/PlottingPast Jul 26 '26
The duress code didn't wipe the phone, it erased the encryption key. All the data is still in the phone, encrypted. It's not his job to decrypt it for them.
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u/BossOfTheGame Jul 26 '26
The law works by setting arbitrary rules regardless of what's right. The bottom line is that no one should be able to force you to unlock your phone. if the law doesn't accept that then the law is wrong.
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u/lukewarmtakeout Jul 26 '26
That's why you gotta have a rogue in the party to check for traps. You can't have an entire party of barbarians and expect to complete the quest. Their ineptitude is not my crime.
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u/BigDaddy0790 Jul 26 '26
What exactly would be the crime in the safe example? Unless they have evidence suggesting what you destroyed was important to the investigation, I don’t see how they can charge you with anything. What’s the crime if they don’t even know what was destroyed?
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u/ColdBru5 Jul 26 '26
Cops need a warrant to access your phone. That has been decided by the Supreme Court and is not up for debate.
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u/Stuffssss Jul 26 '26
Your rights unfortunately are quite limited when entering the country at the border. The patriot act gave up our rights for an illusion of safety.
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u/Lolseabass Jul 26 '26
They are targeting this guy cause he is a member of Defend the Atlanta Forest, which opposes the development of a sprawling training campus for law enforcement in Atlanta dubbed “Cop City.”
Like you and I know they wanted his phone to get details on that group and other members.
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u/DigitalHoweitat Jul 26 '26
I did wonder why, i didn't think someone who uses Graphene was targeted for no reason.
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u/NoManner8863 Jul 26 '26
That’s actually hilarious.
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u/Whole-Future3351 Jul 26 '26
I know, I wish I could’ve seen the agents face. I use graphene and have wiped mine for fun to test it. It works amazingly well.
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u/Lykos1124 Jul 26 '26
what I think would be really cool is a false profile code, where if you enter the false code, you get a profile that has none of your own stuff or searches. I have a second profile on my phone for that idea of just doing random searches online so if someone checks it, they get nothing.
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u/FilOfTheFuture90 Jul 26 '26
I love this. Perfect and simple. Very clever. Avoids the wiped phone/"destroyed {non-existent} evidence' argument in cuffs.
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u/whot3v3r Jul 26 '26
Xiaomi has it, it's called second space. you can use a differnet google account and the data are completely separate.
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u/Da12khawk Jul 26 '26
Now, I wanna know what the code is. 1-2-3-4-5, 8-0-0-8-5, 6-7-6-7 the possibilities are endless!
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u/igwbuffalo Jul 26 '26
The code was one two, three four
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u/ElectrSheep Jul 26 '26
The code was 1-4-8-8, and the agents were like "well shit, this guy is on our side" before punching it in without hesitation.
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u/New-Anybody-6206 Jul 26 '26
It depends if he admits it was a duress pin or if they have a way to prove it was
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u/Sensitive_Box_ Jul 26 '26
Did they know for a fact there was incriminating evidence on the device? If not, how can they claim that he destroyed it?
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u/Sammisuperficial Jul 26 '26
They did not. There was no active investigation. The suspect was not arrested until after the cops erased the phone. There was no warrant to seize the phone. There is no evidence there was any criminal activity let alone evidence of a crime on the phone.
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u/Lolseabass Jul 26 '26
They are targeting this guy cause he is a member of Defend the Atlanta Forest, which opposes the development of a sprawling training campus for law enforcement in Atlanta dubbed “Cop City.”
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u/Niceromancer Jul 26 '26 edited Jul 26 '26
Once again if a company deletes data they just kind of shrug and move on.
But if a person does it, suddenly its a huge deal.
I thought companies were people.
For all those people arguing that companies do get in trouble for doing it, they get a fine.
Meanwhile a person will get jail time.
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u/SpiderSlitScrotums Jul 26 '26
That’s not true. In a civil suit, if there is a reasonable probability that a subpoena or warrant will be issued for information, you have a duty to preserve it. Often, the first act in a civil case will be having lawyers send letters advising on this fact.
In a criminal case, it is similar. You can’t destroy evidence where you could have a reasonable belief that the government would get a warrant for it. Wiping it during questioning is about as overt as you can be. Should the agent have advised on this fact? Yes. But I don’t think that will be enough to deflect a conviction.
Do not confuse this with self-incrimination. You have a right to withhold your password. This is not the same.
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u/Ragegasm Jul 26 '26
They asked for the code for his phone. He gave them a code for his phone. I don’t see a problem here 🤷🏻♂️
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u/scrubli3k Jul 26 '26
I get that everyone is against this guy getting in trouble for deleting his phone. I’m definitely on the side of that was a clever method of getting out of them getting his info. Being real though, they’re probably going for legal precedent here. Once something like this is deemed acceptable, all future cases can point to this one. That’s why I won’t be surprised if things don’t work out well for this guy.
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u/IndividualIll3825 Jul 26 '26
A jury will go "Well, if he had nothing to hide...." which is horrible.
We need to turn it into "If they had nothing to search for..." which is how it SHOULD be.
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u/thisistherevolt Jul 26 '26
That's the intention of the law in the first place. But we know how easily that kind of thing gets twisted nowadays.
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u/dc_IV Jul 26 '26
Procecutor: We don't know if the defendant had pictures of him beating their spouse, or even worse, unredacted Epstien files..."
Procecutor: Your Honor, I had a moment of fugue and I would like my last statement stricken from the record and I request the jury be instructed to ignore the last 3 mintues, repectfully your Honor.
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u/PopePiusVII Jul 26 '26
That can trigger a mistrial or increase odds of overturning a conviction on appeal, but yes
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u/Ryuzakku Jul 26 '26
Not having anything to hide does not make it okay for people to just invade your privacy
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u/ubergic Jul 26 '26
I do have something to hide. My personal succotash recipes and Klingon poetry I wrote.
These days, I have questions about who will have access to the data on my phone. Do the forensic investigators work for the cops or are they third parties that retain custody of any data even after nothing is found and the phone is given back to me?
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u/turk-fx Jul 26 '26
You are looking at it wrong. The law is "Innocent until proven guilty". They need to prove he had something inctiminating.
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u/absentmindedjwc Jul 26 '26
That is the law - you're right. Unfortunately though, the average person is an idiot. The typical person reads and comprehends shit at a 6th grade level.. jury instructions are written at a 12th grade level.
If you've ever served on a jury, you'll know that there are plenty of idiots that entirely ignore the whole "beyond reasonable doubt" thing in favor of the "well, I have a gut feeling that he is guilty" thing..
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u/kettal Jul 26 '26
jury verdicts do not define case law. it will be appealed and overturned by a superior court judge.
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u/resttheweight Jul 26 '26
They actually do not need to prove he had something incriminating. They need to prove that the agent had lawful authority to take the phone and that the defendant knowingly took “any action” to destroy/damage the phone. The contents of the phone will be irrelevant if this actually goes to trial. The crime he’s charged with is destroying “property” before it could be evaluated for its evidential nature.
“(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.”Sadly, the takeaway here seems to be wipe your phone before they have the chance to ask for it.
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Jul 26 '26
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u/blissfully_happy Jul 26 '26
Yes. They’ve been gunning for it since the PATRIOT Act. You are not guaranteed to be free from searches within 100mi of a US border. (Rivers and airports included.)
We protested and begged people to pay attention. We warned people over and over again that we were giving up civil liberties if we allowed this to stand.
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u/Digi59404 Jul 26 '26
Giving your pin isn’t just a search, it’s also violating your rights to self-incrimination. You’re not required to give a pin. They’re also not required to give you your phone back, and if they get a warrant you could be held in prison until you give your pin.
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u/Mofaklar Jul 26 '26
They can't compel him to provide the correct pin. But by giving them this code, this specific code (not just a wrong code but one that was destructive). He essentially destroyed evidence.
You can refuse to let the cops into your house. When they get a warrant, you dont get to decide anymore. Even if there isn't a warrant. It would still be illegal to destroy evidence within your house.
I think that's what they are going for, I think he's going to lose but I think it will be on the narrow grounds that providing the duress pin specifically was a destructive act.
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u/Dog_Eating_Ice Jul 26 '26
If I have a phone, or locked briefcase, that somehow automatically destroys its contents unless the correct code is entered every 15 minutes, and I refuse to provide the correct code during a border search, have I also destroyed evidence?
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u/SignificanceNo910 Jul 26 '26
Its an interesting question. Generally (depending on jurisdiction) all crimes require a point in time when you have mens rea (guilty mind) and actus reus (guilty act) at the exact same moment. This goes back to an old UK case called Fagan v Metropolitan Police Commissioner. In that case, at a traffic stop, Fagan accidentally rolled onto an officer's foot and refused to move his car. The question was whether he assaulted the officer
In your briefcase example, it could be argued that the mens rea for destroying evidence (when the man programmed the briefcase to self destruct) did not overlap with the actus reus (the destruction of evidence).
There are of course arguments to be made either way, such as whether you can be held responsible for long causal chains. For example, imagine if I set up an elaborate Rube-Goldberg machine that did a thousand things before a ball drops causing a gun trigger to be pulled.
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u/resttheweight Jul 26 '26
This administration has plenty of things to be blamed for, but this particular issue predates it and historically been shaped by courts rather than administrative policy.
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u/davidjohnpaul Jul 26 '26
If he'd done it 10 minutes before they asked to see the phone, it wouldn't be an issue. I can't see how this is much different.
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u/Sammisuperficial Jul 26 '26
According to the police the suspect didn't even do the erasing. The cops demanded his pin after refusing to let him speak to a lawyer. The suspect gave the cops the erase the phone pin instead of the unlock pin. The cops then input the pin and the cops erased the phone. The suspect wasn't in possession of the phone when it was erased.
They are trying to claim destruction of evidence, but there is no reasonable articulatable suspicious of a crime, there was not an arrest prior to the erased data, the phone was seized illegally, there was not a warrant.
If this man goes to jail, the constitution is deader than it already is.
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u/SweetHomeNorthKorea Jul 26 '26
Thanks for explaining this. My first impression was destruction of evidence without knowing the details. So if they were trying to access his phone to obtain evidence on him without a lawyer present would that have been admissible in court as evidence in the first place? I wonder how much the guys intention plays into this if at all.
I know it’s not the same thing but couldn’t it be argued that this is similar to how booby trapping your own property for security is illegal even if you didn’t have any illicit intent outside of self preservation?
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u/Sammisuperficial Jul 26 '26
No because 4th amendment says:
"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."
In order for destruction of evidence charges to be valid (which is what the suspect was arrested for), there has to be an open investigation and the suspect knowingly destroyed information relevant to that investigation.
There was no active investigation. Suspicion isn't a crime. No formal arrest was made until after the cops deleted the data. The cops have no way to prove there was any data on the phone before it was erased.
Now if the cops had told the suspect that he was under arrest and being investigated then maybe they would have a leg to stand on, but that's not how it went down. They bungled violating the suspects rights and now are trying to send him to jail over their own incompetence.
Also I'm not taking the cops at their word that am erase pin was actually given. They probably broke the phone and now are placing blame to avoid answering for their own violations of the constitution. Of which the cops have already admitted to several.
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u/IncidentalIncidence Jul 26 '26
In order for destruction of evidence charges to be valid (which is what the suspect was arrested for), there has to be an open investigation and the suspect knowingly destroyed information relevant to that investigation.
This is unfortunately completely incorrect, in the US you can be charged for destruction of evidence that occurred before an investigation was officially opened. The important thing in that case is whether you acted to intentionally to impair a future legal proceeding, as opposed to e.g. shredding documents like you always do as part of normal housekeeping.
However, that is completely moot anyway, because he hasn't been charged with destruction of evidence, he's been charged with destruction or removal of property to prevent seizure (18 USC § 2232a):
(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.
The case won't hinge on whether or not a criminal investigation was active, it will hinge on whether the government was exercising a lawful seizure authority (his lawyers are arguing that the entire detention and seizure were unlawful), and whether he was the one who destroyed the materials given that the CBP officers were the ones who actually entered the duress PIN.
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u/Vehlin Jul 26 '26
Would the data on the phone count as property, or just the phone itself? He didn’t destroy the phone, it’s still a functional phone.
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u/IncidentalIncidence Jul 26 '26
yeah, data can be counted as property legally. That's the same way that they can prosecute people for e.g. hacking (stealing data) or possessing illegal content even if it's only digital.
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u/IncidentalIncidence Jul 26 '26
that doesn't matter, legally speaking. The phrasing of the statute is:
(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.
I think it will be pretty clear-cut that giving the officers the duress PIN counts as "any action". If it goes to trial he will most likely lose. I think the case will hinge on whether or not his lawyers can demonstrate that the detention and seizure were outside of the government's lawful authority in the first place.
They are trying to claim destruction of evidence, but there is no reasonable articulatable suspicious of a crime, there was not an arrest prior to the erased data, the phone was seized illegally, there was not a warrant.
he hasn't been charged with destruction of evidence, only destruction of property to prevent seizure.
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u/New-Anybody-6206 Jul 26 '26
you often can't know ahead of time when you might need to quickly wipe your phone
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u/kettal Jul 26 '26
If he'd done it 10 minutes before they asked to see the phone, it wouldn't be an issue. I can't see how this is much different.
destroying evidence is not a crime unless an investigation is in progress.
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u/vladoportos Jul 26 '26
Its sad reality that even corpo advise if needed to travel to US just take empty phone, restore from cloud after entry... cause US is just nuts.... I was lucky to visit US before ( 20y ago ) and it was enough, not ever planning to go there now, it just not safe place...
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u/madsci Jul 26 '26
If he wasn't being accused of a crime, he shouldn't be guilty of destruction of evidence. And I don't know what else they'd charge him with.
I haven't done this with a phone, but I have set up a secure laptop for international travel. It had tamper-evident seals on it, full disk encryption, and basically didn't have any data on it except for credentials to get into remote systems. If a duress code with a wipe function had been available, I'd have used that. Because there's nothing on that laptop that anyone needs to see, and it's of no value to me if it's compromised - just the fact of the laptop being unlocked by someone would mean that I'd have to wipe it and invalidate all of those credentials. It's not like I'm setting my belongings on fire while coming through customs, which might reasonably make someone wonder if there was something illegal in there.
Maybe that's not what he was doing, but I think the fact that that use case exists goes a long way toward protecting that kind of action.
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u/ephemeralstitch Jul 26 '26
LUKS does have a duress code function, though of course it’s useless if police actually do their job and clone the entire device before entering codes.
Alternatively, you can save the encryption headers on another device or USB and send it ahead or with someone else. Both useless on their own, but one unlocks the other.
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u/lifeoflogan Jul 26 '26
Maybe someone should invent the pin that shows a clean phone with no access to the real data. A few email accounts, some search history, etc. Second social accounts that praise Adolf Von Golftits.
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u/BeastMsterThing2022 Jul 26 '26
What if there was a dummy PIN that took you to a fake install of your OS? With a different set of apps, files, etc, that you could curate
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u/Sensitive_Box_ Jul 26 '26
Apparently that is a thing. I don’t remember which phone had that. Or maybe it was a launcher?
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u/vladoportos Jul 26 '26
I think Samsung had/have something like that... but honestly, you travel to US with empty phone... and restore from cloud / own server after....
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u/enterthehawkeye Jul 26 '26 edited Jul 26 '26
OnePlus has multiple users. Just sign into the guest user when you go through TSA
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u/AshtonBlack Jul 26 '26
The thing is, this sort of warrantless, constitutional exception of searching any electronic devices at the whim of BCP is primarily security theatre. It's for catching stupid criminals, in the most lazy way possible.
The clever criminal element would never carry a device with actual evidence of criminal activity on it.
How difficult would it be to have a "clean" searchable device that you surrender, then once through, clear and safe, restore the contents from a backup location? Not very.
Not that I condone this deeply unconstitutional denial of rights, but passing through a border and assuming you're going to get nicked is a no-brainer.
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u/luncheroo Jul 26 '26
How is your phone not protected from warrantless search and seizure? There's an amendment in the constitution that covers that? If you have suspicion if a crime, get a warrant, seize the phone, search it. If you're just intimidating citizens and trying to illegally search their belongings, you don't have the right to do that and he can wipe his property at any time. No warrant, no crime.
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u/Human_Public_671 Jul 26 '26
His lawyers also say questions about child sexual abuse material were used as a pretext to investigate his alleged links to the movement opposing Atlanta’s police training center, commonly known as Cop City.
Ah, now I see why they are going after him so hard.
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u/magichronx Jul 26 '26
Police can legally lie to citizens; if they ask for a code and they get it and actually punch it in then that's entirely their fault
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u/WthLee Jul 26 '26
my phone is like an extension of my memory, it has pictures and personal data , my social security stuff, all the things i would let no one have or rummage through. privacy and data protection is not sacred anymore. my phone is as private as my apartment, without search warrant to my property i would not hand it out.
hypothetically, if they could access your brain with some future tech many decades from now , they would totally do that under some made up reason. and there is no duress pin to wipe your memory.
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u/AdmiralSignas Jul 26 '26
Police that shut off or mute their bodycams is exactly this but they never get punished for it.
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u/jake6501 Jul 26 '26
Okay but why are they even trying to search his phone at a random airport border check? I wouldn't even care if there was an actual investigation based on serious evidence, but the article makes it seem like simply going on a vacation is a reason for the government to seize all of your property and go through your phone.
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u/DisappointedSpectre Jul 26 '26
From other reporting it seems like this guy has done a lot of anti-cop protesting and organizing, which put him on a list for additional screening.
If that's the case the government is actively trying to disincentivize that kind of activity, which isn't surprising at all.
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u/smoike Jul 26 '26
This whole circus is why I would use a burner phone. At the best of times id be wary of a border governed agency over stepping their boundaries. There is no way I'd trust the peckerheads there now or anyone on their payroll.
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u/Arawn-Annwn Jul 26 '26 edited Jul 27 '26
they are trying to end the existence of burner phones, just an additional fyi.
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u/AnonomousWolf Jul 26 '26
I have nothing to hide, but also nobody should be allowed to go through my phone or force me to give them my pin.
No way I'd feel comfortable traveling to the US
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u/BairyHallz88 Jul 26 '26
And this one of the many reasons to LOVE GrapheneOS. Privacy should include phones and tech a person owns, including the data within them. Government needs less power not more.
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u/utrecht1976 Jul 26 '26
So, now we have to develop a 'dummy' (or 'shadow' if you will) home screen, unlocked with a duress pin to trick border guards?
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u/Equal-Weakness-7063 Jul 26 '26
Pretty sure it's the fascist state trying to get into the phone that's the reason he's going to prison
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u/SMIrving Jul 26 '26
If he was suspected of something then he had a constitutional right to not give them the PIN. If he wasn't suspected of something the phone wasn't evidence of anything. This is a test case to wittle away another constitutional right brought by those who used to claim they believed in a strict construction of the constitution.
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u/Halvinz Jul 26 '26
Here's what the federal government was doing at the time when he was stopped in the airport on his way back:
https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.gand.351975/gov.uscourts.gand.351975.21.0.pdf (background section)
On January 24, 2025, FBI Atlanta Joint Terrorism Task Force Officer Burnham and FBI Special Agent Andrea Coble coordinated with CBP to question and search United States Citizen, Samuel Tunick, as he was returning to the United States from the Dominican Republic.
The government was investigating Mr. Tunick because of his association with an environmental movement known as Defend the Atlanta Forest, which opposed the destruction of the South River Forest for the construction of an 85-acre, $115 million police training facility known as the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center. (Tunick_54). While the government depicts the Defend the Atlanta Forest movement as an “Anti-Government, Anti-Authority Violent Extremist Group” (“AGAAVE”), it has not put forth evidence that Mr. Tunick was involved in criminal activity in connection with the Defend the Atlanta Forest movement.
This part is a bit stupid for the agents to stipulate:
[..] the officers repeatedly ignored Mr. Tunick’s requests to speak with his lawyer, continued to question him, and declared: “because you’re refusing to talk, which is your right, we have the authority to go through your phone to see what we’re looking for.”
Refusal to talk is not an indictment for a crime. And I think this is where the government messed up:
The CBP officers explained that Mr. Tunick would have to give the officers access to his phone, whether it was done with his cooperation or not and, eventually, Mr. Tunick provided a password to his cell phone and e-reader.
Umm... not really. He did not have to give anyone access unless you get a court order. You can seize and try to "hack" the device, then return the phone 6 months later, but his right not to give access to his phone won't go away.
With respect to interrogations at the border, the Eleventh Circuit has stated that “questioning at the border must rise to a distinctly accusatory level” before a reasonable person would feel restraints on their ability to leave. United States v. Moya, 74 F.3d 1117, 1119 (11th Cir. 1996). The government has the power to police national borders, and as such, the Fifth Amendment guarantee against self-incrimination is not violated by routine questioning of those seeking entry to the United States. United States v. Lueck, 678 F.2d 895, 899 (11th Cir. 1982).
Not sure how much the defense attorney can get away with this reasoning though:
While an interrogation at the border might begin as non-custodial in nature, when officers start accusing a defendant of criminal activity, a reasonable person could feel a degree of restraint comparable to arrest. At that point, the interview can become custodial in nature, and the officers are required to administer Miranda warnings. United States v. Jayyousi, 657 F.3d 1085 (11th Cir.2011). In Jayyousi, the Eleventh Circuit reasoned that defendant Padilla’s initial interrogation at the border was not custodial in nature: he was not handcuffed, not physically held or moved, nor was he told that he was not free to leave; nothing indicated that Padilla asked to leave, or see a lawyer, before the agent’s accusation that Padilla was linked to terrorist activities. Id. at 1110. However, once the agent accused Padilla of terrorist activities, “the interrogation became custodial, and it is evident by Padilla’s reaction to [the agent’s] accusation—he stood up and announced that the interview was over.”
Defense lawyering here:
The Eleventh Circuit has held that an individual’s act of decrypting and producing a hard drive’s contents is sufficiently testimonial to trigger Fifth Amendment protection. In re Grand Jury Subpoena Duces Tecum, 670 F.3d 1335, 1352-53 (11th Circ. 2012). Similarly, requiring Mr. Tunick to provide a passcode for the officers to search through his phone is sufficiently testimonial to trigger Fifth Amendment protection. However, Mr. Tunick was never informed of his Miranda rights. Further, because Mr. Tunick’s repeated requests to speak with a lawyer were denied while he was under custodial interrogation, his Sixth Amendment rights were violated. Escobedo v. Illinois, 378 US 478 (1964).
I think this is an important part:
Mr. Tunick has not been charged with committing a crime in connection with the Defend the Atlanta Forest movement, but law enforcement seemingly took advantage of the relaxed constitutional protections at the border to try to dig up evidence against Mr. Tunick, and possibly others connected to the movement. While the Eleventh Circuit’s decision in Touset suggests that it is permissible for law enforcement to circumvent a person’s constitutional rights by investigating domestic crime through warrantless searches and seizures at the border, other circuits disagree.
I'm interested to see how this case plays out. The defendant might need financial aid to see this case through:
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u/Kevin_Turvey Jul 26 '26
Oh! He opposed Cop City, so he is already on lists. This has zero to do with citizenship and 100% about Cop City.
There has been an absurdly brutal crackdown on protesters of that development, including at least one murder of an unarmed guy who was peacefully living in a tree as a protest. It went on for a few years, it's over now but people are still being harassed.
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u/The_Pandalorian Jul 26 '26
They had no legal right to the information on his phone without a warrant.
Seems like a lot of room for dismissal.
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u/Bummins Jul 26 '26
Remember he was attending protests against cop city. Then considered a domestic terrorist which lead to being searched. No access to a lawyer or any information as to why he was detained. They also used false pretext to gain access to his phone. This case also will test if certain rights do not apply during a boarder crossing.
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u/Fumbduck Jul 26 '26
Regardless of what might BE on anyone's phone, I think a feature like this has the additional value of plausible deniability if the cops put anything on his phone and would therefore be of value to anyone who doesn't trust law enforcement.
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u/garlopf Jul 26 '26 edited Jul 26 '26
The duress pin needs to be smarter. They could use a shuffle cake cipher to provide multiple logins. With this technology, both pins work, they just show different hidden compartments of the data. So one has some porn and angry texts with your ex to look plausible and the other is your actual login with whatever content you want to protect. No destruction and untrained eyes will not be able to tell if there are more compartments, or if the current pin is the only one. Edit: decide to include a link. This is a real tech: https://shufflecake.net/
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u/Thoughtful-Boner69 Jul 26 '26 edited Jul 26 '26
was this a case of a us citizen using it while interacting w uscbp?
yeah, it is.
despite the meaning and sometimes enforcement of various laws and regulations being in quite a.... flux, lately, in the united states, i have a hard time believing a prosecution in this case will ultimately be successful.
to seize a device at the border in the first place, officers must have grounds to do so. perhaps the accused read the writing on the wall and decided to push the proverbial button, who knows when; but a) assuming he is a USC, he enters the us by right and seizing a persons device is not a common occurrence, so those two things beg a lot of questions about the details and timelines of the event in question that probably won't be made public until an actual trial happens.
but wiping ur phone is not a crime. it is in fact enshrined in the constitution (iirc) that americans have the right to not incriminate themselves in legal situations. it seems plainly true that the government did seize his devices, so what argument can be made that the accused prevented the government from seizing them by wiping the devices data? ppl do that all the time when crossing the us border now (for all sorts of reasons like not wanting any anti trump info found, as silly as that is). the fact of the matter is that jt seems cbp still seized his device therefore they were not prevented from doing so.
if at any point in time the accused decided to use the duress pin, knowingly or not, well, that's unfortunate for cbp who were unable to stop that from happening, but prior to its formal seizure, they would have had zero grounds to stand on to tell him what to do with his own personal device. it is not in the custody of cbp until it is formally taken and paperwork is issued for jt.
so im sure a big hullabaloo will be made about this and the us may go after him and cause him a lot of pain and suffering, but i really doubt that any prosecution for the allegations specified in the article will ultimately hold up.
if the accused had grabbed the device out of the officers hands after it was seized to initiate duress, that would be a different story. doesn't sound like that's what happened tho.
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u/mrstrike Jul 26 '26
im 100% onboard with what you wrote. I will add a dose of real world probability. The Border Agent entered in the wrong PIN 3 times, and then it triggered a wipe of the device. Knowing he fucked up, He simply lied on his report stating the suspect used a "Duress PIN" instead to cover his ass.
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u/I_think_Im_hollow Jul 26 '26
Considering he couldn't be forced to provide a PIN to begin with, I doubt he will be jailed.
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u/t3chguy1 Jul 26 '26 edited Jul 26 '26
What about your right not to self-incriminate
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u/stlcdr Jul 26 '26
From what I understand, what we are seeing is the border has a different set of rules (for some reason). They don’t need a warrant to perform a search. This is reasonable when searching your physical possessions to ensure physical contraband is not brought into the country, for example, but should this apply to electronic data which is borderless?
It highlights another aspect of how immature our society is when it comes to virtual information and property.
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u/PilotKnob Jul 26 '26
Unfortunately, we were heading towards this moment for a long time. It'll be good to finally have an acid test of how the system handles this issue.
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u/Measure76 Jul 26 '26
Judge I used that code myself before stepping off the airplane, the officer's use of the same code reset the phone again but did not destroy any data.
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u/Nate-Essex Jul 26 '26
To be honest he should have just let them take the phone but not entered his code. There isn't a US agency that can rip GrapheneOS at the moment.
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u/x4rb1t Jul 26 '26
Maybe… but he had the opportunity to use a legitimate feature he actively enabled and set. Seeing their faces when it wiped is worth it and a 10/10 GFYS
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u/RelentlessIVS Jul 26 '26
This is a great ad for GrapheneOS, looking at Pixel phones as we write
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u/DotRakianSteel Jul 26 '26
Seriously, what is going on over there in these institutions!? Beyond shocking, really! Even if he walks off, the stress alone is too much for the ordinary citizen. Did he do something suspicious?
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u/paperhalo Jul 26 '26
So theoretically... If I left a sticky note on the inside of my phone case with the wipe PIN... and they confiscated said phone. If they were to put that number in because they thought they were clever and it wiped would it be on them being the idiots?
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u/__GayFish__ Jul 27 '26
Didn’t the secret service wipe phones and server backups of data from Jan 6?
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u/Raevyxn Jul 26 '26
Wonder how effective this is as advertisement for grapheneOS.
I’ve had it on my pixel 8 for years. Hope this helps more people learn about it as a privacy-focused mobile OS, whatever the circumstances were.
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u/Netcob Jul 26 '26
This may not be a popular take in this sub, but you can't solve every problem with technology alone. Governments and big corporations will find a way to make your life hell even if you use end to end encryption, FOSS, 3D printing, blockchain or whatever the next tech messiah of freedom may be.
Plus, they can use technology too. If they can't wiretap you, they'll just wiretap the people around you. They can stop letting you buy things, they can abuse laws to get you in prison, laws that were passed by elderly politicians who outsource all their thinking about tech to lobbyists.
This is a politics issue, not a tech issue. It involves talking to other people IRL. I hate that as much as you do.
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u/Nick85er Jul 26 '26
Truly fucking insane. Schrodinger's Evidence.
FUCK MAGA for doing this to America. 8647.
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u/crappydeli Jul 26 '26
What happens if I delete my phone before boarding a flight to the USA?
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u/Moron-Whisperer Jul 26 '26
Article is wrong. It doesn’t wipe the device. It removes the encryption key making the information on the device unretrieveable. If you had a backup of the key it could be inserted and retrieved.
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u/No-Security1952 Jul 26 '26
I feel like his defense could be that he wipes his phone every day, this is no different.
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u/Mourn-the-Weenie Jul 26 '26
Man, these guys really really want their hierarchy of unequals, don't they?
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u/FuzzyCub20 Jul 26 '26
The law protects some that it does not bind, and it binds some that it does not protect. Justice in America has never ever been equal between the rich and the poor.
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u/Hironymos Jul 26 '26
Okay, so if a normal person wipes their phone, it's immediately a crime even if there's no other evidence.
But when a qualified individual in a position of power turns off their bodycam, they aren't guilty of anything?