Limit info on smartphones at U.S. border: privacy commish

OTTAWA — Canadians should be exercising a fair amount of caution when crossing the U.S. border with personal mobile devices in the face of American laws that allow their customs agents nearly unfettered access to those devices and the information contained within, the federal privacy watchdog affirmed Monday. “In short, think hard about what kind of information you want to bring with you in your electronic devices as you cross the border because we have heard that that information can be required by U.S. customs officers and it’s prudent you act accordingly,” Daniel Therrien, the federal privacy commissioner, told the House of Commons’ access to information, privacy and ethics committee Monday afternoon. Therrien appeared as part of the committee’s study of the privacy of Canadians at airports, borders and travelling in the United States, and his comments fell in line with what he has previously advised Parliamentarians — namely that an executive order signed by the U.S. president at the beginning of the year would “specifically exclude non-U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents from certain privacy protections,” and that these types of measures “clearly have a material effect on the privacy of many of our citizens, given the scale of tourism and business travel to the U.S.” He also repeated his call for Canada to be added to a list of designated countries whose citizens can seek some sort of recompense for privacy violations in the United States, under 2016’s Judicial Redress Act. According to a summary of the legislation, the act authorized the American Department of Justice to select foreign countries whose citizens can “bring civil action against” the U.S. government if it uses its Privacy Act “for purposes of accessing, amending, or redressing unlawful disclosures of records transferred from a foreign country to the United States to prevent, investigate, detect, or prosecute criminal offenses.” Therrien said Monday he did not know whether Canada has asked to be added to that list, which includes the European Union and more than two-dozen European countries. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, when asked by The Wire Report Tuesday whether Canada has requested inclusion under the Judicial Redress Act, would only say that the federal government is “very closely engaged with the American administration on border issues.” He added: “This is something that obviously matters to Canadians who travel back and forth across the U.S. border every single day, but also it matters to our economy,” given the amount of goods and number of people that cross over the border every day. “We’re always looking for ways to better protect Canadians and ensure both security and a smooth flow back and forth across the border,” Trudeau said. “Our economy, our country depends on it, and we are engaged on an ongoing basis in very detailed discussions with the Americans every day on how we improve the border.” On Monday, committee members questioned whether Canadians should be looking at taking “burner phones” with them when travelling, instead of their usual personal devices. “I would certainly advise Canadians to limit the number of devices they bring to the U.S., point one,” Therrien said, adding that travellers should also “review and limit the information that is found on the devices that you’re bringing with you to the United States.” Though Therrien noted that he thinks “it would be prudent to see whether you would leave in Canada, on local devices or home computer and whatnot, information that you want to keep and that you may not need in the United States,” he also acknowledged that storing sensitive information in the cloud to be retrieved once across the border may not be foolproof either, as travellers could be compelled to give up passwords if entry points are found on their devices. According to numbers Therrien gave to the committee, border searches of cellphones of non-Americans increased from 5,000 times in 2015 to 25,000 searches in 2016. “And according to reliable numbers, in February 2017 there were 5,000 searches in that month alone,” Therrien said, in French. According to the American Civil Liberties Union, which is involved in a lawsuit against the U.S. government over warrantless device searches, U.S. customs officers have conducted almost 15,000 electronic device searches in the first half of the 2017 fiscal year. This isn’t the first time the committee has heard concerns about Canadians’ privacy at the border, as the commissioner and civil liberties groups have previously told the MPs that reasonable grounds should be required before electronic device searches are carried out. It’s taking time for the policy and laws surrounding what’s permissible when it comes to border searches to catch up with the technological advances that have made electronic devices, Therrien said, and though his office will do what it can to make sure Canadians are aware of the risks, it’s also up to Parliament to act by “ensuring that the laws, to the extent that they deal with Canadian officers, protect people so that they’re not subject to random searches.” NDP ethics critic Nathan Cullen — who said he’s had two constituents who were denied entry into the U.S. because of medical information found on their devices — asked Therrien if MPs were to send communication out to their constituents warning them off of bringing their devices across the border “that might seem alarmist to some Canadians, would you not agree?” “Quite possibly, yes,” Therrien said, before confirming that it’s something he would advise MPs to do anyway. — With reporting by Charelle Evelyn at cevelyn@thewirereport.ca and editing by Anja Karadeglija at akarad@thewirereport.ca

Limit info on smartphones at U.S. border: privacy commish

News | September 19, 2017

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Limit info on smartphones at U.S. border: privacy commish

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