Australian Customs Officials Will Search Your Laptop For cough

[NYCguy]

:shock:

Individuals who purchase and distribute child cough are not "real criminals"?

I would gladly offer up my phone or other electronics for search if this puts even one scumbag behind bars.

Fair enough, but from what I understand the legislation makes no distinction between coughographic images depicting minors and coughographic images depicting consenting adults. There's your problem. It's the same old "oh well, if you haven't done anything wrong, you needn't worry"... But the issue is that they ask the question at all, especially since most perverts into CP undoubtedly have more discrete methods of obtaining/distributing their revolting wares anyway. It's called the internet, Joyce.

 

[JohnK]

Individuals who purchase and distribute child cough are not "real criminals"?

I did not say they weren't real criminals. Customs is simply not catching enough criminals and in my opinion these new measures are not going to help them catch any more criminals. What it will do is annoy more people coming back into Australia.

I would gladly offer up my phone or other electronics for search if this puts even one scumbag behind bars.

There is a difference in offering a phone for search rather than when your phone is taken away from you to another room and then brought back switched off and you are asked to switch it back on and then taken away again. And the lady (if I can call her that) going through my luggage was not much better. Looked through everything and was disappointed (yes she could not hide her disappointment) she could not find anything.

All my stuff was just dumped back into the suitcase. I was treated like a criminal and in the end no apology offered for wasting my time. When you go through that process you will understand.

And by the way not every single Australian male that goes to Thailand 2-3 times a year is a paedophile or sex maniac. Perhaps they need to update their profiling.

 

[dajop]

But the issue is that they ask the question at all, especially since most perverts into CP undoubtedly have more discrete methods of obtaining/distributing their revolting wares anyway. It's called the internet, Joyce.

Wonder if we'll see future episodes of Border Security showing people who have ingested condom's filled with flash drives or memory chips

 

[blueflamenco]

Fair enough, but from what I understand the legislation makes no distinction between coughographic images depicting minors and coughographic images depicting consenting adults. There's your problem. It's the same old "oh well, if you haven't done anything wrong, you needn't worry"... But the issue is that they ask the question at all, especially since most perverts into CP undoubtedly have more discrete methods of obtaining/distributing their revolting wares anyway. It's called the internet, Joyce.

I'm sure there is a reason why it has been worded as simply "coughography". Have you seen those individuals on Border Security who claim "I didn't know it was a food item" ? I'm sure you would see the same sort of thing with coughography.

Asking if you are carrying coughography pretty much covers it all.

Australian Customs "...says the aim is to prevent the importation of coughography that includes children, extreme violence or other material that violates Australian law."

I think this is pretty reasonable and I don't understand why people would take issue with it. Yes there are numerous ways to obtain this material however it is still brought into the country from overseas and stored on personal laptops. If those individuals can be intercepted like this, why not?

 

[one9]

I would be interested to hear from someone who refuses to dilvude or enter a password to their computer when asked.

Many business people have confidential business information on their computer and have security such as whole disk encryption or similar. If your computer is taken away by Customs, and your hard drive copied, there is very little information on data safety measures that the government is taking to protect that information from turning up to your competitors.

I believe it is illegal to not divuldge your password if you know it, but don't believe it is illegal to not divuldge it, if you don't know it.

 

[oz_mark]

I believe it is illegal to not divuldge your password if you know it, but don't believe it is illegal to not divuldge it, if you don't know it.

Hard to divulge something you don't know!

 

[Mal]

I would be interested to hear from someone who refuses to dilvude or enter a password to their computer when asked.

Federal law was changed recently IIRC. It was a "relatively" minor penalty to refuse to divulge a password, and many scumbags were choosing it. I believe it's now much higher in the order of offences.

 

[blueflamenco]

I did not say they weren't real criminals. Customs is simply not catching enough criminals and in my opinion these new measures are not going to help them catch any more criminals. What it will do is annoy more people coming back into Australia.


There is a difference in offering a phone for search rather than when your phone is taken away from you to another room and then brought back switched off and you are asked to switch it back on and then taken away again. And the lady (if I can call her that) going through my luggage was not much better. Looked through everything and was disappointed (yes she could not hide her disappointment) she could not find anything.

All my stuff was just dumped back into the suitcase. I was treated like a criminal and in the end no apology offered for wasting my time. When you go through that process you will understand.

And by the way not every single Australian male that goes to Thailand 2-3 times a year is a paedophile or sex maniac. Perhaps they need to update their profiling.

No, you just said why don't they catch the real criminals.. As though they were not already doing so... So catching a child predator would not be a mighty good catch?

I get that it might be frustrating to have your bag pulled apart and your phone looked through. But I would like to see it as a small sacrifice for the greater good. Perhaps they should be more courteous... I don't know. But I respect the job they do.

Why would they look upon Australian males who go to Thailand frequently a certain way? Or did they just pull this demographic out of a hat? I'm guessing it is for good reason. Which, is unfortunate for the majority of males.

 

[Will]

I would be interested to hear from someone who refuses to dilvude or enter a password to their computer when asked.

Many business people have confidential business information on their computer and have security such as whole disk encryption or similar. If your computer is taken away by Customs, and your hard drive copied, there is very little information on data safety measures that the government is taking to protect that information from turning up to your competitors.

I believe it is illegal to not divuldge your password if you know it, but don't believe it is illegal to not divuldge it, if you don't know it.

If this is a concern for you - as it is for many people - programs such as Truecrypt offer encrypted volumes with plausibly deniable inner volumes.

You can enter a password - which you can safely disclose to customs if forced to - which opens the outer volume. In this you place some documents that look like you might want to keep them secret.

If, when opening the volume, a different password is entered, a hidden extra volume is opened in addition to the outer volume. The data for this volume is hidden, encrypted, in what appears to be the free space of the outer volume.

There is no way to prove that the inner volume even exists.

Many people have legitimate reasons for this kind of privacy - preventing industrial espionage, intelligence services gaining access to your information when your HDD is copied by customs - but the fact that this is available means that smart criminals are very unlikely to be caught.

 

[Mal]

but the fact that this is available means that smart criminals are very unlikely to be caught.

The majority of people who deal with CP aren't smart (fortunately for police!).

 

[blueflamenco]

The majority of people who deal with CP aren't smart (fortunately for police!).

You got in before me

 

[pomjim]

Hmm, so they are attempting to stop child cough coming into the country? This sounds rather like the attempt to stop drugs coming in. Most drugs enter Australia in containers, so where are most customs officials? At the airports, not the docks! As has already been mentioned, if somebody is into kiddie cough, they will merely upload it onto a “cloud” based site, not onto their laptop.

I go to Cambodia twice a year, and every time I return to Australia I get pulled over and searched, as Cambodia has a reputation as a destination for child rapists. If I was one of those people, would I really come back with anything on my laptop or phone?

 

[blueflamenco]

Hmm, so they are attempting to stop child cough coming into the country? This sounds rather like the attempt to stop drugs coming in. Most drugs enter Australia in containers, so where are most customs officials? At the airports, not the docks! As has already been mentioned, if somebody is into kiddie cough, they will merely upload it onto a “cloud” based site, not onto their laptop.

I go to Cambodia twice a year, and every time I return to Australia I get pulled over and searched, as Cambodia has a reputation as a destination for child rapists. If I was one of those people, would I really come back with anything on my laptop or phone?

You would be surprised.

 

[JohnK]

No, you just said why don't they catch the real criminals.. As though they were not already doing so... So catching a child predator would not be a mighty good catch?

I am all for preventing child coughography but the article mentioned in the OP specifically makes mention of (all) coughography including the homemade variety made by consenting adults in a committed relationship.

This new law is a gross invasion of privacy (and by the way I have nothing to hide) and stinks of the "Big Brother" attitude that is creeping into society.

Why would they look upon Australian males who go to Thailand frequently a certain way? Or did they just pull this demographic out of a hat? I'm guessing it is for good reason. Which, is unfortunate for the majority of males.

I am a taxpaying Australian who can go on holidays wherever or whenever I want. I should not be labelled a criminal when I return to my country because of some silly profiling program that is clearly wrong.

How about single (or married) females going to Bali or coughet as a group?

 

[ejb]

...
I am a taxpaying Australian who can go on holidays wherever or whenever I want. I should not be labelled a criminal when I return to my country because of some silly profiling program that is clearly wrong.

How about single (or married) females going to Bali or coughet as a group?

Hi John,

It is a sad fact that some people do travel to these places for the wrong reasons and as such Customs are wary of people who travel often.

Try spending 2 days in South America then flying to London for 2 days then back to South America for 2 days before returning home to Perth. A friend of mine did this and was thoroughly searched and questioned by customs on his arrival home.

As long as people frequent South America for drugs and South East Asia for illegal sex customs will be on the loookout.

I am sure however that they could do their job "nicer" but after a long flight home I guess we are all a little tired and wanting to get home so any holdup is seen badly.

Perhaps a T-Shirt that says "Golf not Sex" may help.

Furthermore I don't feel asking about cough will catch anybody with anything illegal, it is just another attempt to look like they are busy catching criminals.

ejb

 

[harvyk]

The majority of people who deal with CP aren't smart (fortunately for police!).

Actually no... There are some who deal with CP who are very smart, and have used technology in ways we can't imagine to distribute their wares.

I somewhat doubt that anyone who deals with CP would be silly enough to take it through customs in a folder called illegal stuff sitting on their desktop.

As for me, well I'm bound by a lot of confidentiality with my work (company secrets et all), so if a customs official wishes to look at my laptop, I will insist they go get a court order and \ or sign a document so full of legalises which holds the custom officer personally liable, with unlimited liability should my private information be disclosed to ANY third parties.

I'm not normally the type which will argue with a customs officer, but having a 3rd party person look through my data in a potentially non-existent needle in 10 haystacks search is not something I am willing to take lightly or happily.

 

[Mal]

Actually no... There are some who deal with CP who are very smart, and have used technology in ways we can't imagine to distribute their wares.

I was talking about the majority - not the minority. I've dealt with CP in a previous role (actually was involved in one of the first cases brought to court in one state of Australia). I've also liaised with agents from Customs, State/Federal Police, ATO and other investigative bodies and chatted about similar things.

Yes, some people have great ways of hiding their habits. Even the latest browsers assist somewhat by having "sandboxes" where you can download and your traces will be removed (but not completely deleted) when you exit. There are internet technologies which assist (such as Tor and anonymous proxies) - by hiding your web access, and of course on-disk encryption as already discussed in this thread.

I haven't done any real research (and have no case studies to back me up), but the common CP user is not particularly computer savvy, often has a wife and children of his own (or is a loner) and isn't that methodical about how they try and access the material.

 

[NM]

As for me, well I'm bound by a lot of confidentiality with my work (company secrets et all), so if a customs official wishes to look at my laptop, I will insist they go get a court order and \ or sign a document so full of legalises which holds the custom officer personally liable, with unlimited liability should my private information be disclosed to ANY third parties.

This would present an interesting situation. I am in a similar situation to you, carrying information on my laptop for which I have signed "Non-Disclosure Agreements". That means it is an offence for me to disclose that information to anyone who is not a signatory to the non-disclosure agreement. My laptop hard drive is encrypted (with more than just Windows encryption) so they would need me to provide details before they could see anything on my drive.

I expect a Customs officer would argue they do not require a court order to inspect the item and if you refuse then they simply refuse to allow you to being it into the country. Then its your choice. But I would be required under the non-disclosure agreements to seek consent from multiple organisations (not just my own employer) before handing my laptop over for inspection. I expect this would start with a phone call to the company legal department. So it could be a long exercise.

Can you imagine if a Customs Officer saw documents that detailed plans to outsource customs activities (purely hypothetical example as I cannot confirm nor deny any plans for such actions do or do not exist on my laptop).

So perhaps we just need to draft and each carry a legally binding non-disclosure agreement that we require the customs officers to sign before providing access to the computer.

I have no issue with them inspecting anything I bring into the country. I am only concerned that I would be breaking the legally binding non-disclosure agreements that I have signed. So long as I am assured of being relieved of my legal obligations for non-disclosure, then they can go ahead and look at anything they like. After all, my employer has the right to inspect anything on my laptop and if they found anything questionable I would be in more trouble than I am willing to risk.

I understand that the only difference now is that the question about coughography has now been added to the arrivals card. I have no issues with its addition nor with the generality or vagueness of the question. Just as the food questions say "any food" and if you have any food then you need to declare it and if it poses no threat then it will be allowed through, the same process can occur for coughography. if you will be embarrassed by what you are carrying, then don't carry it! Simple.

 

[Mal]

This would present an interesting situation. I am in a similar situation to you, carrying information on my laptop for which I have signed "Non-Disclosure Agreements". That means it is an offence for me to disclose that information to anyone who is not a signatory to the non-disclosure agreement. My laptop hard drive is encrypted (with more than just Windows encryption) so they would need me to provide details before they could see anything on my drive.

Most customs agencies have a fully equipped IT forensics team available on call (and in the case of Customs in Australia, I believe most staff are able to do basic forensics when required). Perhaps you should be having that discussion with your company right now - as chances are at some stage the laptop will be searched.

Australia is no different to the UK, the U.S, and parts of Asia. If they want to inspect a laptop, they have the resources required.

Perhaps you need to investigate storing your "confidential" documents on a work server and only carrying a vanilla corporate OS with VPN access back to work. That's how a lot of road warriers deal with the threat.

 

[oz_mark]

Aside from the fact that they have now started asking the question on a form, have their powers actually changed? I was under the impression that they could always have stopped material that, for example, had been refused classification.