(a)Destruction or Removal of Property To Prevent Seizure.—
Whoever, before, during, or after any search foror seizure of property by any person authorized to make such search or seizure, knowingly destroys, damages, wastes, disposes of, transfers, or otherwise takes any action, or knowingly attempts to destroy, damage, waste, dispose of, transfer, or otherwise take any action, for the purpose of preventing or impairing the Government’s lawful authority to take such property into its custody or control or to continue holding such property under its lawful custody and control, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 5 years, or both.
If he hadn’t used duress and had just refused, he’d have been fine. Graphine is secure and would have had his back
If he hadn’t given them the code and instead left it in his wallet, and they did it themselves, he’d have been fine.
All he had to do was plead the 5th.
He’s going to get hit with a felony for destroying data to prevent a search. There are tons of precedents in the 11th Circuit for searching without a warrant.
A duress password is only useful if what you’d be facing is worse than 18 U.S. Code § 2232a, and then only if they don’t have enough to convict you already.
Dude is just protesting the construction of a large cop training facility near him. I don’t know what the fuck he did to get on the FBI radar, but I wish him good luck; he’s gonna need it.
i mean, the broad strokes are obvious, but if they went after every person who was vocal about something being build in their backyard, they’d need the whole of ICE to staff themselves. He must have been saying some shit to an insider. Come to think of it, I bet they have a pretty fucking big online presence for that purpose.
He associated with Defend the Atlanta Forest, which due to being against Cop City, has been flagged as a terrorist organization by the fascists in charge.
There is literally no other reason to be found.
His lawyers have already found (through internal CBP emails) that they flagged him for suspected terrorism because he was associated with Defend the Atlanta Forest.
They internally categorized the group as anti-government, anti-authority, and a violent extremist group.
He protested against Cop City and associated with a non-violent, peaceful org that also protested against Cop City. Thats it.
What if you set a durress password to something simple like 12345, plead the 5th, and the cops try to brute force your device? Would it still be your fault or is it the cops fault since they are the ones who entered the password while trying to bypass your phone’s security measures?
Also, what if you explicitly tell them there is a durress password, but refuse to tell them what it is? Surely if they were informed of the risk and proceeded regardless the blame would fall squarely on them for risking a process that might “destroy evidence”
They’re there because you’re being watched already. You’re coming in from an international flight to the 11th district so they have unreasonable search and seizure rules.
Graphine is clean enough that they can’t sidestep it. Just plead the 5th and leave it at that. They’ll probably confiscate it in hopes they’ll eventually be able to break it on a zero day.
Telling them the duress password is the unlock code will def get you fucked.
Pleading the 5th and then them entering a password found in your wallet that wipes it will get you dragged into court, but probably in a defensible position; those lawyer fees are going to be immense.
Pleading the 5th and having your duress as 1234, which they try, would also put you in a defensible position with 10s of thousands in lawyers’ fees.
The duress password isn’t illegal. The knowing destruction of data is. If you set it up so they’re likely to destroy the data in attempting, you’re going to get served.
Don’t go through a border with a phone full of questionable personal data. Legal or not.
I don’t think ordinary citizens should be required to know the law in lawyer-like detail when they travel.
I think in the broad strokes, you’re probably right about his legal situation, but it suuuuuucks and it’s not what I think of when I hear the word “freedom,” for sure.
The issue I’m seeing with the whole case is they siezed his phone, they kept his phone, the seizure of his property happened successfully. A person later entered something they believed would open it but instead it wiped it. The end user didn’t wipe it, and didn’t lie to the agents of the state because a duress PIN is still a PIN, I’m willing to wager they didn’t specify that they wanted his ‘unlock PIN’ and instead just asked him for a PIN (personal identification number), which he gave.
Is data property? Sure, ideas, concepts, photos, etc can be trademarked/copy-write protected and have some degree of ownership, but I’m talking at a much lower level here… Is the particular configuration of memory on your phone a piece of property? If no, then no property was destroyed by wiping the phone. All of the storage and memory is still intact and functional. If yes, then we must look further…is the position (not the switch itself) of a binary switch (like a light switch) a physical thing that you can own? Would you consider it destroyed if it was switched away from it’s original position?
I don’t think you could charge him with destroying property… Destruction of evidence maybe, but the property is undamaged and functioning normally.
Other arguments. The cop actually destroyed the data. Or, defendant claims he did not know the cops would use the pin to wipe the phone, and that they just wanted to know what the PIN was.
I wouldn’t say there is enough evidence here to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that this guy destroyed any property in response to a search. He didn’t destroy anything, what was destroyed is arguably not property, and he may not be aware that his duress pin was going to be used on the device in the first place.
So far, every time I’ve been outraged about Buckees, they’ve sued a small business that’s trying to file their own trademark. And while I don’t like it one bit, trademark law is more or less designed for that exact purpose. Logos don’t have to be close, they could just vaguely remind you of another established trademark. The barrier to winning is extremely low, and the fault lies with the shitty, overly vague trademark law that attempts to make trademark owners fight any possible contender.
I don’t know if these guys were or were not trying to file a trademark, but I do know the three I looked at so far were begridgingly acceptable by trademark standards.
The video I provided covers this. There are plenty of statutes and precedents. There’s a tiny little bit of unsettled case law to be decided here that will, at best, lower his sentence a bit.
I strongly suspect an imminent plea bargain, unless they want to use him as an example.
It’s legal within most of the US for customs/border enforcement to do warrantless phone searches, because their definition of border is 100 miles from point of entry to the country. So every coastline, every international airport, etc.
Maybe so. But probably guessing targeting someone for a warrantless search would not be legal. That is to say, the cops can’t follow a guy and wait until they’re 100 miles from the border to pull them over and call over customs to search them. What may save Turnick is he was already being investigated and this search was clearly an endrun around needing a warrant.
I’ve heard that is a misunderstanding. It’s 100 miles from a national border or at a point of entry, not 100 miles from any point of entry. It still covers like 50% of the population though.
It’s unfortunately a border entry. They can do whatever they want regarding searches in that jurisdiction. He won’t get away with it being an illegal search.
There are still outs, but they are not super likely :/
They would, but he’d have a significantly better chance at winning. Having a duress setup/password isn’t illegal. if you plead the 5th on what that pin code is, i don’t think they’d have a leg to stand on.
I don’t know if it would win or not. But the cops could argue that you put that piece of paper as a premeditated trap designed to wipe evidence and interfere with their investigation, if they caught you. Especially if you wrote any of that down and they found it. Honestly I’m not sure what the jury would agree with in this country.
So what? Yes, that’s what the paper note is for. If someone wants to get unauthorized access, they will likely try it and wipe the phone. You have zero obligation to warn them not to do that. You didn’t authorize access.
I think you’re on the right track. You could say the note was for cell phone thieves or something and you didn’t expect the police to use it. Plausible deniability.
That would have been a completely different situation though. Even if the pass was written in a note inside his phone case, it’s not illegal to have it, right? If your computer has a button that wipes it and a cop presses it, you aren’t liable, right?
The issue here is that he told the cop that that button switches the computer on, which is a lie and it shows intent on destroying evidence.
There’ll be a chorus of people inexplicably arguing that police get to do whatever they want, until we’ve lost so much of our humanity it’s become illegal to breathe
If he hadn’t used duress and had just refused, he’d have been fine. Graphene is secure
Graphene devs fucked over this guy. They should apologize
When Graphene is serious, the duress passcode will QUIETLY wipe your phone and leave it looking normal, preferably with normal-looking innocuous photos, media, etc.
This is what happens when devs aren’t really thinking about the real world use case.
Can’t Graphene be used like this already? Dude may not have known, or may not have bothered to set up multiple profiles. But I’m pretty sure it can be done.
No. If you make and distribute security-related software, you should consider the safety of your user.
Your threat model absolutely should include this exact scenario. And you should know enough to understand and implement principles like plausible deniability and repudiation.
That privacy was already long gone by the time of this case.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2232
(a)Destruction or Removal of Property To Prevent Seizure.— Whoever, before, during, or after any search for or seizure of property by any person authorized to make such search or seizure, knowingly destroys, damages, wastes, disposes of, transfers, or otherwise takes any action, or knowingly attempts to destroy, damage, waste, dispose of, transfer, or otherwise take any action, for the purpose of preventing or impairing the Government’s lawful authority to take such property into its custody or control or to continue holding such property under its lawful custody and control, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 5 years, or both.If he hadn’t used duress and had just refused, he’d have been fine. Graphine is secure and would have had his back
If he hadn’t given them the code and instead left it in his wallet, and they did it themselves, he’d have been fine.
All he had to do was plead the 5th.
He’s going to get hit with a felony for destroying data to prevent a search. There are tons of precedents in the 11th Circuit for searching without a warrant.
A duress password is only useful if what you’d be facing is worse than 18 U.S. Code § 2232a, and then only if they don’t have enough to convict you already.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2rokxux5cU`___`
Dude is just protesting the construction of a large cop training facility near him. I don’t know what the fuck he did to get on the FBI radar, but I wish him good luck; he’s gonna need it.
…
That is what did it.
i mean, the broad strokes are obvious, but if they went after every person who was vocal about something being build in their backyard, they’d need the whole of ICE to staff themselves. He must have been saying some shit to an insider. Come to think of it, I bet they have a pretty fucking big online presence for that purpose.
He associated with Defend the Atlanta Forest, which due to being against Cop City, has been flagged as a terrorist organization by the fascists in charge.
There is literally no other reason to be found.
His lawyers have already found (through internal CBP emails) that they flagged him for suspected terrorism because he was associated with Defend the Atlanta Forest.
They internally categorized the group as anti-government, anti-authority, and a violent extremist group.
He protested against Cop City and associated with a non-violent, peaceful org that also protested against Cop City. Thats it.
What if you set a durress password to something simple like 12345, plead the 5th, and the cops try to brute force your device? Would it still be your fault or is it the cops fault since they are the ones who entered the password while trying to bypass your phone’s security measures?
Also, what if you explicitly tell them there is a durress password, but refuse to tell them what it is? Surely if they were informed of the risk and proceeded regardless the blame would fall squarely on them for risking a process that might “destroy evidence”
They’re there because you’re being watched already. You’re coming in from an international flight to the 11th district so they have unreasonable search and seizure rules.
Graphine is clean enough that they can’t sidestep it. Just plead the 5th and leave it at that. They’ll probably confiscate it in hopes they’ll eventually be able to break it on a zero day.
Telling them the duress password is the unlock code will def get you fucked.
Pleading the 5th and then them entering a password found in your wallet that wipes it will get you dragged into court, but probably in a defensible position; those lawyer fees are going to be immense.
Pleading the 5th and having your duress as 1234, which they try, would also put you in a defensible position with 10s of thousands in lawyers’ fees.
The duress password isn’t illegal. The knowing destruction of data is. If you set it up so they’re likely to destroy the data in attempting, you’re going to get served.
Don’t go through a border with a phone full of questionable personal data. Legal or not.
I don’t think ordinary citizens should be required to know the law in lawyer-like detail when they travel.
I think in the broad strokes, you’re probably right about his legal situation, but it suuuuuucks and it’s not what I think of when I hear the word “freedom,” for sure.
Freedom, lol. How many prisoners per capita again?
The freedom to enslave, silly.
It becomes a slippery slope. He is unfortunately going to be a martyr that teaches us
The issue I’m seeing with the whole case is they siezed his phone, they kept his phone, the seizure of his property happened successfully. A person later entered something they believed would open it but instead it wiped it. The end user didn’t wipe it, and didn’t lie to the agents of the state because a duress PIN is still a PIN, I’m willing to wager they didn’t specify that they wanted his ‘unlock PIN’ and instead just asked him for a PIN (personal identification number), which he gave.
That’s court fodder, and unfortunately, I don’t believe it’ll pass.
Yeah, sadly I don’t think it will either, I’m just hoping the jury decides the precedent they truly want to set.
Here is my problem with this interpretation…
Is data property? Sure, ideas, concepts, photos, etc can be trademarked/copy-write protected and have some degree of ownership, but I’m talking at a much lower level here… Is the particular configuration of memory on your phone a piece of property? If no, then no property was destroyed by wiping the phone. All of the storage and memory is still intact and functional. If yes, then we must look further…is the position (not the switch itself) of a binary switch (like a light switch) a physical thing that you can own? Would you consider it destroyed if it was switched away from it’s original position?
I don’t think you could charge him with destroying property… Destruction of evidence maybe, but the property is undamaged and functioning normally.
Other arguments. The cop actually destroyed the data. Or, defendant claims he did not know the cops would use the pin to wipe the phone, and that they just wanted to know what the PIN was.
I wouldn’t say there is enough evidence here to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that this guy destroyed any property in response to a search. He didn’t destroy anything, what was destroyed is arguably not property, and he may not be aware that his duress pin was going to be used on the device in the first place.
None of that would hold up in court.
Bucees just successfully argued in court that a beaver and an alligator are visually indistinguishable to the common man…
So far, every time I’ve been outraged about Buckees, they’ve sued a small business that’s trying to file their own trademark. And while I don’t like it one bit, trademark law is more or less designed for that exact purpose. Logos don’t have to be close, they could just vaguely remind you of another established trademark. The barrier to winning is extremely low, and the fault lies with the shitty, overly vague trademark law that attempts to make trademark owners fight any possible contender.
I don’t know if these guys were or were not trying to file a trademark, but I do know the three I looked at so far were begridgingly acceptable by trademark standards.
The video I provided covers this. There are plenty of statutes and precedents. There’s a tiny little bit of unsettled case law to be decided here that will, at best, lower his sentence a bit.
I strongly suspect an imminent plea bargain, unless they want to use him as an example.
I think the application of that law depends on whether a seizure is valid (aka legal), which is kind of up in the air, as your video points out.
It’s legal within most of the US for customs/border enforcement to do warrantless phone searches, because their definition of border is 100 miles from point of entry to the country. So every coastline, every international airport, etc.
It was an international return flight, 100% border jurisdiction.
Maybe so. But probably guessing targeting someone for a warrantless search would not be legal. That is to say, the cops can’t follow a guy and wait until they’re 100 miles from the border to pull them over and call over customs to search them. What may save Turnick is he was already being investigated and this search was clearly an endrun around needing a warrant.
I’ve heard that is a misunderstanding. It’s 100 miles from a national border or at a point of entry, not 100 miles from any point of entry. It still covers like 50% of the population though.
My understanding is that it’s “only” 100 miles from the coast/border, which turns out to be most major population centers.
Yup, because airports
No, what I’m saying is that airports do not count. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Border_search_exception
See also the ACLU site: https://www.aclu.org/documents/constitution-100-mile-border-zone
This one is more detailed: https://www.aclumaine.org/know-your-rights/100-mile-border-zone/
It’s unfortunately a border entry. They can do whatever they want regarding searches in that jurisdiction. He won’t get away with it being an illegal search.
There are still outs, but they are not super likely :/
If they found a duress password in his wallet, and used it, they would 100% prosecute for that.
They would, but he’d have a significantly better chance at winning. Having a duress setup/password isn’t illegal. if you plead the 5th on what that pin code is, i don’t think they’d have a leg to stand on.
I don’t know if it would win or not. But the cops could argue that you put that piece of paper as a premeditated trap designed to wipe evidence and interfere with their investigation, if they caught you. Especially if you wrote any of that down and they found it. Honestly I’m not sure what the jury would agree with in this country.
So what? Yes, that’s what the paper note is for. If someone wants to get unauthorized access, they will likely try it and wipe the phone. You have zero obligation to warn them not to do that. You didn’t authorize access.
I think you’re on the right track. You could say the note was for cell phone thieves or something and you didn’t expect the police to use it. Plausible deniability.
That would have been a completely different situation though. Even if the pass was written in a note inside his phone case, it’s not illegal to have it, right? If your computer has a button that wipes it and a cop presses it, you aren’t liable, right?
The issue here is that he told the cop that that button switches the computer on, which is a lie and it shows intent on destroying evidence.
There’ll be a chorus of people inexplicably arguing that police get to do whatever they want, until we’ve lost so much of our humanity it’s become illegal to breathe
Graphene devs fucked over this guy. They should apologize
When Graphene is serious, the duress passcode will QUIETLY wipe your phone and leave it looking normal, preferably with normal-looking innocuous photos, media, etc.
This is what happens when devs aren’t really thinking about the real world use case.
Can’t Graphene be used like this already? Dude may not have known, or may not have bothered to set up multiple profiles. But I’m pretty sure it can be done.
Point is that when graphene gets the distress code, it makes it really clear that it’s wiping the phone.
That’s the Stupid Part
Something designed like SAmsung Knox would be much better. the rest of the phone/apps are still fine.
They shouldn’t apologize, the dude should of known that destroying evidence during an investigation is going to land you in jail.
There was no investigation, no evidence, and no jurisdiction
No. If you make and distribute security-related software, you should consider the safety of your user.
Your threat model absolutely should include this exact scenario. And you should know enough to understand and implement principles like plausible deniability and repudiation.