How to protect your electronic data at the border

Electronic Frontier Foundation has a detailed article advising you of your (lack of) rights when you enter and leave the United States (this applies to citizens and non-citizens). Here is some basic advice, but check out the article for lots of good advice regarding encryption, use of clouds, backups and other advice, much of it useful even when you are not traveling:

Border agents have a great deal of discretion to perform searches and make determinations of admissibility at the border. Keep in mind that any traveler, regardless of citizenship status or behavior, can be temporarily detained by border agents for more detailed questioning, a physical search of possessions, or a more extensive physical search. Refusal to cooperate with searches, answer questions, or turn over passwords to let agents access or decrypt data may cause lengthy questioning, seizure of devices for further examination, or, in extreme circumstance, prevent admission to the country. For this reason, it may be best to protect your data in ways that don’t require you to have awkward confrontations with border agents at all.

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Who’s the best warmonger?

Robert Scheer reports on the most recent GOP debate:

Here we go again. With the economy showing faint signs of life and their positions on the social issues alienating most moderates, the leading Republican candidates, with the exception of Ron Paul, have returned to the elixir of warmongering to once again sway the gullible masses. The race to the bottom has been set by Newt Gingrich, the most desperate of the lot, who on Tuesday charged that “The president wants to unilaterally weaken the United States,” because his administration has dared question the wisdom of Israel attacking Iran and proposes a slight reduction in the bloated defense budget. Let the good times roll with a beefed-up military budget justified by plans to invade yet another Muslim country. As Paul warned during the South Carolina primary debate as his presidential rivals threatened war with Iran: “I’m afraid what’s going on right now is similar to the war propaganda that went on against Iraq.”

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Encourage aggressive journalism only overseas?

Reporter Jake Tapper to White House Press Secretary Jay Carney:

There just seems to be disconnect here. You want aggressive journalism abroad; you just don’t want it in the United States.
The context: The Obama Administration, which has praised aggressive reporting on regimes elsewhere in the world, has brought six prosecutions against CIA whistle-blowers using the Espionage Act to censor information about CIA torture.

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Atheist editor of high school newspaper denied right to publish article

Krystal Myers is a student at Lenoir City High School (in Tennessee), which has a predominantly Christian student body. She is also the editor of her public high school newspaper. She also happens to be an atheist. KnoxNews reports on a recent incident:

In a recent editorial that Myers, 18, intended for the Lenoir City High School newspaper entitled "No Rights: The Life of an Atheist," she questioned her treatment by the majority.

The article criticized the school for promoting prayer at school events, including school board meetings. Why was Krystal denied the right to publish her article?

Schools Director Wayne Miller said it was the decision of the school authorities not to allow publication of Myers' editorial because of the potential for disruption in the school.

I'd like to know more about the article. If Kristal happens to read this post, I hope she'll contact me. I would certainly consider publishing her article here at DI, if she's interested.

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Is your original cell still alive?

I'm in the process of watching a (Great Courses) video course titled "Understanding DNA, Genes and their Real-World Applications," taught by Professor David Sadava. In today's lecture (#5) he asked whether one's original cell still exists in each adult. Each of us came from one cell, a fertilized egg, which divided, then divided again, on and on. Sadava's question was whether our original cells might still be alive somewhere in our adult human bodies, decades later. His answer was that there is no compelling reason to assume that that original cell is not still "somewhere" inside of you, one cell among the 60 trillion cells that make up your body. Intriguing thought.

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