Civil liberties have been under threat since President Donald Trump came to power in January. The Trump administration is primarily targeting more vulnerable groups, such as immigrants, tourists and non-American activists, as U.S. laws do not grant the same protections as American citizens.
Some immigrants and tourists have found themselves trapped at the border for a long period of time. In some cases, they are held for social media posts that are critical of Trump. It raised the question – what should people prepare for when they meet our immigration agents?
Entry Points
Crossing the US border is a particularly vulnerable point to Trump’s targets of crackdown.
US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) detained a Lebanese doctor and assistant professor at Brown University, Lasha Alawie, who was about to re-enter the United States in March, and eventually an agent who allegedly discovered images related to Hezbollah on her phone was eventually deported her. The agency tried to explain that she did not support her before being ultimately sent to Lebanon, as she did not provide evidence of what she had to do with the paramilitary group.
Tom Bowman, policy advisor to the Center for Democracy Technology (CDT), says crossing US borders raises “clear privacy concerns.” They are allowed to search for people’s electronic devices “without a warrant or possible cause,” he says.
“If you are a citizen, they cannot deny you entry to a country based on refusing to unlock your phone. They cannot deny your entry, but they cannot deny your entry.” “If you are at risk of deportation, we recommend following the customer or border enforcement requests, but that doesn’t mean you can’t minimize the amount of data you have.”
“Some travelers choose to limit data that they carry across borders,” Bowman says. “This includes using a travel-only device, storing essential information in the cloud, logging out of all accounts, or completely deleting sensitive apps and files. Others choose to completely shut down the device before it arrives at the border and rely on full disk encryption to protect its content.”
The ICE targets student protesters in support of Palestine, and often monitors social media.
Badar Khan Sri, a postdoctoral researcher at Georgetown University, was seized by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency (ICE) after returning to his home following Ramadan Iftar in March. ICE is said to have been denied by his lawyer that Suri, born in India and who was in the US on a student visa, “will spread Hamas propaganda and promote anti-Semitism on social media.”
Two days ago, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Agency announced that it would screen social media accounts of people applying for permanent and non-citizens who belong to educational institutions for evidence of “anti-Semitic activities.”
Punish protests
The Trump administration has not yet invoked a rebellion law, but for now it’s punishing people for protesting – non-citizens.
The administration has specifically been trying to deport a student activist from Columbia University, named Mahmoud Khalil.
“I think people should be very concerned,” says Daniel Solob, professor of intellectual property technology law at George Washington University. “We live in surveillance associations, and the government can use facial recognition and AI-assisted surveillance technology to systematically identify and track protesters. We’ve already seen the government chase protesters.”
Cornell University student and activist Momodou Taal canceled his student visa and recently decided to leave the United States to avoid being deported. Yoon Zeo Chung, a Colombian student and activist and a legal permanent resident who moved from South Korea to the US at the age of seven, is also being targeted by ICE.
Federal agents may use video surveillance, social media surveillance, facial recognition or geographical data to identify who is taking part in the protest, Bowman said. He says those recording the protests through photos and videos can unintentionally identify who took part in a particular demonstration. So people need to be aware of how they use their devices.
“One basic protection is changing your phone in plane mode when you protest, which ensures you don’t send data in real time,” Budington says. “You can still navigate streets with offline maps. Both Google Maps and Apple Maps have a way to do that.”
Protesters can also communicate using messaging apps such as signals during the protest, as they can encrypt messages. While it is recommended to keep your phone at home, you may want to have one in an emergency or in cases of an unlawful police action.
It is essentially impossible to avoid all government snooping and have 100% full time for your data, but there are actions that allow you to cross borders or attend protests, which can help reduce the risk of government targeting.
Americans are more aware of the need for privacy and are looking for ways to protect themselves. Buddington says people seem to be much more concerned about privacy than they were five or ten years ago.
“The government already has a large amount of personal data and uses it inappropriately. The government already has countless surveillance technologies and uses them,” says Solove. “We’re already in a constitutional crisis, and this administration seems to push as much as possible until it stops.”
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