“I am not a criminal, but I get treated like one
Posted on December 11th, 2008
Filed under: General — Karl Olson @ 10:39 pm
Every time I’m at the border, they hate Ultraklystron.” – Me, some future track.
You know, if I fit a profile that made any sense, I might not be so bothered by this, but I don’t. My horrendous car combined with otakudom, musician-status and unemployment shouldn’t be read as “drug dealer and/or internet pedophile” more just as nerdy loser and media pirate, at worst (and since I’m not a pirate, all they are left with is nerdy loser.) But no, they go through my car, try to bate me into giving them some kind of incriminating evidence by asking me “what is the definition of obscenity?,” “have you viewed any obscene content recently?,” “is there any obscene content on your laptop?,” amongst other anyone-with-half-a-brain-knows-right-and-wrong-answers questions, and they go through my laptop and thumbdrives, something that really leaves me irritated because who is to say they didn’t any one if not all of the following:
1. Steal personal data. I don’t have laptop save cookies from many sites, but I do have it save some because I don’t want to be on open wi-fi at an internet cafe or public hotspot, transmitting passwords in plain-text. However, this also means they could have copied my cookies for insertion into another browser, looked through my email and via my email pulled passwords for any other site I visited by using password recovery. I’d like to think that border cops aren’t that crooked, but it cannot be ruled out.
2. Plant spyware/viruses on my computer. Normally, the virus and anti-spyware software on my computer is pretty much a joke. It has nothing to with me doing something stupid to compromise my security and everything to do with the fact that you never know when some new exploit will hit that can’t even be stopped with safe browsing (like browser, image and plug-in exploits.) However, before I did anything else, I ran scans with all the software I had installed, downloaded more software to run scans with, and am now, for the first time in years, browsing with a 3rd-party firewall, so that in case the scan miss anything, hopefully I can catch it anyway.
3. Plant evidence to find on a future visit. This would be, of course, the most immoral, illegal, unjust thing that could be done to me, but the fact is, there is no way you can rule out at the least possibility of it occurring. They had access to my computer, they could have done whatever they wanted to it. They could have done anything from copying some pirated movies to adding a true-crypt partition to my hard drive with all manner of super-illegal banned-in-Canada content. I’ve done what I can to search the computer, but the fact is, short of reformatting the laptop and doing a reinstall, there is no way to be totally sure. Some seemingly everyday file could now have something prosecuted appended to it.
Anyways, this results in the following new rules for me when traveling abroad.
1. Stop taking the 1988 Ford Escort. It seems to be a magnet for getting me flagged, where as 1993 Ford Escort isn’t. Additionally, when I drove my mom’s 2008 Honda Civic up to both pick up and drop off Danielle a few month back, I was given no trouble, in spite of the fact that my passport should have been flagged from the last time I was up in the 88.
2. Clear the laptop of any cookies, even the ones I’d rather keep. Odds are, I’ll be able to hit some kind of secure internet once I’m up there, and if I can’t, well, I doubt I have any emails that important for me to check.
3. Bring a recovery disc or flash drive. This way, no matter anyone does to the computer, I can simply reset everything.
…assuming they aren’t so talent as to some how flash in a diseased and evil BIOS. Oh, and since I’m not a citizen of Canada, I’m sure my recourse is exceedingly limited should any of my concerns ever be legit.
PS: I did have an awesome day with Danielle in Nelson, BC. We had fun shopping and walking about the town. Danielle found a very cute hat, and we both got some very cool sunglasses for a good price. I hope the rest of my stay (which thanks to the stop can be no longer than 23rd, lest a warrant be put out for my arrest – hope I don’t get snowed in,) is just as wonderful. Border dramas aside, I do always have a good time with Danielle when I’m up here.
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