fatbrit

The matter's far from settled.

Good advice here: http://www.aclunc.org/issues/technol..._borders.shtml

niku2

Just did a search but didn't find the answer to this question:

Is it safe to take an external hard drive/USB stick through airport security or would they be better off packed into boxes we'll ship bck to the States?

Helix

Please can you clarify your definition of safe? As in will it get wipped? Will it get taken by border control? Or some other definition?

ian-mstm

Airport scanners are not magnetic, so a scan will not wipe the info off a traditional internal/external hard drive. USB flash drives and SSDs store info electronically... and I've put more than my share of both through airport scanners with no problems. It's a non-issue.

Ian

Soundman

I've travelled, alot, back and forth between the U.K. and the U.S. and have never had a problem with USB pens or hard drives in my rucksack (carry-on) - either with wiping or suspician. I usually have 2-3 USB pens and up to 3 hard drives with me at a given time.
I've brought a few built towers into the U.S. (under-luggage) and had them all come through without any problems. I did have one of the HD's bugger-up shortly after but that could either have been from rough handling or just a lemon.
Regardless, if you value your data, carry it onboard.

GeoffM

Thanks all - the worry was that they'd send off the HDs for analysis somewhere and that I'd be without them for a while. Obviously I have backups of the important stuff, it would just be the hassle factor. I think I'll put them in hand baggage and also have some DVDs in the checked baggage of the most important things.

markwm

If it's that vital then why not use something like DropBox or SkyDrive to store your files/documents or whatever in the ether and download them this side as required? Lot easier than carrying hard drives (though I did also use a usb key for immediate stuff - they just ignore it as they do the laptop most of the time). I think SkyDrive offer 25gb free - the others, like DropBox, probably require a subscription.

fatbrit

New story today.
“This ruling affirms that the Constitution is still alive at the US border,” ACLU Staff Attorney Catherine Crump said in a statement. “Despite the government’s broad assertions that it can take and search any laptop, diary or smartphone without any reasonable suspicion, the court said the government cannot use that power to target political speech.”
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/n...der-search.ars

Helix

That's a good start however the normal Joe Bloggs won't be able to claim their laptops were taken for political reasons.

ian-mstm

I'm not so sure. I believe that Joe Bloggs can make that claim. Whether the claim had any merit would be for a judge to decide... not CBP personnel. While the claim would not stop CBP personnel from seizing the laptop/drive, it would effectively stop them from trying to get any data from said drive... at least until a judge ruled on the merits of the case.

Ian

GeoffM

Follow-up: stupidly forgot to take the HDDs out of my hand baggage at Heathrow which prompted a full bag-emptying and manual search! No problems at either end though. Even better, they still work.

Soundman

Good to hear that everything worked out!
Thanks for your update.