So this came up last week again and I just couldn’t help but wonder why they make such a fuzz about data stored on laptops or other data carriers.
Sure, you could be bringing all kinds of naughty stuff into the country but anyone who has really something to hide will either encrypt it or simply download it once they get to their destination.

Lets assume I travel to the states and have some super secret data I don’t want anyone to see.
The easy way would just be to get truecrypt and hide an encrypted file in another encrypted file (xzibit.jpg goes here) which can be done with a few easy clicks.
I put some stuff normal people would hide on their laptop in there and when I’m asked to give my password I’ll just give it to them and they can enjoy going through the
stuff i hid in there.
There won’t be any clue that there’s a second container hidden in there as well.
Decrypting that would be nearly impossible.

While this would work and my hidden data will be safe this of course is very inconvenient.
So why not have a clean laptop without anything suspicious on it and go straight to the nearest public accesspoint or open wifi network and download
all the data you couldn’t get through customs.
You just encrypt everything at home, upload it to a server somewhere and download it when you land.
The only reason to store things on disks or usb drives I could think of is if you have to bring in a lot of data. But than again, you can’t hide all those and not look suspicious.

The point I want to make with this is that you can’t control data. As long as breaking encryption takes years it’s impossible to control it.
This is the same on the internet as it is on airports.
Filtering internet won’t stop pirates or child pornography creators. They will just get better at hiding what they do and the ones who do get caught are just
small fish.

So, should they stop screening laptops?
No. But not because it works but because if they didn’t screen random people everyone would just be able to carry any data they’d like into a country.
And maybe they don’t catch the big guys they probably do get lucky every now and then.