US Court Limits E-Device Searches on Borders Bob Egelko - SFGate.com
go to original March 9, 2013

The Department of Homeland security has declared that anyone living within 100 miles of a national border or even an ocean is subject to searches from DHS agents without any suspicion required, effectively removing your Fourth Amendment right in what are really Fourth Amendment exclusion zones. (Storyleak)

A federal appeals court put restrictions Friday on officers' authority to search laptop computers at U.S. border inspections, requiring grounds to suspect wrongdoing before agents use equipment that can unlock computer passwords.

The 8-3 ruling by the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco was the first of its kind by an appellate court. Border agents generally can search incoming travelers and most types of property without any evidence of wrongdoing.

Laptops, iPads and similar devices "contain the most intimate details of our lives: financial records, confidential business documents, medical records and private e-mails," said Judge Margaret McKeown in the majority opinion.

She said they are entitled to protection under the Fourth Amendment, which prohibits unreasonable searches of people, their homes and their "papers and effects."

Dissenting Judge Consuelo Callahan said the ruling, if it stands, means that "people and things we wish to keep out of our country will get in."

Civil liberties groups were pleased by the decision.

Read the whole story at SFGate.com

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