Litigation Support

Most Americans would be appalled to know that a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agent can explore your laptop at will and without probable cause, having it confiscated if it pleases the agent so the laptop can be explored by the government at its leisure.

Senator Russ Feingold has had enough. He has authored S. 3612, the Travelers' Privacy Protection Act of 2008, which would ensure that American citizens and legal residents returning to the U.S. from foreign countries would not have the laptops, cell phones or other electronic media searched without reasonable suspicion. It would also ban profiling based on travelers' race or ethnicity, allow people detained to witness the process of their laptop being examined, limit the time officials can hold a traveler's hardware and provide compensation for damage to a traveler's computer.

"There is a compelling and immediate need for this legislation," said Feingold, in introducing his bill last Friday. "Travelers have been forced to wait for hours while customs agents reviewed and sometimes copied the contents of the electronic devices. In some cases, the laptops or cell phones were confiscated, and returned weeks or even months later, with no explanation."

The DHS is so arrogant that when Feingold chaired a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on the issue in June, the DHS refused to send a witness for the hearing and did not comply with the committee's request to produce answers to the questions previously submitted to DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff before the hearing.

The Travelers' Privacy Protection Act is strongly supported by the American Civil Liberties Union as well as business trade groups such as the Association of Corporate Travel Executives (ACTE), which represents the global business travel industry and has members in 82 countries.

I have never seen so many lawyers and citizens this angry about an invasion of privacy. If they could speak up in a single voice, they would no doubt echo the words of Peter Finch in Network. ?I?m mad as hell and I?m not going to take it anymore!?

Bravo Senator ? it won?t be easy sailing, but I wish you fair winds. You?re clearly steering by the right star.

E-mail: snelson@senseient.com      Phone: 703-359-0700