In an interview with Wired this week, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said the DHS’s new policy of searching laptops is based on whether there is “some suspicion that the inspector has about the person.” Yesterday, Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI) said Chertoff’s claim is the exact opposite of DHS’s policy:
But the actual policy that DHS published says the exact opposite. It does not even mention secondary screening, let alone limit laptop searches to those cases, and it expressly states that Americans’ laptops may be searched “absent individualized suspicion.” Secretary Chertoff’s blatant mischaracterization of the DHS policy contradicts his claim to be engaging in greater “openness and transparency” on this important issue.
Check out the online campaigns of “Hands Off My Laptop” and the Electronic Frontier Foundation.