With a warrant could LE ask you to decrypt a laptop?

I suppose you could get a bad case of amnesia and forget your key all of a sudden. I wonder what would've happen to Ross if they just got him with an encrypted laptop. I would assume they would try to get someone to crack it and if not throw some of the most severe tampering with evidence charges anyone's ever seen before


Comments


[12 Points] None:

[deleted]


[12 Points] defiantlyfucked:

I was pulled over while dropping 3 packs ready for post.

A tails USB with a persistence volume on my person.

I was searched and charged on possession with intent to distribute.

At no point in time did LE even realize what may have been on that USB.

I received my USB drive back with the rest of my property when I met bail.

Kind of off topic here, but still relevant perhaps.

I would not count on this happening again.


[3 Points] BallsDeepInJesus:

Maybe. Courts really haven't determined if it violates the 5th amendment. Wikipedia has a good rundown:

The Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution protects witnesses from being forced to incriminate themselves, and there is currently no law regarding key disclosure in the United States. However, the federal case In re Boucher may be influential as case law. In this case, a man's laptop was inspected by customs agents and child pornography was discovered. The device was seized and powered-down, at which point disk encryption technology made the evidence unavailable. The judge argued that since the content had already been seen by the customs agents, Boucher's encryption password "adds little or nothing to the sum total of the Government's information about the existence and location of files that may contain incriminating information."

In another case, a district court judge ordered a Colorado woman to decrypt her laptop so prosecutors can use the files against her in a criminal case: "I conclude that the Fifth Amendment is not implicated by requiring production of the unencrypted contents of the Toshiba Satellite M305 laptop computer," Colorado U.S. District Judge Robert Blackburn ruled on January 23, 2012. In Commonwealth v. Gelfgatt, the court ordered a suspect to decrypt his computer, citing exception to Fifth Amendment can be invoked because "an act of production does not involve testimonial communication where the facts conveyed already are known to the government...".

However, in United States v. Doe, the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit ruled on 24 February 2012 that forcing the decryption of one's laptop violates the Fifth Amendment.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation may also issue national security letters that require the disclosure of keys for investigative purposes. One company, Lavabit, chose to shut down rather than surrender its master private keys.

Basically, the federal districts don't agree. We will have to wait for a Supreme Court decision before things are cleared up.


[2 Points] Rus_s13:

If you have the key written down, and lose that piece of paper, there isn't much either party can do.


[2 Points] fuckoffplsthankyou:

Nope. I would say I have a fifth Amendment right not to incriminate myself and they can put me in jail for it if they want but they aren't getting my decryption key.


[1 Points] None:

[deleted]


[1 Points] wtzl4xd:

Can anyone with a little free time help me out and give me a quick rundown of whether it's worth it to encrypt my hard drive? I only buy for personal use and run a windows PC. Does encryption slow down my computer or anything?


[1 Points] anti-omni:

don't be a faggot and just say nothing


[1 Points] BrodhiRoundhouseKick:

Say you had it written down on paper because it was long and complex and then your dog ate it.


[0 Points] u3565572:

Yes


[0 Points] AdrianBeatyoursons:

cops don't even know what MySpace is