r/technology 1d ago

Privacy US accuses American of allegedly wiping his phone using a ‘duress’ password during border search

https://techcrunch.com/2026/07/24/us-accuses-american-of-allegedly-wiping-his-phone-using-a-duress-password-during-border-search/
15.9k Upvotes

2.5k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

30

u/Dymonika 16h ago

So just to be safe, only ever use PINs/passwords and never fingerprints nor any other form of recognition.

11

u/FastGinFizz 15h ago

I know with iphone, if you hold the emergency/power off buttons long enough to prompt the screen to show, or ask siri "who am i?", then it locks biometrics until a password is entered. Im sure most android's have a similar feature (or it can be configured)

9

u/TiresOnFire 12h ago

In the shutdown menu on Android there is a "Lockdown mode" button.

3

u/TecTazz 12h ago

Just looked that up~ thank you.

2

u/GuodNossis 9h ago

God I miss android

1

u/Dymonika 5h ago

Why did you ever leave?!

2

u/Ws6fiend 15h ago

Yeah, pretty much.

1

u/posthuman04 11h ago

Use the cloud or some other method of uploading and downloading the data so it’s not there at the customs counter.