Customs agents searching electronics

WASHINGTON — Northern New Yorkers who yearn for simple and seamless travel to and from Canada received further indication that those days may be gone forever.

In recent weeks, the Department of Homeland Security has announced that it can and will search laptop computers and other electronic devices at land crossings, even if agents have no suspicion of criminal wrongdoing. And the department said it will begin keeping a record of every person who enters the United States at land crossings, and keep that information for 15 years.

The department said the measures are not all that new — the government has long asserted the right to search people and property entering the country, and international air passengers arriving at U.S. Customs already have their information recorded when presenting a passport.

But the latest measures worry business and tourism groups along the border, which say they might dampen travel for business and tourism and all but eliminate the quick trips Northern New Yorkers have made for dinner or shopping in the Thousand Islands and Niagara Falls. The countries exchange $1.75 billion worth of goods daily.

"All of a sudden, going to Memphis or going to Baltimore, for your six-hour drive, it just seems easier," said Craig Turner, director of public policy for the Buffalo-Niagara Partnership, which promotes that region. "It's a marketing disadvantage."

Mr. Turner said he stopped his own trips to Canada for Chinese food, a typical refrain for those border-region New Yorkers who see Canada as the closest source of culture.

The measures come on the heels of the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative, which requires passports or similar documents. Confusion about that requirement resulted in a drop in cross-border travel, Mr. Turner said, although much of the shock has worn off and the DHS has allowed New York and other states to adopt enhanced driver's licenses as an alternative to passports. The WHTI takes effect next June.

The laptop searches gained the attention of Joseph P. Nichols, a Malone lawyer who said he received inquiries from air passengers whose laptops were searched. He said he has not heard of such searches at Northern New York crossings, although a DHS spokesman said such searches are possible anytime a traveler is sent to secondary review at the border.

"When a couple of people came to me, they were shocked that their computers could be gone through," Mr. Nichols said. One was a business owner who had no idea why border agents were interested in her computer, which contained confidential information about her business, he said.

Mr. Nichols said he researched the issue and decided the government acted within its rights.

"Border searches are reasonable by the single fact that the person or item in question has entered into the United States from another country," he wrote in a letter to the Times. "Two courts have recently held that border laptop searches are constitutional and do not require reasonable suspicion or probable cause that a crime is being committed."

Not everyone with business interests at the border is complaining. "I'm not sure that the Chamber needs to take a position on the issue of data collection at the border," Karen K. Delmonico, president and chief executive officer of the Greater Watertown-North Country Chamber of Commerce, said in an e-mail message.

In Canada, tourism boosters worry about anything that discourages travel from the United States, said Chris Whyman, manager of visitor services in Kingston, Ontario. "We always tend to worry about anything that deters the average Joe from traveling."

But so far, Mr. Whyman said, Americans still visit Kingston in big numbers, even amid the WHTI debate.

"A lot of people are biting the bullet; they're coming," he said.

A DHS spokesman, Russ Knocke, said the department is trying to be transparent by publicly announcing the measures.

"If anything, privacy advocates should be rejoicing," Mr. Knocke said.

Recording a traveler's name, address, age and citizenship simply extends a practice that has already been in place at airports, and will be practical for the first time with machine-scannable identification at land crossings, Mr. Knocke said. The adoption of machine-readable cards allows DHS to be more specific with the public about what information is tracked and how it is stored, he said.

As for laptop searches, the DHS cites an issue not typically connected with homeland security — child pornography — as one justification for broad authority. Tourists would rarely be subject to a laptop search, Mr. Knocke said, because those travelers don't generally end up in secondary review at the border.

"We were, again, seeking to be transparent," Mr. Knocke said.