Tech
Phone inspections when crossing the U.S. border: What you need to know about your rights and security
In addition to a sweeping immigration agenda that involves limiting entries at U.S. ports of entry, stripping immigrant visas, and deporting undocumented Americans en masse, the Trump administration is revamping its approach to digital security, including the use of personal device searches to detain and deport U.S. residents or tourists at the border.
Individuals, including legal permanent residents and visa holders, have been harassed and even deported by border patrol agents after traveling out of the country. In a handful of cases, European tourists have been detained and held in immigrant detention facilities. The news has stoked fear among many travelers, as individuals report increased device searches upon entry to the U.S.
In March, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) submitted a proposed change mandating a review of social media profiles as part of the process for vetting and approving benefits. The change would apply to immigrants already residing in the U.S., including green card and visa holders. In January, President Donald Trump issued an Executive Order titled, "Protecting the United States from Foreign Terrorists and Other National Security and Public Safety Threats," which included a directive to slow down the visa-issuance process through heightened application scrutiny.
The administration's efforts aren't limited to the citizenship process. If you're planning to cross or enter a U.S. border or customs point, make sure to know your rights and monitor how you can protect your personal data.
What can customs and border patrol do with my phone?
While warrantless searches of personal devices were ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in 2014, U.S. ports of entry are a different legal landscape. According to U.S. law, the CBP reserves the right to inspect electronic devices that cross the border on the premise of national security, also known as electronic checks. Electronic checks make up a small percentage of all border interactions, reports Axios, but heightened border scrutiny may amplify such activity.
Advocates have pushed to include border patrol in warrant laws, with a notable win in 2023, and various appellate courts have ruled that warrants be required for data searches at the border beyond “digital contraband," such as illegal materials. A New York state court decision, for example, ruled that warrants are required for searches of travelers' devices — that means travelers through major New York City airports, like JFK, should be protected from electronic checks. But at large the CBP policy remains, permitting "the inspection, examination, and search of vehicles, persons, baggage, and merchandise," including electronic devices.
U.S. citizens have the right to decline a device search without being barred entrance, but lawful permanent residents and foreign visitors may face harsher interrogation or be denied entry into the country. In both cases, CBP may seize and hold onto your devices.
If your device a seized by a border patrol agent, the agent will conduct either a "basic" or "advanced" search. Basic searches include a manual search of content easily accessible on your device. Advanced searches involve external equipment that can analyze and copy your device's content — advanced searches should only happen on the suspicion of illegal activity and with higher approval.
How can I protect my device?
Travelers should do what they can to protect their personal data during basic CBP searches. According to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the first step should be limiting the amount of digital information carried across the border, including leaving unnecessary devices at home or using temporary ones.
When entering a port of entry, travelers can also consider turning off their devices completely. Always consult with an immigration lawyer if you are worried your status may come into question or are at risk of deportation.
Delete sensitive information
Experts suggest deleting images or files containing licenses, credit card information, and other documents with sensitive data. Some even suggest deleting personal photos of children or loved ones before traveling. Clear any "deleted" or "trash" folders that may temporarily hold onto erased content, as well.
Make sure any important information or files are backed up to an external location (one that you aren't traveling with), in case your devices are seized and held by CBP. For those with concerns about sensitive data, consider encrypting your device.
Turn off biometric passwords
Due to protections against self incrimination outlined in the Fifth Amendment, law enforcement has the right to ask an individual to unlock their cellphone using a biometric password such as facial recognition or fingerprints, but they cannot ask you supply them with numerical passcodes.
While border patrol operates under a slightly different set of guidelines, you should still consider turning off any settings that provide easy access to your phone, like Face I.D., and strengthening your device passcode before traveling to the U.S. Passcode-locked apps or photo libraries may provide additional security.
Log out of or private your social media accounts
While conducting a basic search, border patrol agents cannot look through personal email inboxes or cloud storage, and your device remains offline or in airplane. However, agents can look at any public social media profiles or posts — so set your pages to private and delete any posts you wouldn’t want an agent to read.
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It seems OpenAI has been caught with its hands in the proverbial cookie jar. Anthropic has reportedly cut off OpenAI’s access to Anthropic’s APIs over what Anthropic is calling a terms of service breach.
As reported by Wired, multiple sources claim that OpenAI has been cut off from Anthropic’s APIs. Allegedly, OpenAI was using Anthropic’s Claude Code to assist in creating and testing OpenAI’s upcoming GPT-5, which is due to release in August.
According to these sources, OpenAI was plugging into Claude’s internal tools instead of using the chat interface. From there, they used the API to run tests against GPT-5 to check things like coding and creative writing against Claude to compare performance. OpenAI allegedly also tested safety prompts related to things like CSAM, self-harm, and defamation. This would give OpenAI data that it could then use to fine-tune GPT-5 to make it more competitive against Claude.
Unfortunately for OpenAI, this violates Anthropic’s commercial terms of service, which ban companies from using Anthropic’s tools to build competitor AI products.
“Customer may not and must not attempt to access the Services to build a competing product or service, including to train competing AI models or resell the Services except as expressly approved by Anthropic,” the terms read.
OpenAI responded by saying that what the company was doing was an industry standard, as all the AI companies test their models against the competing models. The company then went on to say that it respected Anthropic’s decision but expressed disappointment in having its API access shut off, especially considering that Anthropic’s access to OpenAI’s API remains open.
A spokesperson told Wired that OpenAI’s access would be reinstated for “benchmarking and safety evaluations.”
It’s not the first time this year that Anthropic has cut off API access. In June, the company cut off Windsurf’s API access after rumors that it was being sold to OpenAI. That deal ultimately fell through, but Anthropic’s cofounder, Jared Kaplan, told TechCrunch at the time that “it would be odd for us to be selling Claude to OpenAI.”
Anthropic has also tweaked its rate limits for Claude, which will take effect in late August, with one of the reasons being that a small number of users are violating the company’s policy by sharing and reselling accounts.
Disclosure: Ziff Davis, Mashable’s parent company, in April filed a lawsuit against OpenAI, alleging it infringed Ziff Davis copyrights in training and operating its AI systems.
It’s the end of another quarter, which means it’s time for yet another earnings call with concerning ideas for generating more revenue. This time around, it's Amazon CEO Andy Jassy, who told shareholders on Thursday that there’s “significant financial opportunity” in delivering ads through Alexa+, the company’s new AI-powered voice assistant.
“I think over time, there will be opportunities, you know, as people are engaging in more multi-turn conversations to have advertising play a role — to help people find discovery and also as a lever to drive revenue,” Jassy said, per the investor call transcript.
Since launching earlier this year, Alexa+ has reportedly reached millions of users. Unlike the original Alexa, which mostly turns off lights and sets timers, Alexa+ is designed to be more conversational, context-aware, and AI-driven. It can help you plan your date night, entertain your kids, and even dabble in basic image and video generation — all under the banner of your $14.99/month Prime subscription.
But so far, Amazon Alexa has been an ad-free experience. It's also more than 10 years old, and it doesn't make money; thus, it's been deemed a "colossal failure" by those within the company.
Of course, Amazon isn’t alone in trying to figure out how to make AI pay for itself. Both Google and OpenAI have explored ad integration in their AI products as a way to generate revenue. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, in particular, has made a notable pivot: once firmly against advertising in his chatbot, he’s since reversed course, possibly opening the door for ads in future versions of ChatGPT.
Whatever the motivation, injecting ads into Alexa+ would mark a major shift in both user experience and Amazon’s strategy, especially given the assistant’s long history of being expensive to maintain and hard to monetize. Ad-supported Alexa+ could be Amazon’s attempt to finally turn its once-money-burning smart assistant into a revenue machine, without hiking the subscription fee (at least for now).
Alexa+ is still new, and what an ad-supported experience would actually look like remains unclear. According to Jassy, the idea is to frame ads as helpful, something to assist customers in discovering products they might be interested in buying.
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