OTTAWA: A Canadian man named Alain Philippon was charged because he wouldn’t give up his cellphone passcode to Canadian Border Services officers at Halifax airport.
In Canada, much like the US, law enforcement officers generally need a warrant from a judge in order to search a person’s belongings. However, the rules are different at the border.
“The principal difference between borders and our day-to-day interactions with police is the voluntary engagement with a border,” Berger said. “Because we have at some level chosen to attempt to cross a border, it’s in a sense, us who has engaged our liberties, not the police having inserted themselves into our lives.”
Canada’s Customs Act allows border patrol officers to look at ‘”all goods and conveyances include electronic devices, such as cellphones and laptops”‘ according to a spokesperson for the Canada Border Services Agency.
