General Reports

[QUOTE=Lost Johnny]I just got back from a month long journey to China, Thailand and Cambodia, for the first time in my home state (Minnesota) I was searched at customs. I have seen enough movies to know better then to smuggle anything (I would make a terrible smuggler) but that didn't stop the friendly folks from helping themselves to 28 new DVD's, one of the coppers said so long as I was not bringing in a bunch of one copy or had too many it was OK, saddly this one was not mine and I had to fork over the ill gotten movies. The real problem was there looking at my laptop, 90% of my photo's are G-rated stuff, the great wall, Angkor Watt etc, then there is the other 10%. Even then the problem was not photo's I had taken abroad, but video clips and stills I had, some time ago, downloaded. Even though there is nothing illegal on my laptop, the customs man expressed "concern" about the 1200 porn video clips he calims I had (this is a lie I have no where near that many!) also he tried to make it sound like I had illegal content, I had none and I knew it but it is best to not keep anything on a laptop that you don't want anyone else to see, just a thought. I have heard of mailing DVD's back but would that make things worse? Just a heads up[/QUOTE]According to an article I read last week online in a professional photo journal, the Dept. of Homeland Security is planning to impliment a "policy change" (not propose a new law that would have to be debated in Congress) that would require that anyone entering the USA found in possetion of "pornographic" or "purient" images would have to have "proof" that the subject of the image is adult and gave consent.

In other words, if you have some digital photos in your camera or computer memory of a bare breasted maiden, you will have to produce some kind of acceptable documentation prooving it legal.

I can hear it now: "Uh-, honey; before you go would you mind signing your name here; and here: and on this one here: and if you could just put your fingerprint there-----. Oh, and by the way, do you happen to know a notary close by-------?"

The sooner the US gets that FUCKING IDIOT and his bible thumping "friends" out of power the better

Dinghy, to follow up on your previous post........

Fellas,

Just tell me if the Baht is going to go back up now that Thaksin is out of office?

Thanks,
LBM

[QUOTE=Mai Yao]According to an article I read last week online in a professional photo journal, the Dept. of Homeland Security is planning to impliment a "policy change" (not propose a new law that would have to be debated in Congress) that would require that anyone entering the USA found in possetion of "pornographic" or "purient" images would have to have "proof" that the subject of the image is adult and gave consent.

In other words, if you have some digital photos in your camera or computer memory of a bare breasted maiden, you will have to produce some kind of acceptable documentation prooving it legal.

I can hear it now: "Uh-, honey; before you go would you mind signing your name here; and here: and on this one here: and if you could just put your fingerprint there-----. Oh, and by the way, do you happen to know a notary close by-------?"[/QUOTE]
Mai Yao,

that sounds quite familiar. As you might know, a few members of this board had the very same demand.
But just as those guys, homeland security should first check their own behaviour.

[url]http://www.cnn.com/2006/LAW/04/04/homeland.arrest/index.html[/url]

[QUOTE=Seeko]I guess, it depends on which part of Thailand.

But, overall, it'd be good for monger scene:
No more cleansing of bar scene or "entertainment districts."
No more running the government in a corporate style with efficiency. It's back to big bureaucratic government with administrative waste and corruption, so later open times and full-nudity in go-go's everywhere.
No more rural improvements, so more poor girls flocking to BKK, i.e. higher supply in bars and go-go's. And, subsequently, lower ST/LT rates...

I'd better start booking my next LOS vacation...
Seeko[/QUOTE]
Seeko,

I doubt that. Even though Thaksin isn't the prime minister anymore, he is still acting behind the scene. Don't forget, many of the guys in power are close friends and he lifted them into their positions. So the "Thaksin system" will still be in place for some time.

[QUOTE=LittleBigMan]
Just tell me if the Baht is going to go back up now that Thaksin is out of office?
[/QUOTE]
LBM,

the stock market went up but the cross rates are rather affected by other factors.

T.T.

Doing well in the market in U.S., but it seem everytime I'm ready to wire a large sum of money to Thailand the baht drops! I get the worse luck sometimes! But I can't really complaint since I'm halfway to my goal to retirement by the end of the year! Then starting next year that's when I will really be poor.

LBM

I'm no computer expert but maybe while in still Thailand, you can upload your pics on to a website and store them there until you get home then download them to your computer again. This way, you won't have any pictures with you when you pass through customs. I'm sure The Traveler knows if this can be done or not.

[QUOTE=The Traveler]Mai Yao,

that sounds quite familiar. As you might know, a few members of this board had the very same demand.
But just as those guys, homeland security should first check their own behaviour.

[url]http://www.cnn.com/2006/LAW/04/04/homeland.arrest/index.html[/url][/QUOTE]

What about downloading them on a thumbdrive and putting them someplace not in plain sight?

[QUOTE=Retired Army]What about downloading them on a thumbdrive and putting them someplace not in plain sight?[/QUOTE]
An X-ray might reveal it.
There are other methods in order of difficulty:
(1) Hide the directory and select "do not show hidden files and folders" under Windows Explorer's Folder Options.
(1) Change the extensions to something else, so a simple global search wouldn't reveal them.
(2) Zip them with passwords. If you get questioned, tell the DHS agent that the zip files contains sensitive private information. And, you'd need court-orders, a signed non-disclosure affidavit, and privacy act briefing before you can reveal the contents.
(3) Convert them to ASCII text files. If the agent looks at them, they'll apprear to be just a bunch of garbage characters. Recombine them when you get home. Similar process to Usenet News postings.

Good luck,
Seeko

I don't think they can do anything to you if it is just regular sex pics with girls. I had a friend come back from Brazil with a bunch of nudes and they just looked at it and let him go.

I think the point is that unless you are a known pornography smuggler on the 10 Most Wanted List, don't attract attention. Just don't have things in plain sight.

Also, aren't there secure thumbdrives available? Seems like I have seen them advertised.

[QUOTE=NoCBJ4me]I'm no computer expert but maybe while in still Thailand, you can upload your pics on to a website and store them there until you get home then download them to your computer again. This way, you won't have any pictures with you when you pass through customs. I'm sure The Traveler knows if this can be done or not.[/QUOTE]
NoCBJ4me is right, you can create multiple Yahoo mail accounts (1 GB each), sent your pics to your own account (or to a non-existing one) and have them stored in your "sent mail" folder by doing so. Easy and for free, but a fast connection is needed if you really want to upload 1 GB and more.

[quote=seeko]an x-ray might reveal it.
there are other methods in order of difficulty:
(1) hide the directory and select "do not show hidden files and folders" under windows explorer's folder options.
(1) change the extensions to something else, so a simple global search wouldn't reveal them.
(2) zip them with passwords. if you get questioned, tell the dhs agent that the zip files contains sensitive private information. and, you'd need court-orders, a signed non-disclosure affidavit, and privacy act briefing before you can reveal the contents.
(3) convert them to ascii text files. if the agent looks at them, they'll apprear to be just a bunch of garbage characters. recombine them when you get home. similar process to usenet news postings.

good luck,
seeko[/quote]
seeko,

what ? do you really want to tell us that you can see files on an usb stick or mp3 player via x-ray ? no way man.

solution (1) doesn't work, since the pc that us custom will use to check your usb stick might have a different setting and everything would be visible.

second solution (1) won't work as well. they might just load it into a pic viewer or might use a little proggie that is checking the file structure rather than the extension.

i don't think that solution (2) will work either. at the end all info on your laptop is private info. they obviously don't need or already have all necessary permissions to have a look at it. so they might confirep001e your laptop if you don't let them have a look at that zip file.

finally solution (3) won't work too. converted into ascii would reveal the file structure, it is in no way different than looking at the files with a disk editor. those guys probably know their stuff.

best is still very strong encryption and make the container invisible. there are tools (like steganos security suite [url]http://www.steganos.com[/url]. ) that provide these functions. if they should really find the container, claim to not know about it, could be an old windows swap file (name it like "pagefile.sy~")