Re: Travelling With Laptops/PGP

["Pyro Teknik" <pyro-teknik@mail.geocities.com>]

> Problem:
> 
> I will be spending a couple of months chilling out in Barcelona, Spain.
> I will have a local Internet account/dial-up in that city, and will use 
> it to telnet into my various US-based accounts. This is how I plan to 
> keep in touch with various people while I am gone.
> 
> Questions:
> 
> 1 - Is the importation of two laptops and it's various peripheral devices 
> by a US citizen into Spain going to be a problem? I know it is in some 
> European countries.
> 
> 2 - Will having PGP 2.6.2, with 2048-bit keys, or any key length for this 
> matter, installed on these two machines, cause a problem?
> 
> Would this be a viable workaround? Or should I just say fuck it, and just 
> disavow myself of any reason/need for PGP for the duration of my stay? If 
> this is gonna be a problem, I'll just forego anything requiring 
> encryption while I am in Spain.

I walked straight through British, Dutch and Maltese Customs at the 
respective airports and they didn't even ask what was in the bag, let 
alone what software. I had PGP and a huge keyring stored on my hard 
drive and they were known the wiser.

> I have no interest in smuggling crypto in, or defying international law 
> just to use PGP for personal use. If it's not allowed, I simply won't use 
> it. But, I MUST be able to bring my laptops into the country. That HAS to 
> happen.

I'd suggest to lugging them through as hand luggage. If you are 
worred, zip up pgp and so on with a password - if customs do check, 
they aren't gonna waste breaking the zip password (even though it can 
be done quickly)

Also, I think the law may different, as you are an American Citizen 
using your own equipment...


 
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