Summary

  • Samuel Tunick, an activist from Atlanta, is the first American to be charged under federal law for allegedly employing a "duress password" during a warrantless border inspection at Hartsfield-Jackson airport in January 2025.
  • This feature is part of GrapheneOS, a secure Android operating system designed for Google Pixel devices; entering the duress code triggers an instant and irreversible wipe of the device's data.
  • A federal judge is anticipated to make a decision regarding the motion to suppress evidence no sooner than the end of October.

Samuel Tunick is now facing potential prison time after using a "duress" password on his phone.

The Atlanta resident has been charged under a seldom-used federal statute—18 U.S.C. § 2232, which prohibits willfully destroying property to prevent law enforcement from seizing it—following an incident on January 24, 2025, when he allegedly activated a "duress password" during a warrantless search at Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson airport. As reported by The Guardian, this marks the first known criminal prosecution in the U.S. related to this specific feature due to the use of a password.

A duress password serves as a secondary unlock code set alongside the primary one. While the regular PIN opens the phone normally, entering the duress code triggers an immediate and irreversible wipe, erasing encryption keys that protect the data, effectively resetting the phone to its factory state.

This feature is integrated into GrapheneOS, a privacy-focused version of Android made exclusively for Google Pixel phones, widely used by journalists, activists, and security experts. Edward Snowden has endorsed it, claiming to use it daily, although the operating system has been available for several years.

I use GrapheneOS every day. https://t.co/8tWRvwVtgJ

— Edward Snowden (@Snowden) November 4, 2022

The duress PIN feature was introduced in June 2024, specifically designed to address situations where individuals are coerced into surrendering their devices.

This issue has surfaced in legal contexts previously. For instance, in 2023, Decrypt reported on the challenges courts faced with smartphone monitoring when devices running privacy-centric operating systems like GrapheneOS resisted surveillance software mandated by court orders.

According to Tunick's legal team, a similar situation occurred. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents detained him for secondary inspection upon his return from the Dominican Republic, demanding access to his phone without a warrant. Under the "border search exception" to the Fourth Amendment, CBP asserts its right to inspect devices before travelers officially enter the country. His attorneys claim he was not allowed to contact a lawyer and was not informed of his Miranda rights.

When he entered a code, court documents state, "the screen went blank, flashed several times, and the phone appeared to restart." Despite this, agents confiscated the device and allowed him to enter the country shortly after.

The indictment from the government alleges that Tunick provided "a passcode to border agents that caused the phone to delete the digital contents" before the device was seized.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation offers a public guide regarding device rights at U.S. borders, as part of a broader initiative advocating for privacy-respecting tools that have been gaining traction in recent years. Tunick has pleaded not guilty, and a federal judge is expected to rule on his motion to suppress evidence by the end of October.