CBP and your phone at the U.S. border

This page describes CBP Directive No. 3340-049B, the agency’s own current policy on searching electronic devices at ports of entry (effective 1 January 2026), plus the federal circuit courts that have ruled on the framework it uses. It is executive-branch policy, not an act of Congress, and the circuits that have addressed it agree on the core structure but have not all spoken — a Supreme Court petition on a related question is currently pending. For how this compares with other countries this site covers, see At the border; for what to do before you travel, see Before a border crossing.

Basic search

The directive defines a basic search as any border search of a device that does not qualify as advanced — an officer reviewing or analyzing information already on the device. An officer may conduct a basic search “with or without suspicion, subject to the requirements and limitations provided herein and applicable law.” There is no suspicion threshold to clear first.

Advanced search

An advanced search is any search where an officer connects equipment, wired or wireless, to copy or analyze a device’s contents. That requires more: “reasonable suspicion of activity in violation of the laws enforced or administered by CBP”, or, without individualized suspicion, a national security concern — and supervisory approval at the Grade 14 level or higher before it can happen.

The directive states this plainly: “Travelers are obligated to present electronic devices and the information contained therein in a condition that allows inspection of the device and its contents.” That is what the directive says, and this page does not go beyond it — it does not tell you that you can decline, because the directive itself frames presenting the device as an obligation, not a request.

If you do provide a passcode or other means of access, the directive limits what officers may do with it: it “will only be utilized to facilitate the inspection of devices and information subject to border search,” and “may not be utilized to access information that is only stored remotely” — cloud-only data, in other words, is out of scope even once a device is unlocked.

If a device is protected by a passcode or encryption and an officer cannot complete the inspection, the directive allows the officer to “detain the device pending a determination as to its admissibility, exclusion, or other disposition.” That is a real, lawful consequence of a device staying locked — not a bluff, and not something this page advises you to test.

CBP may keep copies of what it finds where, based on the review, there is probable cause to believe the information contains digital contraband or evidence of a law violation CBP enforces. Outside that, the directive sets a default cap: CBP “will retain no copies of the information beyond twenty-one (21) calendar days following the conclusion of the border search” unless one of the directive’s own retention grounds applies. See Getting a seized phone back for how that compares with the general federal picture away from the border.

CBP’s own report to Congress states that “travelers are not referred to secondary inspection for the purpose of accessing digital content,” and that in FY 2023, CBP conducted device searches “for less than 0.01 percent of arriving travelers at a POE.” CBP’s live statistics page puts a more recent number on it: “In FY 2025, out of the over 419 million travelers CBP processed at ports of entry, CBP only searched the electronic devices of 55,318 international travelers.” No FY2024 figure is published on that page as of this review — this site is not substituting the FY2023 or FY2025 number for a year that has no published figure of its own.

The First Circuit, in Alasaad v. Wolf (2021), joined other circuits “in holding that basic border searches of electronic devices are routine searches that may be performed without reasonable suspicion,” and separately held that advanced searches “do not require a warrant or probable cause.” The Fourth Circuit, in United States v. Belmonte Cardozo (2026), drew the same basic/advanced-style line under different names: “forensic searches of cell phones are nonroutine” while “manual searches of cell phones at the border are routine and thus do not require individualized suspicion.”

A related question is now in front of the Supreme Court: Anibowei v. Blanche had a petition for certiorari docketed on 19 August 2026, with a response due 18 September 2026 — a petition pending, not a decision. This page will be reviewed again once that moves.