Pascal Abidor, a doctoral student in Islamic Studies at McGill, was riding an Amtrak train from Montreal to New York in May 2010 when border agents removed him from the train, handcuffed and questioned him in a holding facility, and confiscated his laptop for 11 days. A dual French-American citizen, Abidor found himself singled out by border agents due to his earlier travels to Jordan and Lebanon recorded in his French passport, which culminated in a preliminary search of his laptop on the train and its later confiscation. Last December, Abidor saw his lawsuit challenging the American’s government’s right to search electronic devices at its borders dismissed. Abidor speaks with The Daily here about the danger of loosening laws that protect people’s privacy.