GrapheneOS User Charged with Obstruction Hopes Case Sets Precedent on Data Privacy
A user of the privacy-focused smartphone operating system GrapheneOS, who faces charges of obstruction for utilizing the system’s duress password feature, has expressed hope that his defense will establish a critical boundary.
“I just hope to send the message that the government doesn’t own our data,” Samuel Tunick told The New York Times in an interview published Friday. “The government doesn’t own our communications, our relationships, as hard as they might try to,” he stated, emphasizing that in a democracy, “we have to defend our fundamental right to privacy.”
Tunick, a 30-year-old musician and geography graduate student at Georgia State University, was returning from the Dominican Republic in January 2025 when U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers detained him at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport and requested his phone. He complied, providing a passcode that triggered a device wipe – a duress feature of GrapheneOS, the privacy-centric Android build he uses on his Pixel handset. Prosecutors subsequently charged him with obstruction.
Court proceedings later revealed that authorities had placed him on a watch list. Tunick told The New York Times he was “surprised and upset,” though he contextualized it against the backdrop of approximately 40 “Stop Cop City” protesters and dozens of music festival attendees already facing domestic terrorism charges in Georgia.
He drew a connection between his case and NSPM-7, a presidential memorandum issued last September that broadened the definition of domestic terrorism, describing it as “a direct attack on our First Amendment rights to free speech and free assembly.”
Tunick stated he installed GrapheneOS with an understanding of the extensive surveillance faced by activists, driven “just out of the principle of privacy.” The notion that the government is “trying to dig up dirt on you,” he remarked, is “creepy,” particularly in light of his prosecution.
The obstruction charge carries a potential penalty of up to five years in prison, and Tunick has surrendered his passport. Consequently, any travel for touring or visiting family on the West Coast now requires judicial approval to leave the Northern District of Georgia.
U.S. Attorney Theodore Hertzberg issued a statement asserting that individuals who destroy data to thwart a lawful search should anticipate prosecution. CBP maintained that it reserves the right to search the devices of any individual crossing the border, irrespective of citizenship, and noted that it examined fewer than 0.01% of arriving travelers’ devices in the last fiscal year.
Tunick has pleaded not guilty. GrapheneOS has characterized its software as “completely legal” and constitutionally protected. A ruling on Tunick’s motion to suppress evidence is not expected before the end of October.
