Hypothetically speaking, if someone was travelling to Bali tomorrow and had with them an external hard drive with downloaded movies and such (no porn), is there any chance of a problem with Indonesian customs?

I ask for a friend, of course.

My usual disclaimer (it seems the only questions I ever ask on TVF are always kind of stupid): sorry for the foolish question and I truly appreciate anyone who could take a moment to give me a quick reply.

Two and half hours, 90 views and no one has an opinion?

Bummer.

Two and half hours, 90 views and no one has an opinion?

Bummer.

They switched off when you said no porn.

Anyway why would customs care? They would be the only ones in Asia that did.

Two and half hours, 90 views and no one has an opinion?

Bummer.

They switched off when you said no porn.

Anyway why would customs care? They would be the only ones in Asia that did.

I agree with that, a hard drive is more likely to cause problems with US or UK customs than Indonesian customs.

Why would anyone bother you if you are carrying your DVD/BluRay collection on your hard drive for convenience?

In reality I doubt anyone in Asia would care.

If I were truly paranoid I would buy a new portable drive and keep it in its box, then encrypt the whole thing with TrueCrypt, to the casual observer it then looks new and unformatted when you plug it into a machine.

I would then install the portable version of TrueCrypt on my camera SD card and leave that in the camera (or conceal it somewhere, a Micro-SD should be pretty easy to hide), so no trace of TrueCrypt on the PC.

If I was really, really paranoid, I would also install a hidden volume on my TrueCrypt drive.

But if I were that desperate to hide something from the authorities I wouldn't carry it on physical media anyway.

I doubt your friend would have a problem. I've never heard of anybody having issues with this. But porn, then yes, it could cause problems.

I travel to Indonesia regularly, including to Bali, with my portable hard drives (I always travel with one or two) - I have never had an issue or had them looked at

Nonsense post removed

Two and half hours, 90 views and no one has an opinion?

Bummer.

They switched off when you said no porn.

Anyway why would customs care? They would be the only ones in Asia that did.

I agree with that, a hard drive is more likely to cause problems with US or UK customs than Indonesian customs.

I agree too, The US, UK, Europe & Australian borders will by the ones that might be interested in your HD not "third world" customs...

I doubt your friend would have a problem. I've never heard of anybody having issues with this. But porn, then yes, it could cause problems.

Are you thinking they'll want to power-up the drive and watch all the media on it? I've never been to Indonesia but is that really something that happens?

I doubt your friend would have a problem. I've never heard of anybody having issues with this. But porn, then yes, it could cause problems.

Are you thinking they'll want to power-up the drive and watch all the media on it? I've never been to Indonesia but is that really something that happens?

As mentioned above, I doubt that would happen. It'd be very, very rare for something like this. But, it is possible. More so if passing through Europe or North America.

I have heard of scams in the Philippines regarding this, but it typically involves being turned in while you are there.