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The Washington Post reported yesterday on allegations that US Customs agents have inspected and confiscated laptop computers, iPods, and mobile phones during passenger inspections. Passengers claim they were asked to provide passwords and open files. In some cases, mobile phones were inspected and returned with purged call logs. One person claims their laptop has been held for an over a year.

According to this article, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the Asian Law Caucus have filed a civil lawsuit against the Federal Government, based on 20 complaints from Northern California residents. The goal is disclosure of the US government’s boder search policies. One sourse of concern is an apparent pattern of racial profiling, in which agents targeted Asian and Muslim passengers.

The US Department of Justice asserts that electronic equipment falls into the same category as a briefcase, and may be searched and confiscated for inspection.

However, the scenarios described in this article sound more like coercion or out-and-out robbery.

Of course, many corporate travelers have confidential or private information on their computers and phones. The Post article cites a Canadian law firm that sends corporate travelers headed to the United States with “empty hard drives”. There’s an operating system and a web browser on the laptop, of course, but employees access their email and documents through a secure Internet connection such as a virtual private network (VPN). This helps keep confidential data off the drive, as the law firm fears discovery by search more than a hacked Internet connection.

BoingBoing and the Consumerist each had articles about the Post report, although both blogs misidentified US Customs as the TSA.

Sadly, the activities alleged in this lawsuit do not surprise me. BusinessWeek recently reported on Indian IT outsourcing firms that have systematically underpaid IT workers who were brought to the United States on H1-B visas. These workers make tempting targets, as their outsourcing companies can send the workers back home for any reason. By the time some workers determined they would never get their back-pay, they were no longer in the US. It seems that only a few lawyers or client companies will step in to help these guest workers.

Peter Calveley (via Boing Boing) reported last week that the United States Patent and Trademark Office has finally struck down Amazon’s overly broad patent for one-click online shopping.

In an earlier post, Calveley described how Amazon had submitted 32 Wikipedia articles as supporting evidence for its patent claim. The discussion becomes hilarious as Calveley mocks the fungible nature of Wikiality, noting that the USPTO had removed Wikipedia from its list of acceptable references in 2006.

From USA Today and news.com: According to a Federal study, approximately 1% of files listed on Google and Microsoft search engines are pornographic.The study was commission by Federal lawyers to support the 1998 Child Online Protection Act. COPA required web sites to collect a credit card number before allowing a user to view adult materials. The law was overturned by the Supreme Court in 1998. A 2000 law that required libraries and schools to install and use Web filters was upheld by the Court in 2003. An earlier 1996 law that banned online pornography was overturned by the court in 1997, in part because the law employed a broad definition of porn.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) supports filters, claiming that highly restrictive filters can block a majority of adult web sites. However, many porn sites are operated outside the United States, and porn sites tend to use popular non-pornographic keywords in attempts to direct new users to the sites.

From Yahoo, the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, and the Honolulu Advertiser: Del Monte announced yesterday that the company will shut down its Hawaii operations within the next 60 days, the minimum amount of time allowed by Federal law for a layoff announcement. The layoff affects 551 Del Monte employees.I’ve heard of giving pineapples as a Christmas present, but this seems cruel. Del Monte’s been a part of the Hawaiian economy for a century, and this announcement is another nail in the coffin for Hawaiian agriculture, as more farmland is converted to residential and commercial use.

It’s much less expensive for Del Monte to grow pineapples in Costa Rica, the Philippines and Thailand than Hawaii, mostly because of labor costs. Apparently Hawaii pineapple no longer commands a premium price from consumers.

The company had announced in February that it would shut down operations in 2008. The new date means that the current crop of pineapple, grown on a 5100 acre plot in Kunia, may be abandoned. Pineapple takes three years to cultivate and harvest. Maui Pineapple has asked to salvage the abandoned crop, but Dole may become the only company growing pineapple on Oahu.

From CIO Insight: John Parkinson asks an important question - how well can business schools prepare their students to take leadership positions in information technology and innovation?

Graduate education emphasizes meta-learning, or the ability of learning how to learn. A successful master’s degree candidate has demonstrated that they understand and use the course material, and that they can continue to learn and grow as professionals and scholars.

The MBA degree program is fundamentally different from more specific degrees programs. I speak from experience - I earned an MBA as a full-time student at Rollins College in 1988, and I’ve been program chair of an MSIS program for the last 3 years. I also teach dozens of MBA and MSIS students every year. I have a bio page here.

MBA programs provide broad cross-training

An MBA program provides cross-training over several required topics (finance, accounting, marketing, management, law, technology, strategic management) and a handful of specific electives. However, some MBA programs have no electives at all. Other MBA programs have specific areas of interest, such as entrepreneurship, technology, or vertical markets.

A major part the MBA program’s value lies in the integration among the courses. As this is a master’s program, students must do the integrative work themselves, using the frameworks provided by their faculty. This represents the integration of functional areas into business, corporate, and enterprise strategies.

MSIS programs provide managerial and technical preparation

An MSIS program tends to focus on technical skills (telecommunications, software, hardware) and management skills (project management, knowledge management, strategic management). Again, the students follow a framework provided by the faculty as they integrate their knowledge.

If we treat IS as a functional area, and innovation as a process to be managed, the role of the IS professional is to help the organization deliver more value and effectiveness through technology and innovation.

Parkinson’s thesis - that deep scholars are difficult to find - has some merit. Many organizations select CIOs who have demonstrated management ability, but who have limited technological experience. These CIOs are expected to be “quick studies” as they master the technologies and processes that provide value in their organizations.

The MBA degree has often be derided as the “quick study” certificate. Because MBA students get only one or two classes in each of the core functional areas, they learn how to perform rapid analyses that may be sophisticated, but may also lack detail and rigor.

On the other hand, Herbert Simon pointed out that decision-making is usually constrained by the bounds of time, space, and our own cognitive abilities. Managers want to optimize, but they end up satisficing, or making do with less in oder to complete the task at hand. This Wikipedia article has more information and links about Simon’s work, and any good principles of management textbook should discuss Simon as well.

Information systems and technology allow managers to extract more precision and process more data in their everyday work. While IS professionals are essential to this task, they do not necessarily understand the strategic value of the systems they develop, implement and maintain.

In the end, MBAs depend upon IS professionals, and vice versa.