So the victim is to blame for their honesty? How does this improve security?
Border crossings are one of those utterly weird situations where not knowing what's up will put you at odds with people who have zero respect for your convenience or comfort and are perfectly willing to remove you from both. And you won't learn what's up the first, second, third, or even fourth time you go through. You have to first appreciate the gravity of the situation and then second learn what you have to in order to gain successful passage.
Borders are where ordinary people run right smack into geopolitics. Most of us have learned the lesson from others to not bring plants or currency across borders, and not to say you're working without a work visa, but there's lots of other things that can fuck you over.
I learn something every time I read a story like this. In this case it's about the necessity of not giving the appearance of tax avoidance. This particular situation had nothing to do with security, they weren't worried about her trying to attack the UK.
Does this sound realistic?
I certainly would not bring any documents. If I really needed hard copies, then beforehand I would scan them and upload them to Dropbox, then print them back out after I step off the plane.
I'd bring a cheap burner phone and keep my contacts in the cloud, with a short list of essential names / numbers in my wallet. If asked about the clean phone, I'd just say I'm worried about theft.
That way, when I tell them I'm just there for a vacation, they have no reason not to believe me, and even if they didn't, no inconsistency to start grilling me on.
For hotel booking, I'd simply tell them the name of the hotel I'm actually staying at. If they want to verify, they can call the hotel, I am not going to volunteer a booking printout.
If you were to look in my car at any given time, you would find nothing immediately visible. This is both to deter someone looking to break into my car to steal something, and law enforcement officials looking for something to mess with me over. I hold to the same principle when traveling. Stay clean and nondescript when moving through dangerous territory.
I would take these steps whether I'm actually going for a vacation or not. I would never travel to another country willingly unless I could follow this protocol. It's just too dangerous.
Edit: can't add a reply to the followup question anymore. So I add it here. Google, all your 007 travel style will break down if the find your name via Google on the speaker list.
They'd first need me to give them a reason to Google my name.
If you're nondescript, then you don't arouse this kind of suspicion in the first place.