Slashdot Mirror
High-Tech Gadgets Can Pose Problems At Mexican Border
TechnologyResource writes "Going across the border will be a more 'interesting' experience since Customs and Border Protection will now be checking laptops, digital cameras, cell phones and any other electronics on your person or in your vehicle. It's not a new authority, according to Angelica De Cima, Office of Public Affairs Liaison 'They've always had the right to inspect your person, vehicle, baggage, anything on you. Nothing has changed from before,' De Cima said."
"He said anyone coming across could be a terrorist, drug dealer or someone trying to carry or take information out of the country by hiding it in a smaller device."
Why not just FTP it. Or hide a microSD card inside a cake? It should bake okay, the chip inside gets put under higher temps than the inside of cupcake when they place them on a PCB. The plastic on a uSD might melt a little, but I suspect the information will still be there.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
... that US customs agents will some of the first thugs against the wall when the revolution comes.
There is a war going on for your mind.
I wonder what they'll do when they search my 'unusable' Linux laptop.
"Blue corvette with three gringos heading south route X should pass through your village in 20 minutes. They have laptops, top-notch cellphones, some GPS stuff and wallets full of cash. I'd say some $15k in various assets. Remember, 10% is mine."
Searching the 9/11 hijackers wouldn't have stopped them. It's not like they had their plans saved on their computers. Why do we accept this kind of crap whenever anyone says the magic words "9/11"? We don't even need to change the policy at the airport...people are going to beat down hijackers now, on their own.
They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety. Ben Franklin.
...which is rather scary. Used to work for US Customs many years ago (before it was ICE), and we were legally permitted to basically search *anything* entering the country (including personal mail, something that is a federal crime in most other instances) other than diplomatic mail and pouches. Nothing was off-limits: If it comes from overseas, ICE has the constitutional right (backed by many years of case law) to search it.
I'm not saying this is a good thing, but every international traveler should be aware of this. Whining about your constitutional rights being violated while standing in the "red" line at your port of entry will simply prolong the agony.
I think I've finally found a use for those virus infected disks I kept from years ago.
I support the troops. I pay f'ing taxes.
I think from a Constitutional perspective they are correct that they have the right to do such inspections. However, doing them on a large scale is a really bad idea. However, stupidity is not unconstitutional.
Captain Koons: The way your dad looked at it, this iPod was your birthright. He'd be damned if any US Border agents gonna put their greasy hands on his boy's birthright, so he hid it, in the one place he knew he could hide something: his ass. Five long years, he wore this iPod up his ass. Then when he died of dysentery, he gave me the iPod. I hid this uncomfortable piece of metal up my ass for two years. Then, after seven years, I was sent home to my family. And now, little man, I give the iPod to you.
Apparently this is one of those times where the feds take advantage of that massive loo-pole in the fourth amendment effectively allowing them to disregard it in the case of "reasonable" searches and seizures...
Sigs are too short to say anything truly profound so read the above post instead.
Heck checking your laptop is nothing, they can probe up your ass if they really want to!
Once I was a four stone apology. Now I am two separate gorillas.
First - this is fishing. You aren't actually accused of anything... we are going to search you till we find something. What was the famous quote - something like: "give me 6 lines from the hand of an innocent man and I'll find something to convict him".
Second - the fact that they found something. After trampling over the rights of 221 million passengers, they found a paedophile. Is that worth the cost? How many rights are you willing to give up to find that paedophile? Having rights and freedoms means that sometimes bad guys get away. To catch all bad guys requires us to live in a panopticon.
Third - the tone that if you object to this program, you obviously support the paedophile.
Fourth - I'm from outside the US, but I travel there frequently for business. The entry requirements have risen from a form to being fingerprinted and photographed and carrying biometric data at all times. Is there an upper level to this? What would happen if they require DNA swabs to enter? Is that a step too far? Right now in Chicago, they take a nude photo of you using a new scanner to be able to fly. That is so screwed up.
They have extended the thickness of the border by 100 miles as well, so that now 80% of the population can be summarily stopped and searched at anytime.
Isn't it great?
It's not "High-Tech Gadgets Can Pose Problems At Mexican Border", it's "High-Tech Gadgets Can Pose Problems At United States Border".
I am officially gone from
I figure by 2100 in many areas of Texas, New Mexico and California, English will be taught as a second language.
Because our primary language will be Chinese.
They have the power. Not the right. There is a difference.
SD cards are so small that have to be one of the easiest items to hide in the known universe. There's a brazillion places you could tape one to a car or hide it about your person. Dogs can't sniff them out so unless they're going to start strip-searching *everybody* and dismantling every car then they're not going to find them.
It's just more pointless stupidity from the DHS.
Don't even get me started on micro-SSD or FTP.
No sig today...
Ever flown through Ireland, not even as a final destination? It's worse than any American customs stop I've been through.
Um, yeah - About three months ago, actually. We got off our plane, followed the signs around this amazingly convoluted set of hallways to the passport-check area, only to find...
No one there.
Waited about five minutes, figuring someone had gone to the bathroom, and didn't see a single uniformed person (got passed by plenty of people walking right on through without even pausing, though).
So, we walked through and onto our connecting flight.
Granted, we went from one "secure" area to another, so I really didn't see the need to go through customs at all, but literally, we merely walked past an unattended desk. Simple as that.
Topped
.You needn't worry about your GPS unit, ever since the Firestone tire debacle. The resulting law said that every tire needed to be able to be identified as being from Lot #X without being dismounted (prior to that lot numbers were printed on the inside of the tire). The manufacturers' solution was RFID chips with unique serial numbers embedded in every tire.
Uh, no. I work in the tire manufacture business. The lot ID has always been - and still is - available for inspection on the outside of the tire. We call this the "serial plate", it's mounted to the mold. Look for a series of letters / numbers bracketed by impressions of what looks like screw heads: that's the serial plate. It's near the bead area. Granted, it may be on the inboard side and may require you to crawl about with an inspection mirror (or put the vehicle up on a rack), but no need to dismount the tire. Tire lot ID's were never on the inside of a tire. What people see there are impressions of the cure press' bladder lot ID, a different thing entirely.
What the law requires is for vehicle manufacturers to provide a way of reading tire pressures automatically and notifiying the vehicle operator of low and/or imbalanced tire pressures. The pressure transponder (an RFID-like device) is part of the valve assembly, not the tire.
Various tire makers have experimented with placing RFID tags into tires but with little success. It's a very hostile environment (high temperatures and pressures) inside the material while the tire is being cured, tags don't survive it very well.
There's been waaay too many documented cases of people buying guns (and I mean big guns, like assault rifles) legally in the US with their God-given 2nd ammendment right and smuggling them to the drug cartels here.
When you say "and I mean big guns like assault rifles", it pretty much shows that you know nothing about firearms and US laws.
The articles you link to all cite the "90% of guns traced to US" lie. 90% of the guns that are submitted for tacing are from the US. Only a small number of guns are submitted for tracing, because there's no point in submitting AKs from China and North Korea with no serial number to the ATF for tracing.
Fully automatic guns (pull the trigger and they rattle off bullets) require a federal license with large yearly fees and an anal probe from the BATFE. They are rarely sold here and are exceptionally expensive. Even the gangs here don't buy them legally here. They smuggle them from overseas - it's way cheaper. I'm behind a censor here, but google "BATFE" and "class III license" to see what it takes to buy a machine gun.
What the ill-informed such as yourself call "big guns - like assault rifles" are military-looking guns that have been altered so that they fire one bullet at a time. To make them or import them here, they must not be alterable to fully automatic fire.
The articles you quote suggest a flood of guns from the US using faulty statistics, then go on to list a bunch of confiscated weapons that you cannot easily buy here. You can't get grenades and rocket launchers here. If they are able to smuggle those in from the third world, why would they pay US prices for rifles that aren't even full-auto?
http://www.factcheck.org/2009/04/counting-mexicos-guns/
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/elections/2009/04/02/myth-percent-guns-mexico-fraction-number-claimed/
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2009/apr/16/barack-obama/Obama-claims-90-percent-guns-used-Mexico/