Patrolling the US Border Via Webcam 249
The BBC features a story today on a controversial effort to patrol the border between Mexico and Texas by means of 21 hidden cameras, the output of which is streamed online for viewers at home, who can then report suspected illegal border crossings; more than 130,000 people have registered to observe the streams, from as far afield as "Australia, Mexico, Colombia, Israel, New Zealand and the UK."
Re:Mexico? (Score:5, Interesting)
Could it be that Mexicans have registered for the purpose of locating the cameras?
... or to continuously report a bunch of fake border crossings all the time so that the real events drown in a sea of fake ones.
other uses? (Score:3, Interesting)
I wonder if something like this couldn't be used to provide more effective protection than the police currently provide for witnesses, abused women, and others under threat. All too often even when such people get some protection it takes the form of a patrol car driving by now and then or officers posted outside the front door, often for limited hours and not for very many days. Providing really effective protection takes a lot of manpower that is hard for police to provide. And then there are cases where te police are unsympathetic or consider that there isn't enough hard evidence of a threat. If cameras could be set up to monitor building and in some case apartment entrances and exits and streamed to sites where volunteers would monitor them, that could provide a large increase in the manpower available.
Re:Why guard the border at all? (Score:2, Interesting)
I think we have bigger problems than illegal immigration and trying to patrol the border, which is an arguably worthwhile endeavor, is really not the most effective technique at our disposal. It would help, for starters, if the country they were fleeing wasn't such a cesspool of corruption, crime and poverty. Notice that we don't have nearly as much trouble with Canadians fleeing their country. I can hardly blame those Mexican immigrants for wanting to get the heck out of there.
Exactly! All this talk of "criminals" and "drugs", calling large swaths of people "illegals"...its a terrible thing! They are still human beings you know...
This idea of having people watching computer screens for desperate people trying to make a new life in another country, its revolting to me. I also feel sorry for those who have grown up on the other side to see these people as a "pest".
And the point? (Score:3, Interesting)
After being on hold for 30 minutes: "Officer, i saw a crossing, 50 miles from any human post.. "
By the time they mobilize, all the cameras will do is allow us to count how many crossed over, for the census.
Re:Why guard the border at all? (Score:5, Interesting)
Really, if some impoverished people want to come to your country, is it such a bad thing for you, as a "rich" person?
Put that way its not really a bad thing but spare a thought for the great number of people from poor countries who do the right thing by applying through channels, filling out the forms and working hard to qualify. Letting asylum seekers through does two bad things IMHO:
I 1997 I visited friends in the US. They had an apartment in Manhattan and during the day I made use of the laundry in their building. The demographics in the laundry and the attached playground were totally different from elsewhere generally in the building. The clothes were being washed and the children were being cared for by middle aged women from central America. It was actually a lot like Malaysia (my wife's native country), where many families have Indonesian servants.
If you want to retain your identity, migration has to be slow. I am sure that India or Sri Lanka could dump enough people on NZ in one year to create a new majority. I doubt that even the past immigrants from those countries want that to happen. And it is a sad fact I think that population pressure has to be used to reduce population growth. Its sad because starvation is implied in that equation.
There is no obscurity. (Score:5, Interesting)
Please. This isn't even slightly tricky. Time the sunset / shadows. That gives you the east-west position (and very accurately, too.) Local noon identifies local midnight (and every other local time) perfectly. So does sunset. Since the cameras are on the border, that reduces the problem to a very small one -- what portion(s) of the border match those times. Then go there (using GPS and holding a pic of the POV of the camera)... walk right up to it, grab it, throw it in the 4WD. Rinse, repeat. If the cameras are observing places where people can go, they're in places where people can get at them.
Also, borders aren't "square miles", they are linear miles. The problem is not as intractable as you want to think it is.
Offer me fifty grand per camera, as well as guaranteed legal immunity, and I'll go down there and hand the vast majority of em to you in a dusty heap in, oh, a couple of weeks or so. It'd be fun. :)
Re:When in Rome... (Score:3, Interesting)
I always thought we could just consolidate all US military bases into one, long skinny one along the border. :-)
The whole controversy is weird. It's like we're not allowed to have a border. You'd think it was Kashmir, but even India and Pakistan mange to have a little fun with it.
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1689795,00.html [time.com]
I can't think of any other border where people act like it's an offense against the universe. Meanwhile, you see all sorts of anti-illegal immigration laws being tightened around the world and you don't hear boo about them.
Re:Mexico? (Score:1, Interesting)
'And when dozens of cattle and feral horses are left maimed or dead, we'll just say "serves those stupid animals right! They should learn to read!"'
For the wild animals it doesn't much matter and for the domestic ones it is the responsibility of ranchers to track and herd their own animals. No reason to be concerned about this unless you are a PETA nutter.
'Or, for that matter, how desperate some people are when they're trying to escape severe poverty or starvation? Or do you just not care?'
I certainly don't care. Not when there are legal routes for the poor and starving to take to enter. Or they could get off their asses and work to improve their economic situation. Even Mexico has internet these days and that means they have more knowledge than any first rate university in the world at their fingertips.
Its an entire nation, you're going to tell me that with the global store of information at their fingertips and millions of people to search Google they can't figure out a way to make money?
'A rudimentary knowledge of fairly recent history would have told you land mines don't deter the very poor from attempting to use land'
That is what we refer to as natural selection.
The problem is that landmines are expensive we couldn't pepper the area with enough landmines.
I picture something more like two chain link fences with barbed wire and pressure sensors rather than landmines between them. The fences keep out animals and the pressure sensors alert border patrol. At regular intervals you have an autonomous motion sensing machine gun mounted. They can cover a greater range than landmines. They also help to protect against a Mexican military invasion.
Re:Mexico? (Score:2, Interesting)
Caller: "I saw someone on the border cam! Go get him!"
Operator: "Let me review the last 5 minutes"
<5 seconds later>
Operator: "I didn't see anything from that camera in the past 5 minutes."
Re:Stop or I'll show you my genitals! (Score:4, Interesting)
You contact the webcam base in the USA and the call the feds with the location.
So, essentially, you could spam the authorities and tell them where to go. I guess that could never be abused by drug smugglers or illegal immigrants, could it?
Re:Well... (Score:3, Interesting)
1. Wear a Bigfoot costume and approach the border.
Since I first heard of this strange setup, I too have wondered why nobody has played with the cams, the potential for harmless shenanigans making fun of the security loonies is limitless.