One-Third of DHS's Border Surveillance Cameras Are Broken, Memo Says

According to an internal Border Patrol memo, nearly one-third of the surveillance cameras along the U.S.-Mexico border don't work. "The nationwide issue is having significant impacts on [Border Patrol] operations," reads the memo. NBC News reports: The large-scale outage affects roughly 150 of the 500 cameras perched on surveillance towers along the U.S.-Mexico border. It was due to "several technical problems," according to the memo. The officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive issue, blamed outdated equipment and outstanding repair issues.

The camera systems, known as Remote Video Surveillance Systems, have been used since 2011 to "survey large areas without having to commit hundreds of agents in vehicles to perform the same function." But according to the internal memo, 30% were inoperable. It is not clear when the cameras stopped working.Two Customs and Border Protections officials said that some repairs have been made this month but that there are still over 150 outstanding requests for camera repairs. The officials said there are some areas that are not visible to Border Patrol because of broken cameras.

A Customs and Border Protection spokesperson said the agency has installed roughly 300 new towers that use more advanced technology. "CBP continues to install newer, more advanced technology that embrace artificial intelligence and machine learning to replace outdated systems, reducing the need to have agents working non-interdiction functions," the spokesperson said. The agency points the finger at the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), which is responsible for servicing the systems and repairing the cameras. "The FAA, which services the systems and repairs the cameras, has had internal problems meeting the needs of the Border Patrol, the memo says, without elaborating on what those problems are," reports NBC News. While the FAA is sending personnel to work on the cameras, Border Patrol leaders are considering replacing them with a contractor that can provide "adequate technical support for the cameras."

Further reading: U.S. Border Surveillance Towers Have Always Been Broken (EFF)

So what?

[iAmWaySmarterThanYou]

In a catch and release system, does it really matter if they catch anyone?

No one is vetted, no one is turned away, no one is prevented from entering.

Why have any cameras at all? Why have a border patrol?

Re: So what?

[hdyoung]

Youre basically correct. The leadership in both parties are engaging in theatrical histrionics in order to placate their voters, but they also know that our leaky southern border is providing the labor that our country doesnt want, but absolutely needs. Without that southern border influx, our population would be cratering like Russia, China and Europe. So, the dems talk about amnesty, and the repubs talk about a beeeaauuuttttiful wall and mass deportations, and when either party proposes actually doing any

I think the Republican party will do one thing

[rsilvergun]

I think they will build the camps they're talking about. And I think they will round up immigrants and toss them in those camps.

But deport them? Hell no. They will lease them out just like we lease out prisoners and they will work for nothing but enough food to make it through the next day and that's if they're lucky.

And you will be competing with all that slave labor. One of the things that held back the Southern United States was they could never transition to a consumer economy because there was

Re:

[RossCWilliams]

To be fair, that last line applies to every elected official. Most of us don't want to hear some stuff even if it is true and we like to hear some things even if they aren't true. I have been told that I am handsome. I know better, but I still like to hear it.

Re:

[silentbozo]

Smuggling of drugs and other contraband... like turtles.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/1... [nytimes.com]

"A woman pleaded guilty on Friday to attempting to smuggle 29 Eastern box turtles, a protected species, that were individually wrapped in socks inside a duffle bag as she tried to paddle in an inflatable kayak across a lake from Vermont to Canada over the summer, officials said."

Catch and release (if my understanding is correct) mainly applies to people taking advantage of the massive backlog of asylum applications to g

Well, if you can't see the illegals coming over

[RightwingNutjob]

Then you have no record of the illegals coming over. So you can't really perjure yourself when a Congressman asks you how many illegals have been coming through and you say "we have no records showing any came through."

I mean...er...anybody get any good pictures of the comet? I got a nice one with my DSLR last night.

FAA??

[cciechad]

Why would the FAA be responsible for these cameras? Are they looking up at the sky for planes/drones or something like that?

Re:

[will_die]

Short reason, they have an inter-agency agreement to do so. :)
Here is a link I found explaining why they got into that business. BTW in the congressional hearing to fix this they said they are looking at getting bids from outside companies.
From other reading the FAA procedures I would guess they decided to do it because they were already working with border people in various things from aircraft and other monitoring they figured they could handle the job of camera repair.
https://www.esc.gov/MONRONeYne. [esc.gov]

Theatre

[RossCWilliams]

I think this quote from the EFF link pretty much summarizes the problem:

It was only a matter of years before the DHS Inspector General concluded that ISIS was a flop: "ISIS remote surveillance technology yielded few apprehensions as a percentage of detection, resulted in needless investigations of legitimate activity, and consumed valuable staff time to perform video analysis or investigate sensor alerts."

The camera's not working isn't really the problem. The camera's are a distraction when they do work. The folks on the front lines know they are a waste of time. Which may explain why no great effort goes into fixing them. We are in the "silly season" where everything in government is political.

If anyone wants to stop the flow of migrants

[rsilvergun]

You could do it almost overnight by just sending some freaking foreign aid to the two or three countries that are coming from, and hint it's not Mexico.

Joe Biden and by extension Kamala Harris are planning to do just that. With a solid Democrat Congress they could fully fund it too. Within a few years those countries would stabilize and we would stop seeing migrants at the border.

On the other hand if you just need something to rage about and you don't want to take the risk of actually solving problems then well, you know what to do...

Re:

[imunfair]

If anyone wants to stop the flow of migrants....

You could do it almost overnight by just sending some freaking foreign aid to the two or three countries that are coming from, and hint it's not Mexico.

You could do it instantly by making the E-Verify system that already exists and is in use by US businesses a mandatory requirement to check all employees against. Unfortunately no one ever asks the politicians why they don't use this simple tool that already exists rather than trying to physically stop people. People who wouldn't come if E-Verify was mandatory because they wouldn't be able to get a job, as they do currently with fraudulent documents that are accepted by employers who intentionally turn a

DHS is too dumb for tech

[laughingskeptic]

About a decade ago when they first started putting up cameras along the border they quickly got months behind in looking at the footage. What blew my mind was rather than taking a LIFO approach and looking at the most recent video and then working backwards as time allowed ... they were using a FIFO approach and insisting on looking at months-old footage first.