Building a wall on the southern US border has been a contentious issue for decades and political candidates, especially in the presidential elections, have made promises that they have not been able (or willing) to keep. Who can forget Donald Trump’s promise that a 1,000 mile wall would be built and paid for, by Mexico?
There has also been heated debates about the effectiveness of a physical wall versus a “virtual wall” that relies not on barriers but on technology.
Now the U.S. government is building a “virtual wall” at the southern border by erecting hundreds of high-tech surveillance towers — some of which use artificial intelligence — to detect people in an effort to reduce drug smuggling and sky-high unauthorized migration.
A record-high number of people have entered the U.S. through the southern border this year, resulting in multiple crises and exacerbating U.S. Customs and Border protection staffing shortages. But while the new surveillance technology is more promising than physical barriers, it is giving rise to concerns over civil liberties, digital watchdogs say.
The surveillance towers at the border are not new, they have been in place for several years, but the new autonomous towers can better detect abnormal activity.
The U.S. has installed about 300 different types of surveillance towers from the California coast to the tip of Texas, according to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit that monitors civil liberties in the digital world.
Using public records, satellite imagery, road trips, and virtual reality, the nonprofit mapped the presence of surveillance towers along the border in remote and highly populated areas.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials have praised the autonomous technology as a great asset that helps agents do their jobs, and it has bipartisan support, and more are coming. They sit on public, private and tribal land. Many are located where there are few border agents.
The autonomous surveillance towers contain 360-degree pan radars and sensors that can scan for miles. They are outfitted with AI software that distinguishes people from desert animals. Images are fed back to Border Patrol personnel who can deploy agents to the area where activity was detected.
The towers are solar-powered and can be erected in a matter of hours without drilling holes or requiring concrete, which means they can also be moved with ease.
Defense contractors such as Anduril Industries and Elbit Systems of America, a subsidiary of Israeli-based Elbit Systems, are among those who have recently built new towers on the border.
Jorge Guajardo, a partner at Dentons Global Advisors, tells Axios, “This is a perfect solution in terms of a way to protect the border. They are better than a wall or just having officers patrolling on horseback.”
But if the virtual wall is such a good idea, why is it drawing the attention of civil liberties advocates? Dave Maass, Electronic Frontier Foundation’s director of investigations, tells Axios that it’s unclear if the surveillance towers close to the border are also monitoring people in Mexico.
It’s also unknown if towers near cities are watching everyday citizens as well, he says. “What are these towers for? How often are they just looking at people who live there or go hiking out there?”
Regardless of the controversy, the U.S. will continue to build more towers along the border, according to CBP.
