Border Security Pwnage

[PepperElf]

PepperElf - were you the beaner or beanee?

actually neither. i'm pretty sure the instructors would have ripped us big ones if we'd done that. although we knew they were safe, we still had to practice "treat never keep keep" with them. unless we were practicing specific scenarios with them etc.

[fireheart]

This were some new ones from last night and some incidents from a while ago which made me laugh:

The new incident: Someone's trying to mail a vaccuum cleaner into australia. OK, that's suspicious enough given that you can actually BUY a vaccuum cleaner at any store. Yep, they dismantle it to discover a series of foil-wrapped square packs, kind of looking like trading cards. They were actually blank credit cards used for credit card fraud. Turns out that they had tried to smuggle some in previously by concealing them inside a CD player.

The not-so-new incident: Guy brings down a whole bunch of things including a laptop. His story didn't add up, so they checked the laptop. The laptop had the same thing as the mouldy old keyboard, except with just a few dummy slots rather than a complete setup (skimming equipment). They picked it up due to some anomalies on the x-ray. (Yeah....is it safe to X-Ray a laptop?)

And another drug smuggling incident, which is partially stupid: woman comes down from America with questionable travel movements. Swab comes up positive for cocaine. twice. They also notice that the woman is wearing a wig and it's sitting somewhat high on her scalp. Turns out that underneath the wig, there was a total of around $275,000 worth of cocaine. (She confessed)

An immigration story which ended on a somewhat amusing note. Guy comes down on a tourist visa paid for by another guy who had organised some gigs for him. Because his expenses and that were covered for the time while he was playing in a band, they considered that to be work and were about to refuse entry. Instead, they got hold of the guy who had organised the group's gigs and had him fill out the paperwork for an entertainment visa (short-term work visa) instead. The funny part was that although they weren't going to deport him because of the error (since his story was legitimate), he ended up getting deported anyway because the paperwork wasn't submitted on time .

[Sandman]

(Yeah....is it safe to X-Ray a laptop?)

Questionable... last time I flew out somewhere and I brought my laptop, the TSA Head of Security gave me his card and told me to let him know if my laptop was damaged by the X-Rays.

[fireheart]

Questionable... last time I flew out somewhere and I brought my laptop, the TSA Head of Security gave me his card and told me to let him know if my laptop was damaged by the X-Rays.

The laptop in question was seized and destroyed. But I'm still curious.

[PepperElf]

I would think it's not safe. I mean the hard drives use magnetic storage.


what's sucky is that when we were in china we had to get our stuff xrayed before getting back to the ship. ... and the local military actually xrayed my bf's film. i mean HELLO?


Although my bf did have one fun story about xrays and film. He got picked for xrays on a navy ship once. however these guards knew about film so they had to let him to take all of his film and cameras out first.

Him: *handed over bag*
Guards: This is empty!
Him: Yep!

[Kanalah]

And now I have something new to watch on Youtube

[Chromatix]

Laptops go through X-ray machines routinely at airports. You're actually supposed to take it out of the bag and put it through separately, so they can have a really good look at it. The hard disk is fine - it's protected by the metal casing. Solid-state storage is also fine.

Film is only problematic because it's explicitly meant to be sensitive to light - and of course X-rays are high-energy light that goes straight through the canister.

[Geek King]

Laptops go through X-ray machines routinely at airports. You're actually supposed to take it out of the bag and put it through separately, so they can have a really good look at it. The hard disk is fine - it's protected by the metal casing. Solid-state storage is also fine.

Just throwing in that I've had a gaming laptop, PSP, and XBox 360 go through the current U.S. scanners four times in the past year-or-so, and had no issues with any of it.

[fireheart]

And now I have something new to watch on Youtube

I don't know if it's region-locked or not, but yahoo7 (yahoo7.com.au) also allows you to watch the most recent episode of Border Security.

If you're going to go on youtube though, make sure to specify the Australian ones, otherwise you end up with the UK/Irish ones. (nothing wrong with them, but there's only so many times you can watch passengers smuggling cigarettes....)

[Kogarashi]

If you're going to go on youtube though, make sure to specify the Australian ones, otherwise you end up with the UK/Irish ones. (nothing wrong with them, but there's only so many times you can watch passengers smuggling cigarettes....)

Whereas Australia apparently has all the amusing food-smugglers too. (Yes, I watched a few episodes thanks to this thread.)

What had me smacking my forehead was the American lady who was upset about her unpopped popcorn and raw almonds, and how the first thing she said when told they weren't allowed, was a sarcastic "I can't make a bomb out of almonds!" (nevermind the failure to declare, and the fact that she was more than fluent enough to understand what "food" meant unlike some of the other people).

[fireheart]

Whereas Australia apparently has all the amusing food-smugglers too. (Yes, I watched a few episodes thanks to this thread.)

What had me smacking my forehead was the American lady who was upset about her unpopped popcorn and raw almonds, and how the first thing she said when told they weren't allowed, was a sarcastic "I can't make a bomb out of almonds!" (nevermind the failure to declare, and the fact that she was more than fluent enough to understand what "food" meant unlike some of the other people).

Was that one of the more recent ones? if it was, then it sounds like Yahoo7 isn't restricted.

[ralerin]

More for my curiosity, but, what if someone ate, say, apple seeds (as an example) from a rare type of apple tree banned in Australia and then tried to enter the country? Would they be forced to vomit up the seeds before entering?

[Kristev]

If I understand it right, they wouldn't have time.

Apple seeds contain a deadly poison, cyanide, I think.

[fireheart]

More for my curiosity, but, what if someone ate, say, apple seeds (as an example) from a rare type of apple tree banned in Australia and then tried to enter the country? Would they be forced to vomit up the seeds before entering?

It's only what they're carrying. One of the cases here involved someone bringing a packet of salami slices over from another country, but they couldn't take it in. So instead, they got out their crackers and cheese and had a little snack right in the airport.
The only time they'll care about internal concealments is in the case of drug smuggling. There have been a few cases of internal concealments.

One I found on another episode was actually pretty brazen, but very clever. Guy comes over to Australia to sightsee, with virtually no clothing and a ton of food. He declared the food-ok, absolutely fine. He says he had no contact with drugs. So they take the swab. Uh-oh, shows pretty high traces of narcotics (that would be inconsistent with someone going through a high-party area)....guy gets held up while they check his bag. Turns out that ALL of the food he was carrying was actually blocks of narcotics disguised with food wrappers. A packet of chips had thin wafers of narcotics for example. All up, 4.3kg of heroin/cocaine worth about 1.3million.

Another more recent one was 7.2kg of Tylenol tablets (among other things) containing psuedoepidepherine (sic?). That was about a $7.4million heist.

Some of the immigration stories just make me . It's definitely good watching though.

[Geek King]

If I understand it right, they wouldn't have time.

Apple seeds contain a deadly poison, cyanide, I think.

Kind of an urban legend. They DO have a small amout of poison, true. However, whole seeds will not break down in your digestive tract before passing, so the poison is not released. Chewing the seeds will release the poison, but there is such a small amount per seed, you would have to eat hundreds in a short period to see an effect on a human.