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FAA selects avionics manufacturers for nextgen technology… Who will be the next DHS secretary?… Biometrics, interoperability technology help identify criminal aliens
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Australia opens national tsunami warning center… Document requirements announced for visitors to international peace garden… European data breach laws could land in 2011… Aberdeen: Unified threat management can shave IT costs
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U.S. citizens and legal permanent residents who pre-register for the program may use the Global Entry kiosk as an alternative to the regular passport control line
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Americans can now apply for the U.S. Passport Card, which is also known as the Pass Card; the RFID chips are cheap Class One Generation Two models, which are vulnerable to cloning
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Worries about imported food, and about animal disease and the invasion of lakes and rivers by foreign species, increase; Border Protection adds food specialists for better point-of-entry inspection
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There have been many — many, many — complaints about the accuracy and effectiveness of DHS no-fly watch list; TSA takes responsibility from individual airlines for matching names on the list with passengers
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Six more countries admitted to the Visa Waiver Program: the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovakia, and South Korea
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The Michigan agreement, similar to that reached with other states, seeks to create an enhanced driver’s license — which denotes both identity and citizenship — as a compliance option to fulfill Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative (WHTI) requirements
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Researchers are looking to increase security at border crossings by developing a computer system that can detect guilt
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An anonymous technology researcher discusses the ease with which e-passports may be compromised by hackers
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U.S. may add Israel to the Visa Waiver program in 2009, after Israel implements a new biometric passport for Israeli citizens
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Dems want DHS to target criminal illegal immigrants… “A delicate balance” between port security and business requirements… Somalia: Pirate’s vital routes attacks cause shipping costs to soar
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Immigration matters / David B. Palinsky
The demand for H1-B visas far outstrips its supply; one alternative is the L-1 visa which allows companies to transfer employees to, and allows investors to form start-up operations in, the United States
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Years after Congress urged the U.S. Coast Guard to speed up its patrol boat replacement program, the service finally picked a design and a shipbuilder for its new cutters; the winner: Bollinger Shipyards
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There has been a 75 percent in the number of illegal immigrants attempting to cross the Mona Passage from the Dominican Republic into Puerto Rico in the past two years; the Coast Guard is not sure the drop is all due to the service’s biometric measures, but it thinks the technology has something to do with it
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Cameron County, Texas, must decide which option is more beneficial to it: DHS’s fence plan which the county does not like, but which will see $37 million in contracts go to local businesses, or resubmitting the county’s alternative fence plan, which DHS had already rejected, exploiting the fact that DHS has postponed the 31 December fence deadline
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Immigration matters / David B. Palinsky
The U.S. immigration services received more than 163,000 petitions for the 65,000 regular H-1B visas allocated for FY2009; the homeland security, hi-tech, and services sectors, as well as academic and research institutions, need another way to bring to the United States qualified foreign workers and researchers; one such way is the O-1 “Extraordinary Ability” visa
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The Free And Secure Trade (FAST) program allows truckers who drive back and forth across the U.S. border to pre-register with Customs, thus giving them the status of low-risk traveler; one FAST-certified driver used status to smuggle drugs
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TWIC aims to provide 1.2 million U.S. port workers with forgery-proof biometric IDs; so far only 500,000 workers have been enrolled, and DHS pushed completion of enrollment from 25 September to 15 April; lawmakers are not happy
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New York State leads the nation in the adoption of enhanced license technology, and state residents may now apply for an enhanced driver’s license; they have an incentive to do so, because beginning 1 June 2009 U.S. citizens will have to present either a passport or an enhanced driver’s license when re-entering the U.S. from Canada, Mexico, Bermuda, and the Caribbean
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The long view
ICE Not Only Looks and Acts Like a Paramilitary Force – It Is One, and That Makes It Harder to Curb
ICE and CBP meet many but not all of the most salient definitions of a “paramilitary force.” Both are also not subject to the same constitutional restrictions that apply to other law enforcement agencies. ICE and CBP thus bear some resemblance to the informal paramilitaries used in many countries for “regime maintenance,” carrying out political repression along partisan and ethnic lines, even though they are official agents of the state.
How the 9/11 Terrorist Attacks Shaped ICE’s Immigration Strategy
The immigration enforcement response to 9/11 set the stage for ICE’s aggressive conduct. Under this way of thinking, if the homeland is under threat, then those who challenge immigration enforcement are “domestic terrorists.” Investigations into ICE officers are muted, for the officers are protecting the homeland against existential danger. Severe tactics to detain immigrants and condemn protesters – and violate U.S. citizens’ constitutional protections — become not only permissible but also advisable.