• AutoTL;DRB
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    105 months ago

    This is the best summary I could come up with:


    But privacy, immigration and digital liberties experts are also concerned over another aspect of the bill: more than $400m in funding for additional border surveillance and data-gathering tools.

    The lion’s share of that funding will go to two main tools: $170m for additional autonomous surveillance towers and $204m for “expenses related to the analysis of DNA samples”, which includes those collected from migrants detained by border patrol, according to the text of the bill.

    The bill also includes $25m in funding for “subterranean detection capabilities” and $10m to acquire data from unmanned surface vehicles or autonomous boats “in support of maritime border security”.

    The US has already spent hundreds of millions of dollars on these automated surveillance towers, which are primarily made by Anduril Industries – the brainchild of Palmer Luckey, founder of Oculus VR.

    “Rather than solving immigration and border issues, this allocation is a windfall for surveillance tech vendors,” said Saira Hussain, senior staff attorney at EFF.

    “It’s evident that they are presenting a sense of inevitability that technology will dictate the course of your life in the United States, whether it’s by serving as the ‘soft’ enforcer at the border or through the surveillance that will follow you into the country,” said Shah.


    The original article contains 570 words, the summary contains 206 words. Saved 64%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!

  • Rentlar
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    85 months ago

    Yikes that’s rough. I’m hoping Biden turns around and completely abandons the negotiation tactic of “give Republicans what they want” because somehow that doesn’t work with the current ilk either.