Huge Brother on the Border Is Looking for a ‘Hidden Language’ in Individuals’s Textual content Messages

United States Customs and Border Safety (CBP) has a foul snooping behavior, and it’s searching for a bit assist to get its repair. Based on a report from Wired, the company is at the moment asking tech firms to pitch it concepts for a digital forensics software that will enable it to course of and analyze information from seized telephones and computer systems and doubtlessly uncover “hidden” patterns.

In a federal registry listing from June, CBP mentioned it’s looking for a software that may scan textual content messages, photos, movies, contacts, and different info saved on gadgets seized from individuals at U.S. borders. However extra than simply course of all that information, it desires a software that may discover patterns inside it. The company desires to have the ability to discover “hidden language” in an individual’s textual content messages, like coded phrases that “will not be apparent at first look.” It additionally wants to have the ability to establish particular objects that seem throughout movies and images, and the company desires the software to have the ability to rapidly course of the info for “intel era.”

The request, which looks like it borders on a Pizzagate stage of conspiratorial considering, comes because the company is seeking to increase its digital forensics instruments, partially as a result of it’s seizing significantly extra gadgets from individuals. In 2015, it searched 8,500 devices. That determine skyrocketed to 41,500 devices in 2023, in line with the company’s information. It additionally carried out 4,200 “advanced” searches, which embrace a digital forensic deep dive into a tool, in 2024.

CBP at the moment uses tools from Israeli intelligence firm Cellebrite to scan gadgets, but it surely seems open to newcomers if somebody has a extra highly effective software to supply. The company claims to make use of “all kinds of digital information extraction instruments,” per Wired, so it’s not prefer it’s been monogamous with Cellebrite so far anyway.

The company hasn’t precisely been shy about snagging phones and different gadgets from individuals beneath Trump’s second time period. CBP brokers can and will ask travelers at hand over and unlock their gadgets in order that they are often searched, which has led to some vacationers opting to pack a burner phone on journeys to the U.S. to keep away from pointless scrutiny after they come to the border.

In its request for info on this potential new software, CBP urged that it’s going to choose a vendor and signal a contract to construct the system within the third quarter of 2026. So maintain your eyes out for that, a brand new authoritarian dystopia function could be dropping someday in 2027.