Want to cross the border illegally? There's an app for that | Hacker News Reader

Want to cross the border illegally? There's an app for that

psfk.com

54 pointsauston24 comments

For every "Border Angel" trying to help illegal immigrants cross the border, there's a "Minuteman" trying to prevent it from happening.

I wonder if this app will do more harm than good for this guys' cause. It's only a matter of time before the people in the "Minuteman Project" figure out that they can go raid/camp out/etc. near these water sources/help centers and do ... well, whatever it is they do when they spot an illegal immigrant crossing the border.

whatever it is they do when they spot an illegal immigrant crossing the border

They call the border patrol. Can you believe such wickedness exists?

Yeah, at least they have the decency to wait until you're in the country before murdering you in your home:

http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/2009/06/13/20090613fa...

I assume your use of "they" refers to "Minutemen" as a whole. Regardless of your opinions on the illegal immigration debate, the article seems to indicate the folks involved in this crime were not accepted by the Minuteman movement. I doubt even the perpetrators would suggest the killings were motivated by their anti-illegal immigration beliefs.

Would you have used the same language to group the entire Muslim faith in with those who commit terrorism?

Don't get me wrong, I suspect we probably hold fairly similar opinions on the immigration issue. I just don't think false generalizations add anything useful to the conversation.

Yes, I can actually understand that some people might want an enforced immigration policy. Most democracies have one, so empirically I would say such "wickedness" is popular.

He was being sarcastic. Most people over the age of reason understand that it's OK to enforce your borders.

I must be spending too much time with people under the age of reason on the internet, I can no longer detect sarcasm in such issues.

> figure out that they can go raid/camp out/etc. near these water sources/help centers

They already try to do this.

Source: http://www.viceland.com/int/v16n11/htdocs/follow-the-gps-225...

An interesting interview on the more traditional 'grey hat' aspects of hacking.

I actually like this guy's thinking. For example:

"I would imagine they won’t be too happy with us, but again we’re not trying to hide. It’s a safety tool. It’s not trying to resolve the political anxieties of these communities or resolve the inadequacies of a fictional border for a so-called free-trade community. Again, our position is that it’s not a political resolution; it’s a safety tool. That, at the core, is what we’re attempting to do."

In Meyers-Briggs terms, I'm a Perceiver, not a Judger. A big part of what I do in life is rethink and reclassify and question current mental models, assumptions, and classifications. I look for that "third option" (a la http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TakeAThirdOption) on a regular basis.

So thanks for the link.

Illegal immigration has always been a touchy subject. I applaud Ricardo Dominguez for his effort and for standing up to save human lives.

In regards to the app, it would certainly be a double-edged sword. If I were an illegal immigrant, I would only rely on this app if I were lost and had no other resort to survive. In such case it would be valuable.

> double-edged sword

What's the other edge? It seems to me that crossing the border with this tool is strictly better than crossing without it.

Border patrol also having access to the app... waiting for you at one of the safety/shelter/water points?

Border patrol already have access to all this information and much much more from various surveillance equipment they use. If you make it across the border without being caught by border patrol then it is purely due to lack of manpower and other priorities by the border patrol and not due to lack of intelligence on their part.

Probably this would be illegal, but crowsourcing the position of border patrols is another use. It would add social network capabilities to the app.

Makes me wonder what the potential legal repercussions are for developing an app to help folks do something illegal like cross the border.

Couldn't be more than the repercussions of being a "Border Angel" leaving water out there to help those who are going to do it anyway. The app developer can just use their slogan: "Saving People's Lives" (yes, they put it in quotes too).

How much you wanna bet this app will be used to track those folks down by The Law?

How is that going to work, unless they are putting out locate data? GPS is passive reception.

The article states: "We were also able to add other information, like where to find water left by the Border Angels, where to find Quaker help centers that will wrap your feet, how far you are from the highway—things to make the application really benefit individuals who are crossing the border."

So it sounds to me like they are giving out information which could potentially lead you to the whereabouts of such helpful sorts of people.

Oh, I see. That wasn't exactly a secret prior to this, though - I thought you meant some novel way of finding crossers by tracking the phone, as opposed to exploiting existing information available on paper maps or suchlike.

I hadn't thought of that, but if people actually make phone calls, their location can be approximated based on the cell towers that picked up the call (or so I understand -- I imagine there are folks here who know way more about that process than I do).

That's a good point. It could very well be just as easily used to rat these people out.

Well at least the developer has an escape route planned out ;-)

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