The Spanish authorities have deployed extensive surveillance equipment to monitor the territorial border between Spain and Morocco, including drones, thermal cameras and laser illuminators in Ceuta and Melilla, where the implementation of facial recognition systems is still pending. In the Canary Islands, the focus is more on electro-optical cameras and artificial intelligence (AI) systems to distinguish “suspicious” vessels, although biometric technologies are also used to try to identify migrants who do not provide personal information. This is how it reveals a report carried out by associations Algorights and EuroMed Rights which is presented this Friday and which examines the use of technology at the borders.
The research carried out by these groups, based on interviews with police, civil guards and other personnel involved in border management – and complemented by day and night visits to border crossings and hot spots in the Canary Islands, Ceuta and Melilla – corroborates that the Facial recognition is not yet operational on the border with Morocco. This system should have begun to be used in 2022 with all non-EU citizens who want to enter community territory, as contemplated in the Entry and Exit System (Entry/Exit SystemEES). However, the EU project approved in 2017 and endowed with a budget of around 650 million euros has been suffering delays: its launch has been postponed until 2025.
The use of AI-based technologies is still testimonial. In the Canary Islands, image processing tools have been incorporated for the identification of people and vessels. Maritime Rescue has put out to tender contracts to acquire smart sensors, drones and software of machine learning to equip their ships, the study reports. Despite this, field work carried out by researchers confirms that GPS and satellite phones continue to play a fundamental role in rescue operations, ahead of newer technologies.
On the borders of Ceuta and Melilla, AI is not evident today either. “Although authorities insist that it is essential to incorporate digital technology to improve border control, there is a general perception that there are not enough means to sustain this infrastructure; and even less so, to train staff in its use,” the researchers point out.
The use of technologies at the borders “depends on the technical capabilities of the agents of the Civil Guard, the National Police and Frontex, who act as end users and are responsible for making non-automated decisions in their daily work. Although many daily decisions are still based on the personal experience of agents, they increasingly rely on the information collected by these technologies,” the report maintains.
Ceuta and Melilla
The African border is not equally guarded on both sides of the fence. According to what the Civil Guard told the researchers, “while technological means predominate on the European front, Morocco provides essential physical resources,” referring to the Moroccan Royal Guard agents who are in surveillance towers along the perimeter. The report highlights, in fact, that border infrastructure combines analog and digital systems, “which changes the way we should investigate borders as sociotechnical elements.”
At the end of 2023, the Thales Group, a French multinational specialized in defense and the development of AI technologies, was selected by the Government to implement a new surveillance system in Melilla. “It consists of fixed stations equipped with high-resolution day and night cameras, thermal cameras, laser illuminators and Horus software, which facilitates remote monitoring and control,” the report describes.
As explained by the Civil Guard to the investigators, thermal sensors allow people trying to swim across the border to be detected with greater precision, while laser illuminators, located in the port and emitting a green light, are used to fix the exact coordinates of objects or people previously detected by thermal sensors.
Drones are used to detect vessels, although they are also used to identify and locate people who try to jump the fence, as well as to provide real-time information to the Operations and Services Center (COS).
Canary Islands
The Integrated Outdoor Surveillance System (SIVE) is the main technological tool used to detect and monitor the arrival of boats to the Canary Islands. This system, which is also used in the fight against drug trafficking, “is not limited to a single computer program, but rather combines a series of infrastructures and technologies that allow the Civil Guard to search for and intercept boats as they approach. to the islands.”
The SIVE physical infrastructure consists mainly of electro-optical cameras and radars connected to a central control unit. When objects are detected in the sea, an alarm is sent and they are presented on digital maps. Each object is classified as suspicious or not. “Although this process may seem simple, border guards working with SIVE need up to 10 years to fully master the system,” the researchers say. It is difficult to distinguish between a canoe and a sailing sports boat. “The system also has a problem with waves, which it sometimes confuses with boats.”
SIVE has been enhanced by another program, Perseo, which uses AI-based algorithms to automatically classify vessels that show signs of being suspicious as suspicious. “It uses image recognition technology to analyze the silhouette and size of the vessels detected by SIVE; and identifies whether they are sailing ships, merchant ships, passenger vessels, boats or drug trafficking ships, which are the main objectives of the system.” The system evaluates additional parameters such as the area in which the radar detects the vessels, the trajectory they follow and the speed at which they travel.
Maritime Rescue is independently developing a project that incorporates AI-based products, such as smart sensors and automated detection programs for “castaways and objects dangerous to navigation.” This program, called the iSAR project, would also allow the detection of small boats transporting people on the Atlantic route. Until May 2024, the iSAR project had only been implemented in the pilot phase in the Canary Islands. It is expected to officially begin operating on the islands during the second half of 2024.
Technology and rights violations
One of the conclusions of the study is that the deployment of these technologies on the southern border of Spain has led to “an increase in cases of human rights violations. Practices such as racial profiling, difficulties in accessing asylum and the criminalization of people on the move are contrary to their fundamental rights.”
Asked about exactly what violations they have detected, the authors of the report do not provide EL PAÍS with specific data or evidence. “We have found that immigration routes and procedures have been sophisticated and complicated with technology that serves to monitor and demonstrate, rather than help. This forces many people to seek higher risk routes, violating the fundamental right to life or even the free movement of people. There are more deaths, for example, on the Canary Islands route. And we already see that as a violation of human rights, since technology is not serving to save lives,” the researchers point out.
