An obsolete system, developed for a purpose other than the detection of boats or canoes, with parts “cannibalized” from other equipment and a lack of maintenance which “prevents it from operating at its maximum capacity”. The result is a technological infrastructure that is complex to use, but managed by border guards with “limited training” and who must combine this task with others, which “affects their concentration and efficiency depending on the workload “.
This is the diagnosis of the SIVE (Integrated Foreign Surveillance System) reflected in a new report produced by AlgoRace and EuroMed Rights, presented this Friday. The analysis, carried out from interviews with civil guards, maritime rescue personnel, information provided by the Interior Ministry and visits to its facilities, sheds light on the technology supported by the forces responsible for detecting the canoes trying to reach the Canary Islands by sea, one of the hottest spots on the routes to Europe and which causes hundreds of victims.
SIVE is made up of a set of electro-optical, radar and infrared cameras distributed in 24 installations on the islands, including 17 on Gran Canaria. Most are in towers on the coast or in mountainous areas close to the sea. When the radar detects something in the sea, it sends an alert to the system’s coordination centers, where it is displayed on a map with the area monitored by the infrastructure and indicates whether the object is “suspicious” or not.
However, the initial objective of SIVE was not to detect cayucos, but to combat drug trafficking in the Strait of Gibraltar. The system was migrated to the Canary Islands in 2004 as an emergency solution to the cayucos crisis and has since been patched. However, the huge difference between the fast boats used by drug traffickers and the precarious boats that set sail in the belief that the sea will help them reach the islands places a heavy strain on the capabilities of detection infrastructure.
“SIVE has a significant problem with waves, as it sometimes confuses them with boats,” the report reflects. “This happens because on some occasions ships move at speeds similar to waves (around 10 kilometers per hour), causing radar to mistakenly identify the movement of wave crests as ships “, he explains.
SIVE has a major problem with waves, as it sometimes mistakes them for boats. This happens because on some occasions boats move at speeds similar to waves.
Officers must manually adjust the radar camera to inspect images and check for the presence of vessels, although bad weather and high waves make it difficult to operate properly. Radar sensitivity can be reduced to avoid erroneous wave detections, but this also reduces its ability to detect small vessels. Due to these problems, the Civil Guard had to remove several radars due to breakdowns.
The images captured by the cameras do not have the same quality as those of conventional video surveillance and have also become obsolete, according to the investigation. “According to the testimonies of officers from the Maritime Rescue and the Civil Guard, the images are not very clear, especially at night: in the dark, the system provides black and white images with diffuse shapes. The interpretation of these images and the decision to activate the rescue protocols depends on the officers of the Civil Guard,” he explains.
One of the maritime rescuers revealed that false positives caused by waves are not the only problem SIVE suffers from. “The system also has depth perception difficulties. One night, while looking for a boat in Almería, it was completely dark and we couldn’t see anything. The Civil Guard informed us that the boat was in front of us, so we moved in a straight line to find it. However, the boat was not really in front of us, but behind us. The perspective on the radar screen gave the impression that we were on the same line,” he lamented.
The Civil Guard eventually acknowledged that there had been misinterpretations of SIVE data by its agents, as well as failures in the automated alert system itself, the report said. “In some of these cases, it was later discovered that the alerts concerned boats carrying migrants that had capsized while waiting for help that never arrived. »
Spare parts that spend a year in warehouse
elDiario.es contacted the Ministry of the Interior and the Civil Guard to include its assessment of the claims in the AlgoRace and EuroMed Rights report, but did not receive a response. The study shows that the government has allocated tens of millions of euros in recent years to modernize the technological systems of the southern border, which includes the digitalization of the fences of Ceuta and Melilla, but the updating of the SIVE on the islands Canaries was not carried out. been a priority.
The authors point out that boat detection systems on the islands have been patched with few resources since their implementation in 2004 on Fuerteventura, in 2006 on Lanzarote, in 2007 on Gran Canaria and on Tenerife in 2008. This is a another key that undermines the effectiveness of all the infrastructures intended for the detection of boats and the rescue of immigrants traveling on them.
A civil guard explained that over the last decade the practice of “cannibalization” of cameras and radars has prevailed, reusing parts from other devices instead of replacing them. He noted that this causes frequent failures
“Instability in managing maintenance and replacing parts prevents the system from operating at its maximum capacity. A member of the Civil Guard explained that over the last decade the practice of “cannibalizing” cameras and radars has prevailed, reusing parts from other devices instead of completely replacing them. He emphasized that this inconsistency causes frequent equipment failures,” they say.
In other cases, the investment never reaches its destination. The study highlights that “the most recent and most revealing case of this mismanagement occurred in Lanzarote, where radars and cameras intended for a station were stored in a garage for more than a decade”. In October 2023, when another SIVE facility was about to open on the same island, it was vandalized and rendered completely unusable. “Suspicion suggests that last weekend they accessed the interior of the establishment at night,” “They doused him with an inflammable liquid and set him on fire,” reported Canarian public television.
“For years we have been denouncing the lack of personnel and equipment in the Canary Islands,” denounced the Unified Association of Civil Guards, the main organization of agents, in The Atlantic todayanother local media. “A few years ago it was necessary to report daily on the arrival of boats or cayucos in islands like Lanzarote and Fuerteventura, which included the real status of the SIVE. He was sent daily to Las Palmas de Gran Canaria. We found that the system was not infallible, that it did not work. And despite this, human perpetrators were sought when a boat was not located. But that doesn’t happen anymore. Why isn’t this interesting?
Artificial intelligence
The aim of the report was to analyze the implementation of artificial intelligence at Spain’s southern border and determine whether it respected the human rights of immigrants. However, the reality of the researchers’ findings is very different. Especially in the Canary Islands. “Even though AI appears mainly in long-term project documentation and public tenders, as detailed in this report, its presence on the Canary Islands border remains limited. »
Among these plans, the maritime rescue plan stands out, which aims to improve rescue, surveillance and maritime security services through the iSAR project. It focuses on the development of intelligent sensors, unmanned drones and advanced communications systems to detect cayucos and dangerous and polluting objects at sea, even in adverse weather conditions. The project, with a budget of more than 20 million euros, is 85% co-financed by European funds. For the moment, its deployment is reduced to a pilot project, but its final implementation is expected to begin before 2025.
“Young people in juvenile centers are sometimes the first to know that a boat is on its way because their cousin is traveling on board. A phone call: that’s all the artificial intelligence you need,” reflects a social worker from a Canarian center intended to accommodate immigrant minors interviewed as part of the study.
