NEW YORK—With the Holidays quickly approaching, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has its hands full.
CBP has found and seized more than double the amount of ecstasy this year than it saw last year. The peak holiday season is keeping officers busy as they try to stop the drugs from reaching the public.
“Every day, we get a lot of opioids, a lot of painkillers,” said Officer Kevin Antoine during our tour of the facility. The officer said the facility is seeing less fentanyl, but more opioids.
There is so much that needs to be x-rayed at JFK. More than half the country’s international mail arrives at the facility—one million parcels a day. From that lot, packages are put aside based on a risk-based assessment for inspection.
But drugs aren’t all they’re looking out for; holiday meats, plants, and fake brand-name products are also seized.
Intel and advanced information on parcels help give CBP an idea of what to look out for; the technology is vital for CBP.
An upgrade of the facility is set to take place over the summer. They also told us that this upgrade would give them technology that could use algorithms to detect suspicious mail.
