You may own a Ford vehicle and travel across the border but that doesn’t necessarily mean you want to smuggle illegal drugs. And the automaker wants to make sure you don’t accidentally participate in narcotics trafficking.
Ford recently filed a patent, spotted by Motor1, for an “unknown cargo detection and evidence collection system” that can use a vehicle’s various cameras and sensors to prevent the driver from becoming a “blind mule,” or someone who carries illegal drugs across the border without their knowledge.
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The system is designed to detect suspicious activity by monitoring for fluctuations in the vehicle’s weight, listening to any activity around the vehicle that seems out of norm, and scanning for unfamiliar GPS signals, since that’s the most likely way a drug smuggler would track a vehicle and retrieve their cargo after it crosses the border. As the report points out, if the system does think something fishy is going down, it can turn on the cameras, make recordings, and store the footage so it can be used as evidence later.
It’s an interesting application for many of the cameras and sensors already included with Ford’s vehicles but it’s unclear if it will ever become a standard feature. What’s also unclear is how a driver might react to their vehicle telling them there could be illegal drugs planted on their truck. Would they jump out and try to give the drugs back? Would they drive to the border crossing and say ‘You’re not going to believe this, but…?’” Neither option sounds great.
If the tech seems far-fetched, an inewsource story pointed out in the report said blind mule drug trafficking has been a strategy employed by Mexican drug cartels for decades. And it’s resulted in some enormous legal headaches for anyone caught smuggling drugs without realizing it.
This isn’t the first time Ford has filed a patent designed to catch law breakers. The company previously patented technology that would allow its vehicles to detect other vehicles speeding around it and take photos for the record. Last year, the company patented technology that would allow for the remote disabling of features or let a self-driving vehicle repossess itself if the driver misses car payments.
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