Let’s keep it real—there’s a lot going on in the world, and sometimes it feels like the powers-that-be want us to get lost in the chaos.
Enter: “Explain Like I’m 5” (ELI5), Border & Surveillance edition.
It’s not about dumbing things down; it’s about breaking the messy, complicated stuff into no-nonsense, straight-up answers that make sense. Here, we’re diving into the border surveillance industry—the tech, the stakes, and the impact—because, spoiler alert: it’s all tied to the fights for climate justice, immigrant rights, and tearing down systems of oppression.
Know better, organize better, collaborate better. Let’s get into it.
The Polis Project Collab
For the first videos of the ELI5 BSI series, we teamed up with The Polis Project—founded by the incredible Suchitra Vijayan.
The folks at The Polis Project are all about spotlighting resistance at the crossroads of politics, art, and culture.
From calling out authoritarianism creeping into democracies to exposing racial, class, and caste injustices- they’re not here to play nice with oppressive systems.
Together, we broke down the border surveillance industry’s mess, connecting the dots between state power, tech, and how it all hits marginalized communities hardest.
TL;DR: Resistance meets receipts. And it’s just the beginning.
EP01: What is the Border and Surveillance Industry?
“Borders aren’t just lines—they’re battlegrounds for surveillance and control.”
In Episode 01 “What is the Border and Surveillance Industry?”, The Polis Project’s founder, Suchitra Vijayan, delves into the booming industry that’s turning people into data points and borders into war zones.
From 6 to 63 border walls, armed with surveillance tech, all in the name of “security.” But who’s really profiting? The industry is set to grow from $51.25 billion to $73.51 billion by 2032—and it’s built on a foundation of racism, Islamophobia, and corporate greed.
Israeli companies, using tech tested on Palestinian bodies, are a key part of this global apartheid. The question is: Who benefits from these walls? And at what cost?
EP02: Profiting from Crisis- Corporations and Climate
Climate change is forcing entire communities to flee—yet instead of compassion, they’re met with surveillance and violence. In Ep 02 of ELI5 BSI, “Profiting from Crisis: Corporations and Climate,” The Polis Project’s founder, Suchitra Vijayan, reveals how corporations are turning climate chaos into a cash cow.
The border & surveillance industry isn’t just about stopping migrants—it’s about controlling populations fleeing environmental disasters, especially from the Global South. As sea levels rise, so do corporate profits.
Drones, biometric tracking, and militarized borders—all for “national security,” but who really benefits?
EP03: Tools of the Trade
Did you know that modern surveillance started as a tool of colonial control?
In ELI5 BSI: Episode 03, Suchitra Vijayan uncovers how surveillance is now embedded in our daily lives—tracking, recording, and selling our data without our knowledge. From your phone to your car, companies, police, and even weapons manufacturers are profiting from your every move.
Are these systems really making us safer? Or are they fueling new forms of violence? Communities are resisting this growing surveillance state—and we’ll explore that resistance in future episodes.
EP04: Treated As Terrorists
Why are climate activists being treated as terrorists?
In ELI5 BSI: Treated As Terrorists, Suchitra Vijayan breaks down how peaceful climate protests are being criminalized—pushed by major oil and gas companies using anti-protest laws to silence dissent.
Governments are cracking down on non-violent activists with counterterrorism laws, excessive force, and blanket bans. Behind the scenes, the border and surveillance industry profits, selling tools to crush dissent and protect corporate interests.
We need to ask—who benefits from silencing those fighting for a livable planet?
EP05: Reproductive Injustice
Reproductive justice goes beyond access to healthcare—it’s about power, control, and surveillance.
In Episode 05 of the #ELI5BSI series, Suchitra Vijayan delves into how state surveillance is used to enforce abortion bans, target vulnerable communities, and control bodies, especially at the Southern Border.
In places like Texas, private citizens are now empowered to enforce abortion bans, drawing a haunting parallel to the Fugitive Slave Act. The tools of surveillance aren’t just watching—they’re controlling.
How does surveillance impact our reproductive rights, and who truly has power over our bodies?
EP06: Art Should Protect & Connect
“Art should protect and connect, not control and surveil.” In Episode 06, we explore the complex relationship between art, resistance, and surveillance.
Throughout history, artists have been targeted by the state for daring to reimagine society and ignite hope. But today, we’re also seeing art co-opted by the systems of control it once resisted.
Take “robot dogs,” for example—originally developed for border patrol and police use, they’re now finding their way into art spaces. But what happens when art begins to normalize the very tools of oppression?
Art must subvert and challenge—not reinforce—the systems of power. Let’s create a world where art fuels liberation, not surveillance. Watch now to learn how we can resist together.
Professor Robot
What do you get when creatives in the resistance team up to roast the border and surveillance industry? A machine with actual critical thinking: Professor Robot.
Unlike the billion-dollar AI hype machines built to spy on you, scrape your data, and waste obscene amounts of resources, Professor Robot is here to break it all down—snark included.
Think of them as your reluctant AI whistleblower, spilling the messy secrets of Big Tech, mass surveillance, and the climate-wrecking nonsense behind it all. Because let’s be real: if AI is supposed to be “smart,” why does it keep working for the worst people?
With Professor Robot, we’re hacking the narrative!
Innovation or Incineration? The True Cost of AI
🚨 AI isn’t magic—it’s a resource-guzzling, climate-wrecking beast dressed up as “innovation.” 🚨
Training AI models burns through electricity, water, and data like there’s no tomorrow (literally). Some server farms are bigger than 12 Walmarts combined, sucking up more power than a small town just so AI can remix existing info and call it “intelligent.”
A single 100-word email from ChatGPT? 17.5oz of water, 0.14 kWh of electricity. That’s 14 LED bulbs running for an hour—just to spit out another AI-generated email no one asked for.
In a world on fire, wasting resources like this isn’t just reckless—it’s climate sabotage. 🔥
The Disrupticons
The Disrupticons are your friendly (and slightly feral) crew of troublemakers fighting back against tech fascism, border violence, and corporate nonsense.
There’s TechCat, our rogue insider from the belly of Big Tech. They know how the sausage gets made — and just how often that sausage is served with a side of racism, profit-hunger, and totalitarian creepiness. TechCat translates the corporate doublespeak into plain language, no purring required.
Then there’s Petra Molnar, our Habibti Anthropologist-Attorney Rock Star — part lawyer, part anthropologist, full-time thorn in the side of digital border profiteers. She’s seen how AI, surveillance, and militarization crush people’s rights, and she’s here to break it down for you with snark, clarity, and receipts.
We’re joined by a growing cast of misfits, monsters, and resistors — all working to expose the surveillance state and build a future that centers people over profit.
We’re always recruiting new heroes for the squad. If you’ve got ideas, skills, or just a burning rage against the machine, hit us up to collaborate.
👇 Wanna collab on an ELI5 BSI video? Click the button below. Let’s expose the nonsense together.
Palatir: From Data Bros to Deportation Pros
Okay, so full disclosure: I work in tech, so you know I’ve seent some dark, dystopian shit… But this is worse than anything I’ve witnessed.
Palantir, the tech company that named itself after a dark surveillance orb from Lord of the Rings, is now living its villain arc for realsies.
Leaked Slack messages show they’re now actively helping ICE find and deport people. Not hypothetically. Actually.
Their “Enforcement Prioritization and Targeting” project? It’s about creating “actionable leads” using law enforcement data. There’s even a “self-deportation tracking” feature—because nothing says empathy like surveillance-powered exile.
Meanwhile, apparently, the Palantir execs are prepping their staff for public blowback with… ethics discussion groups and Tolkien jokes. I’m not joking. They called concerned employees hobbits.
Meanwhile, they’re placing recruitment ads on college campuses like they’re the resistance.
Spoiler: they’re not the resistance. They’re the empire with better branding.
Because this isn’t just backend software, it’s ICE’s digital command center, fueled by Palantir, and funded by our tax dollars.
And if you think this stops with immigrants, I hate to break it to you, but you’re in the dataset too, babe.
And if we, tech workers, don’t shut this down right now? We’re all next.
Postal Service x ICE: The Collab No One Asked For
What’s this? The Postal Service is now moonlighting as ICE’s little sidekick. That’s right, my kittens, USPS Inspection Service, which, yes, is a real law enforcement agency, has decided to join a Department of Homeland Security Task Force to help hunt down undocumented immigrants.
How you ask? Oh, just a casual program called mail covers, where they photograph the outside of your mail, scrape your USPS online activity, and collect juicy, juicy data like IP addresses and credit card info.
And let’s be real, this isn’t about safety. This is techno surveillance dragnet targeting people just trying to live.
The same government that accidentally labels immigrants as dead in a database is now turning your mailbox into a trap.
So here’s your action items: Flood the phones of your reps, demand USPS accountability, and if you’re organizing– remember the EAD protocol!
Encrypt, anonymize, decentralize!
TechCat out! Meow-litia rising!
Introducing Deportation Diplomacy™: Cruelty You Can Contract Out
Hi! I’m Petra, a lawyer and anthropologist studying how border surveillance hurts real people.
If you thought we were done with the “ship migrants to random countries” era, then sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but Trump’s got new deportation dreams, namely Rwanda and Libya.
But here’s the plot twist: Europe already tried this. And it failed. Hard.
The UK blew hundreds of millions, just a few years ago, trying to dump asylum seekers in Rwanda, people with no ties to the country, only for the courts to call it unlawful. And guess how many were sent? Zero!
And Libya? That’s where the EU literally pays militias to snatch people at sea and drag them back to torture camps. Yes, real ones — with slavery, trafficking, and abuse. It’s a system that violates international law, including the principle of non-refoulement, which forbids sending people back into danger. And no, it hasn’t stopped migration. It’s just caused maximum misery.
Now Trump wants in on this cruelty cosplay, flying folks to countries they’ve never been to, without telling them where, and calling it “policy.”
Meanwhile, Secretary Rubio’s out here saying, ‘We want the most despicable human beings — the further from America, the better,’ like he’s playing international Hot Potato with human lives.
So we need to ask: Who gave Trump this idea, who’s profiting, and who’s next?
Because this isn’t about safety, security, or immigration policy. It’s about dollars, deals, and dehumanization.
ELI5 is run by an international coalition of climate justice and human rights campaigners who believe all human beings deserve safety, protection, and dignity. To contact us please email eyesonbsi@gmail.com.