Recently traveled abroad and was shocked at how dystopian moving through borders is anymore. Scans after scans of passports, fingerprinting, face scans, questions about intentions for visiting, paperwork, cameras throughout airports that are surely doing untold amounts of biometric analysis with some bullshit AI…in some of these places you get laughed at if you ask about opting out. It almost isn’t worth it.
Japan. It went full 1984.
Ah that explains it. They have their own way of doing things over there. Thanks for sharing your experience all the same, it is good to know.
Interesting, I didn’t have this experience a couple of years ago. I wonder if they’ve just upped it to try and “automate” things more with the crazy amount of tourism they’re suddenly getting. Also I’d be curious on which airport you went to, Haneda or Narita?
If the scans and such were in the states, I’ve requested opting out and no one really cared, they just said okay. Funny enough, it actually made me go through quicker than it was taking everyone who did the face scans, contradicting the sign claiming it’s quicker.
You are never going to cross a border anonymously. The extra checks are to prevent people crossing borders under a false identity. If you are travelling under your own identity, then you are no less private than you ever were. They’re just taking extra precautions to prevent people from using false identities.
I disagree. I had to scan my passport 3 times in the same room before I could exit it. Shit is insane. I’ve traveled quite a bit and never experienced such things.
Did you consider your privacy invaded any more after the third time than the first?
The fun part is that you don’t have to do all that stuff if you have a long term visa.
Seconded. I was just traveling to Japan from the States. While it was more or less painless, it was pretty invasive.
What are they doing these days that is invasive (I have been wanting to go back to visit friends)?
The only time I have visited Japan was back in 2012 and all I remember was just waiting in a line and handing over my passport to a customs/foreign visitors person. I also might have had a paper slip with my dates of arrival and departure, that I wasn’t bringing in more than $9999.99 in cash, and the address I was officially planning to be staying for the bulk of the time there (and name of my friend that was already living there on work visa). I don’t remember ever being stopped to check my bags or answer addition questions. Though I might have just been lucky to have not been picked for additional checks.
I went to Japan earlier this year. Filled the travel related paperwork online in advance, and at the border they took fingerprints, compared face to passport (which I assume included a photo) and that was it. Not any different from any other developed country.
I imagine that most nations would have started doing that extra stuff. Still good to be aware of it since it isn’t something I think about often. And since my friends over there have a different process and might not know off-hand to mention.
In addition to all that you get funneled through a thermal camera section for quarantine reasons, and then you have to stop at a machine where they simultaneously scan your passport, you put all your fingers on a reader and you look into the camera (without glasses) for biometric scanning. After that you go through passport and customs.
None of this was optional and everyone had to go through it (at least for foreigners).
That does sound like a pretty big difference, but I guess it makes sense given it has been so long since I went. The only other nation I have visited was Canada, and that was back when you just needed a valid US driver’s license/state ID. I believe they now need a passport. Interesting to see how things like that change over time. Kind of like how we could go all the way into airport terminals to greet people you were waiting to arrive back in the 90s. The “war on terror” really pushed a lot of extra shit into travel.