I'm curious, do immigration authorities know where you are, at any given moment?

[Maggusoil]

They know when you leave and when you return, or visa versa.

[rickirs]

<script type='text/javascript'>window.mod_pagespeed_start = Number(new Date());</script>

Only through the microchip implanted in your body that transmits your GPS location every minute to the NSA. Find it and cut it out, then you're safe. Or just go back, turn yourself in and serve your time like a man for the crime you're obviously running away from.

That chip is in your penis. Have a nice day.

[iamariva1957]

In simple terms.... if they are looking for you you will not be able to hide for long.

[transam]

Wonder what the chip in my 2008 UK passport does ?

[momtaz]

After the fresh leaking of Snowden .. the big brother (USA CIA) they are watching over all.. they are refining every inputs and outputs, but they may have some top priority task to perform within the top interest of the USA Govt.

I do strongly believe that everyone (connected to internet, use mobile, etc) all of us are under the microscope, and located by them accurately,

[marko kok prong]

you can dissapear but it takes a lot of work i would imagine,you would have to know the right people,get a new id,maybe plastic surgery,maybe fake your own death,be a good actor etc,but shit Elvis did it.

[horsesr4all2luv]

olddoc is right! I was told when I received my new passport that it contained a "chip" installed to track the passport "if it was STOLEN", (RIGHT!) There is no such thing as privacy any more, IMHO!

[horsesr4all2luv]

Oh, btw, it is a US passport!

[Nemesis7]

To be honest with you yes they can trace you if they really wanted to. Though you say fly in to Thailand by air and cross border to Laos or Cambodia, still you can be traced. If you wish not to be traced throw away the phone and simcard. Avoid contacting close home relatives as to trac you the authorities will motiyor them as we'll. email , yahoo , msn is a big NO. Viber kind of safe for now.

[bbbbooboo]

Word has it that the Western country with the biggest spy network in the world has incorporated GPS tracking devices into passports.

So the answer would be Big Brother does know !

well we will just have to destroy our passports. That will put a stop to THAT.....555

[HerbalEd]

If your country's authorities deemed you important enough, and wanted to expend the personnel, time, effort and money, they could trace you throughout the world thru border crossings, hotel stays, credit card use, internet use, cell phone use, etc. However, given the great expense, that's only going to be done in very rare cases.

To put it into perspective: The USA and other countries must have spend hundreds-of-millions (if not billions) of dollars tracking down Ben Ladin, and look how long that took.

[transam]

If your country's authorities deemed you important enough, and wanted to expend the personnel, time, effort and money, they could trace you throughout the world thru border crossings, hotel stays, credit card use, internet use, cell phone use, etc. However, given the great expense, that's only going to be done in very rare cases.

To put it into perspective: The USA and other countries must have spend hundreds-of-millions (if not billions) of dollars tracking down Ben Ladin, and look how long that took.

Perhaps they spelled his name wrong............ .....................

[HerbalEd]

Word has it that the Western country with the biggest spy network in the world has incorporated GPS tracking devices into passports.

So the answer would be Big Brother does know !

Well, there you have it. "Word has it." It doesn't get more authoritative than that.

It amazing that they can put a GPS transmitter and the battery to power it for years into a passport and it's so tiny that it's not detectable. Bull s__t.

[FiftyTwo]

you can dissapear but it takes a lot of work i would imagine,you would have to know the right people,get a new id,maybe plastic surgery,maybe fake your own death,be a good actor etc,but shit Elvis did it.

Or just move to an Issan village.

[Suradit69]

Could you imagine UK immigration on behalf of the police force calling Thai immigration, just to check.

Usually when UK authorities ring up Thai officials it's because they need the help of Thai police to catch criminals who they've allowed to to elude them.

"Most other nations, including the UK, Germany, France and Israel also have law enforcement and intelligence officers based in Thailand, though no approximations of the numbers is available."

http://www.thailawforum.com/prominent-extradition-cases-in-thailand-snaring-minor-offenders-to-big-time-crooks/

Edited February 24, 2014 by Suradit69

[Aussie Paul]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PISCES

One would assume they can track your passport's progress, otherwise it would seem easy for fugitives to evade capture.

movements can be tracked only by an international arrest warrant which is accepted by most (not all) countries.

Well, kind of.

In Thailand, (and many countries) have PISCES which is a border control system provided free of charge by Uncle Sam (USA) and installed & maintained by Booz Allen Hamilton, you may know of this company as a chap called Edwards Snowdens previous employer.

Personal Identification Secure Comparison and Evaluation System (PISCES).

As a general rule of thumb, countries or passport holders that do visa waivers, generally share info and stuff is at their finger tips.

eg, if you are a Kiwi going to Canada, it is amazing how much info they can bring up quickly on you if they want to on your entry.

Don't be naughty by and girls.

[furyrider]

If you swan the Mekong river into Laos and got a boob job they wouldn't find you.

I would get the boob job first to aid in floatation

[nithisa78]

<script type='text/javascript'>window.mod_pagespeed_start = Number(new Date());</script>

US State Department knows where I am because I tell 'em:

https://step.state.gov/step/

Many would not use that service.

They hate government and live in a world of paranoia !

Personal problems aside. Good to tell them. We were in Nicaragua some years back. In the bush. Took less than five minutes, we were found. Good link, thank you, for many of us.

Edited February 24, 2014 by nithisa78

[nithisa78]

Word has it that the Western country with the biggest spy network in the world has incorporated GPS tracking devices into passports.

So the answer would be Big Brother does know !

Well, there you have it. "Word has it." It doesn't get more authoritative than that.

It amazing that they can put a GPS transmitter and the battery to power it for years into a passport and it's so tiny that it's not detectable. Bull s__t.

Pardon Me, Herb, Sir, Word has it. Word also has it if you leave the passport in hotel safe. . .it will know were you've gone to eat. olddoc, we're pulling your foot. Enjoy your life.

[americaninbangkok]

<script type='text/javascript'>window.mod_pagespeed_start = Number(new Date());</script>

US State Department knows where I am because I tell 'em:

https://step.state.gov/step/

Many would not use that service.

They hate government and live in a world of paranoia !

Or perhaps they value their privacy.

That's not paranoia. It's a desire for freedom from unwanted intrusion into ones private life by busybody state agencies.

Sure... but people like their"nosy" State Dept when there's unrest, rioting and flooding and they want a ticket back to the US, don't they?!

[Bernard Flint]

If your country's authorities deemed you important enough, and wanted to expend the personnel, time, effort and money, they could trace you throughout the world thru border crossings, hotel stays, credit card use, internet use, cell phone use, etc. However, given the great expense, that's only going to be done in very rare cases.

To put it into perspective: The USA and other countries must have spend hundreds-of-millions (if not billions) of dollars tracking down Ben Ladin, and look how long that took.

2 people i know have been arrested for dole scrounging,both from South Wales,how strange.One is allowed 1 month per year holiday in a non eu country if claiming dole,housing etc etc.Both of these were fined 20,999 gbp and their dole decreased.These guys were goiing to Thailand naybe 3 months a year and got caught,they were even claiming heating alowanace,what dickheads

[RandomSand]

If you swan the Mekong river into Laos and got a boob job they wouldn't find you.

Sounds a bit fishy.

[Old Croc]

New passports for most developed nations are embedded with Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tags.

There is a LOT of misinformation about these tags. A lot of people falsely claim that somehow the government is tracking your every move by remotely scanning the RFID tag from your passport. Some people also claim that the tags pose a serious threat to the security of your personal information.

RFID tags in ID cards and passports can ONLY be read from a very short distance of a few centimetres, It is impossible to remotely track someone with the RFID chips in their pockets. You would literally have to be right on top of somebody to scan any RFID tags on their person.

The entire passport is shielded. That means it is impossible to scan the RFID chip in the passport if the passport is closed, it can ONLY be scanned if the passport is open. Secondly, the information on the RFID chip is encrypted with a cipher which is based off the information PRINTED INSIDE the passport. This means it is impossible to read any personal information stored on the RFID chip unless the passport is OPEN and the scanner can also read the information PRINTED on the passport ID page using an optical scanning processor.

The RFID tag in your passport contains the SAME information pritned inside your passport and in some cases may also contain biometric data (like a fingerprint). The RFID on passports is a security measure. It helps the border security officer (regardless of the country you enter) verify your identity and verify that the passport is authentic.

Older passports can be easily duplicated, modified and manufactured despite having built-in checks to help protect against this. The RFID tag is an essential and necessary upgrade over the previous print-only passports. The RFID tags are much harder to fake and they further increase the chance of detecting fraudulent, duplicate and modified passports.

Apart from biometric data the tag in your passport does NOT provide the government with ANY other information they couldn't already get from reading your passport. The tag can only be scanned if the passport is open and the ID page can also be scanned, so the only function of the tag is to prevent fraud/identity theft, it can't be used for tracking or anything else that couldn't already be done with a print-only passport.

The people who make false claims about government tracking and security threats are who most logical and reasoned people refer to as 'conspiracy nuts', or if you prefer the more politically correct term, 'conspiracy theorists'. Usually the claims they make are highly exaggerated and are the result of wild assumptions based on false or mis-interpreted facts and weak evidence which cannot be substantiated.

[Ulic]

Only if they are on good terms with the USA and ask them.

[louse1953]

Word has it that the Western country with the biggest spy network in the world has incorporated GPS tracking devices into passports.

So the answer would be Big Brother does know !

That means they know where the PP is not the owner.

[mrfaroukh]

These days most passports have a electronic security in them, if u look every time u enter a country they draw your passport through a machine and all your details will be available to them. It means the moment you leave one country and enter another your passport will automatically be registered if they draw it through the machine. So the only way to disappear is the illegal way which I have no clue about how.

[hawker9000]

Well, you can deliberately render the chip inoperative if you're really that paranoid about it. Check the web. Different methods. But it might get you pulled into secondary, at least back in the pp-issuing country occasionally, so probably counter-productive to do so. One day it may be a GPS xmtr, but today it's just a very short-range RFID... Your cellphone (certainly has GPS) & credit cards & internet logons are much better locating tools. 'Notice how in Thailand you even have to "register" your simcard now? Really though, except for the Jason Bournes, if they want you - and aren't being in one way or another incentivized not to - they can find you. Less resources required to do so every day. 'Almost as easy for a criminal or reasonably tech-savvy investigator as it is for a government (for some of whom it's becoming an almost trivial exercise). As aggravating as it is for those of us who understand the meaning & worth of privacy, there's no point worrying about it.

Edited February 24, 2014 by hawker9000

[hhgz]

"Do immigration authorities know where you are, at any given moment?"

No, of course not.

[JimHuaHin]

Could you imagine UK immigration on behalf of the police force calling Thai immigration, just to check.

it happens all the time. Might surprise you but there's an organisation known as Interpol (The international Criminal Police Organisation) and there's thousands of 'international' type inquiries going on every week.

Apart from Interpol, there are also the "informal' arrangements between national intelligence agencies, immigration authorities, and various security agencies.

[Acharn]

The answer to the OPs question is "Yes" they know if you are out of the country trying to collect benefits pretending to be back home.

Errrmmm... Not so much. I had a friend who collected unemployment insurance from New York state for almost two years while living in Bangkok and doing visa runs. Of course that was twenty years ago, but I doubt very much they've improved the system since. It's cheaper to accept the fraud than to set up a really expensive system to prevent it. I know the contractors who handle the U.S. Army's pension payments know my mailing address, because I provided it to them, but my American mailing address is in Bangkok and I live upcountry, so they don't really know exactly where I am. As far as I can tell the State Department doesn't care where I am. Incidentally, to the OP, the American Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE, aka La Migra) doesn't care where American citizens are -- it has nothing to do with them, although the DEA does. Not sure if the FBI has a Legat in Bangkok or not, but the CIA certainly has a large operation here (actually I think they're just like the rest of us, here for the drugs, sex, and rock and roll).