A Stitch in Haste

You might want to take a moment's break from debating "Blu-Ray v. HD-DVD" to note that DVDs are now essentially considered contraband:

An alliance of film industry groups that includes the Motion Picture Association of America and the Federation Against Copyright Theft has announced the world's first dogs specially trained to detect CDs and DVDs in bags and packages. The idea is that the dogs may be able to alert police to large stashes of pirated movies.

The MPAA says there are currently two DVD-sniffing dogs in the world. They are Labradors named Lucky and Flo working at Stansted Airport in the United Kingdom. The canines have been taught to recognize the unique smell of a compact disc.

Of course, there is no way for a dog to distinguish between a perfectly legal original DVD, a perfectly legal copied DVD, or an illegally pirated DVD:

Customs officials in the U.K. hope one day the dogs will only signal when there are large collections of discs, which would more likely include illegally copied movies. For the time being, Lucky and Flo are working at a FedEx shipping center at Stansted Airport where they are sniffing packages that are shipped around the world. Trainers say the dogs have been notifying customs agents of packages with discs in them. The packages have been opened but so far no pirated movies have been found.

Details, details.

Assume that, someday, the dogs can be trained to alert only for large quantities of discs. So what? Does even that rise to the level of probable cause to conduct a search? Or is the presumption that you automatically consent to a search whenever you ship a box?

More on "when legal becomes contraband" here. More on the fallibility of dog sniffs here.

At least the dogs are cute:


(Via Fark.)