US border AI surveillance towers failed to stop over a thousand deaths in a decade
MIT Technology Review finds over 1,050 deaths inside tower surveillance range, a systematic gap between the towers' detection promise and real-world performance.
Original event 2026-09-21
An MIT Technology Review investigation found that more than 1,050 people died within range of border surveillance towers between 2015 and early 2026, including more than 110 within range of Anduril's autonomous towers.
The team cross-referenced nearly 4,000 locations where human remains were found with nearly 600 tower locations identified by the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Deaths occurred within the advertised range of about two-thirds of the towers analyzed, and most did not happen in terrain blind spots. In April 2024, a man died 360 feet from the nearest Anduril tower in New Mexico; landfill workers, not Border Patrol, spotted him first.
Anduril responded that towers are operated by CBP once delivered, that actual coverage varies with terrain and CBP-set virtual boundaries, and that the reporting contains inaccuracies it did not specify. The investigation also notes it counted only deaths that left a trace.