Canadian man enters USA using scanned passport on iPad 2 (update)

Oftentimes passing through border security can be painstakingly difficult, which is why we were shocked (and frankly quite amused) when we heard that Martin Reisch managed to cross the Canadian-American border with a scanned copy of his passport on an iPad 2. Reisch says that he was too close to the border to turn around when he realized he’d forgotten his passport at home, but thankfully, he had a digital copy of the document in his Dropbox folder. Thanks to the wonders of modern technology and a whole lot of luck, he handed the border officer the iPad 2 and his driver’s license, and was granted access into the US. Sure to improve your faith in security procedures, Reisch successfully used the same digital credentials on his return to Canada about a week later.

Update: US Customs and Border Protection denies Reisch’s story: “The assertion that a traveler was admitted into the U.S. using solely a scanned image of his passport on an iPad is categorically false. In this case, the individual had both a driver’s license and birth certificate, which the CBP officer used to determine identity and citizenship in order to admit the traveler into the country.”