The Latest Law Enforcement Trend: Porn Sniffing Dogs

By Joshua Krause

Now that the drug war is slowly but surely winding down in America, you have to wonder what the police are going to do with their drug sniffing dogs and handlers. Granted, not all drugs will be decriminalized, but surely there will be some superfluous LEO positions after marijuana is completely decriminalized?

Unfortunately the government doesn’t work like the private world. Unneeded positions are simply given a new purpose rather than being removed, regardless of how stupid that new purpose may be. Which is why in the future, you’re going to see a lot of police departments adopting what the media has dubbed “porn sniffing” dogs.

Of course, these dogs don’t sniff out grubby magazines and old VHS tapes. They can sense hidden flash drives, because they’re taught to seek out an adhesive that is commonly found in SD cards and USB drives. The term “porn sniffing” dog was first coined after one of these animals aided in the arrest of former Subway spokesman Jared Fogle. While there’s no doubt that these dogs can help from time to time, as PINAC has pointed out, their costs likely outweigh their utility.

SD cards are literally everywhere in modern society, so having a dog indicate their presence seems hardly requisite by the typical police officer.

But law enforcement agencies look for the next big thing or shiny toy all the time, and after last year’s news that former Subway pitchman Jared Fogle had been convicted with the help of a supposed “porn sniffing” dog, popularity and demand seems to be increasing from police for K9 partners.

The big marketing pitch is landing home in far flung law enforcement communities, with big budgets and with the waning usefulness of dogs in law enforcement, many K9 specialist officers whose skills would otherwise be unused, without a dog to handle.

More importantly, these dogs may open a whole new avenue for the police to violate your rights. As of now these dogs are being presented by the media as the latest and greatest tool for combating child predators who may have illicit pornography stashed away on a flash drive. That’s certainly noble, but that won’t be the end of it.

It won’t be long before these dogs are used for everything. After all, just about any crime you can think of may potentially have evidence on a flash drive. In the future, being accused of any crime, no matter how trivial, could lead to a search for evidence on flash drives. The police could use a minor accusation as an excuse to find evidence of a more serious crime before sending out the dogs to sniff out your flash drives, and every private moment you have saved on them. In fact, that’s pretty much how drug dogs are used now.

Drug dogs give cops plenty of opportunities to violate your 4th Amendment rights, because though they have a powerful sense of smell, they have been bred for thousands of years to appease their owners. If a cop expects to find drugs in your car, there’s a good chance that the dog will pick up on that desire and give a false reading. Once the dog signals back to his handler that there are drugs, your 4th Amendment rights don’t mean squat. And that doesn’t consider the possibility of the handler deliberately signaling to his dog.

Who would have thought that man’s best friend could provide so many ways to aid our police state?

Joshua Krause is a reporter, writer and researcher at The Daily Sheeple. He was born and raised in the Bay Area and is a freelance writer and author. You can follow Joshua’s reports at Facebook or on his personal Twitter. Joshua’s website is Strange Danger.