Travel Focus: Rio de Janeiro

While the Rio Olympics are well underway, here are some tips for those of you in our network who might be down there right now or are planning to travel there in the near future.

Terrorism

There are no known indigenous terrorist groups operating in Brazil. However, there is significant and sustained organized criminal activity throughout Brazil, especially prevalent in the major cities. Hezbollah is also known to have built networks in the country as well.

Crime

Rio de Janeiro has over 1,000 different slums, called favelas. These areas should be avoided.  As the city prepared for the 2016 Olympics, police effectively controls most major favelas in Rio. Still, drug gang members walk openly with weapons in unpacified favelas.

Local police have been known to occasionally shake down tourists for bribes or to rob them outright.

Do not display or walk openly with expensive jewelry or electronic devices.

Use ATMs located in discreet locations and in major tourist hotels only.

Armed carjackings are not uncommon in Rio.  If confronted with this situation, we urge giving up the vehicle without resistance or comment.  This is true for any armed robbery.  Criminals in Rio are prepared to meet resistance with deadly violence.

Do not use unlicensed cabs or vans, only taxis with functioning meters.

Credit card fraud is a major problem in Brazil.  Only use credit cards at major hotels and formal, established restaurants and shops.

While kidnappings for ransom have become rare in recent years, these incidents continue to occur.

Driving

Brazil has one of the highest levels of vehicle accidents and death rates due to accidents in the world.  This is due, in part, to poor road conditions, haphazard lane markings, excessive speeding and large numbers of trucks.  When driving in the city, pay particular attention to your surroundings while waiting at traffic lights. If you feel threatened in your vehicle at any time, do not stop.

Healthcare

Medical care is adequate in Rio, but certain medications may not be available. Private hospitals and clinics in are better staffed and equipped than public ones, but often expect immediate cash payment for medical care.

Laws and Customs

Tourists are subject to local laws.

Possession of illegal drugs is severely punished.

It is a legal requirement in Brazil to carry evidence of identity (original ID and copy of passport and visa) at all times.

Consumption of any alcoholic beverages prior to driving is illegal in Brazil.

For more information about travel security in Rio de Janeiro or other destinations, please contact Interfor International.

Internet Eyes

A UK company has said that it would like to set up a program called Internet Eyes which would allow ordinary citizens access to government CCTV camera feeds which they could observe for the purpose of reporting crime.  People that spot the most crimes taking place would receive a financial reward.  The pilot program would start in Australia, where, because of the time difference, citizens could log on and watch overnight feeds from the UK during the day.  It is hoped that this program will help UK law enforcement reduce crime and even fight terrorism.

Besides the Big Brother factor of having people ordinary citizens spying on each other, I have a lot of reservations about this sort of program.  While I have long been an advocate for encouraging citizens to report crime or things of a suspicious nature as an important tool in the fight against terrorism, I feel like this program is another example of an unfortunate over-reliance on technology.  Programs that involve citizens work best when the participants actually live in the area and are familiar with what should be going on there.  For example, if a strange truck starts parking across the street from a church or synagogue for several days in a row, a local person would know that this is unusual and might think to report it to the authorities.  Reporting out of the ordinary occurrences like this can stop a robbery or an act of terrorism before it takes place.  Someone sitting at home in another country would not know that the truck doesn’t belong there.  They may be able to spot a mugging or someone breaking into a car, but the crime is already being committed.  By the time they alert the authorities and help arrives on the scene, the damage will probably have already been done.

Additionally, I think that any program that relies on ordinary citizens needs to include a certain amount of education and training.  If people know what to look out for and when they should report something to the authorities, there would be a much greater potential for success.  In Israel, a lot of crimes are stopped and terrorist attacks are prevented because the citizenry has been trained to be aware of certain behaviors or scenarios and when to report them to the authorities.  My concern with the UK program is that if that if you have people who aren’t properly trained, who have a financial incentive to report something, then the system is going to be so flooded with false alarms that it would be useless.

Giving people access to the UK’s extensive CCTV system also has the potential to be abused.  If the participants are not going to be screened or supervised in any way, what is going to stop someone from using that access for more nefarious purposes?  The feeds are supposed to change constantly to random cameras, but would allowing people access to the system make it easier to get to specific feeds for longer periods of time?  What if thieves or terrorists could use the feeds to case a business or government building?  That is clearly not a good idea.  And if people are getting constantly changing feeds from random cameras, how are they even going to know what they are looking at?

If the UK government wants to engage everyday people in the fight against crime and terrorism, I think neighborhood watch programs would be a much better option.  Neighborhood watch programs have been around for decades and are proven to be effective at reducing crime.  There is an educational component to the programs which teaches the participants how to monitor their neighborhoods effectively, and they encourage people to take more responsibility for their communities which has benefits that extend beyond crime reduction.  Relying on technology that should probably not be generally accessible that will be used by people in a distant country that have no knowledge of the communities that they are policing, is an unnecessarily complex solution to a problem that could better be handled by the people who are actually being affected.