The United States Customs Service (now the United States Customs and Border Protection Service or "CBP") was the portion of the US Federal Government dedicated to keeping illegal products outside of US borders. It also regulated what could leave the United States and was partially responsible for who could enter the United States.
Operations are divided into two seperate sections - the first of which is the Office of Field Operations (OFO) which handles duties and tax penalties along with helping to prevent contraband from entering the United States. It is primarily made up of Inspectors that serve as the "front line" of Customs by monitoring and policeing all international ports of entry into the United States by land, sea or air by screening incoming and outgoing international shipments of cargo along with informal entries of dutiable goods by individuals through personal transport and shipment through international postal carriers (government and private). Customs Inspectors also handle initial operations regarding smuggling of contraband into the United States and export controlled strategic resources and illegally obtained currency instruments from leaving the United States. Other OFO personnel include Import Specialists, Customs Intelligence Officers, and other contracted personnel responsible for record keeping, handling protest and tax penalty arbitration along with other record support functions.
Import Specialists provide the backbone of OFO by providing expertise concerning proper classification of goods for the purpose of charging duties. The primary resource for determining duty classifications is the two volume Harmonized Tarrif Schedule for the US or HTSUS, which is updated annually to reflect politically motivated protectionist campaigns to shield strategically crucial industries functioning within the United States from extinction. Import Specialists are divided into Commodity Teams (CTs) which are assigned specific types of goods to specialize in. For example: one team may be assigned vehicles, vehicle components and ball bearings and another may be assigned clothing, textiles and toys. Each CT is assigned a more senior Import Specialist whose job it is to train Import Specialists that are new to a particular Commodity Team. These individuals are usually defacto experts in the analysis of goods that they are assigned and are often called upon to physically inspect goods entering (or petitioning to enter) the United States. They are primarily enagaged in activities concerning Formal Enteries
which are handled by Customs Brokerage Houses, but they also provide assistance in Informal Enteries.
The other half of the United States Customs and Border Protection Service is the Office of Investigation or "OI." The Office of Investigation consists of specialized sections of Special Agents that are divided by common crimes regarding international affairs. Primary sections include Financial Crimes, Narcotics, Strategic, and Computer Forensics. The Office of Investigation also includes an Internal Affairs section that monitors and investigates allegations of misconduct and criminal activity within both the Office of Investigation and the Office of Field Operations.
USCustoms will have direct access the reservation databases of airlines based in the EU from 5 March 2003.
In effect USCustoms and other agencies will be able to place under surveillance all booked passengers details well prior to the flight taking off.
The European Commission says it accepts "the good faith of UScustoms" to respect the principles of the EC Data Protection Directive - but the USA has no data protection law and is not subject to EU law even though it will be "accessing PNR data in the territory of the Community".
As Newsarama readers will recall, the books, copies of the Stripburger anthology were seized by Customs in November after the agency claimed that two of the stories contained therein: Richie Bush by Peter Kuper, and Moj Stub (My Pole) by Bojan Redzic were of piratical nature, and infringed the copyrights of the respective owners.
Customs seized five copies of the issue with the Peanuts reference and fourteen copies of the issue containing "Richie Bush." The stories were both published in the middle of their respective issues and no graphics from either story appeared on the covers.
Though Customs had stated their reasons behind the seizure when the books were originally held, Brownstein told Newsarama that they offered no explanation upon their release.
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