There are various motivations to smuggle, most but not all of which are financial. These include the participation in illegal trade, such as drugs, illegal immigration or emigration, tax evasion, providing contraband to a prison inmate, or the theft of the item(s) being smuggled. Examples of non-financial motivations include bringing banned items past a security checkpoint (such as airline security) or the removal of classified documents from a government or corporate office.

Etymology

The word probably comes from the Proto-Germanic verb smeugan (Old Norse smjúga) = "to creep into a hole". Other sources say it comes from the word smooky (fog) which was used in West Flanders.

Smuggled goods and people

Much smuggling occurs when enterprising merchants attempt to supply demand for a good or service which is illegal. As a result, illegal drug trafficking, and the smuggling of weapons (illegal arms trade), as well as the historical staples of smuggling, alcohol and tobacco, are widespread. As the smuggler faces significant risk of civil and criminal penalties if caught with contraband, smugglers are able to impose a significant price premium on smuggled goods. The profits involved in smuggling goods appears to be extensive.

Profits also derive from avoiding taxes or levies on imported goods. For example, a smuggler might purchase a large quantity of cigarettes in a place with low taxes and smuggle them into a place with higher taxes, where they can be sold at a far higher margin than would otherwise be possible. It has been reported that smuggling one truckload of cigarettes within the United States can lead to a profit of US$2 million.

With regard to people smuggling, a distinction can be made between people smuggling as a service to those wanting to illegally migrate, and the involuntary trafficking of people. An estimated 90% of people who illegally crossed the border between Mexico and the United States are believed to have paid a smuggler to lead them across the border.

People smuggling can also be used to rescue a person from oppressive circumstances. For example, when the Southern United States allowed slavery, many slaves moved north via the Underground Railroad. Similarly, during The Holocaust, Jews were smuggled out of Germany by people such as Algoth Niska.

Smuggling methods

With regard to crossing borders we can distinguish concealment of the whole transport or concealment of just the smuggled goods:

• Avoiding border checks, such as by small ships, private airplanes, through overland smuggling routes, smuggling tunnels and even small submersibles. This also applies for illegally passing a border oneself, for illegal immigration or illegal emigration. In many parts of the world, particularly the Gulf of Mexico, the smuggling vessel of choice is the go-fast boat.
• Submitting to border checks with the goods or people hidden in a vehicle or between (other) merchandise, or the goods hidden in lugguage, in or under clothes, inside the body (see body cavity search, balloon swallower and mule (smuggling)), etc. Many smugglers fly on regularly scheduled airlines. A large number of suspected smugglers are caught each year by customs worldwide. Goods and people are also smuggled across seas hidden in containers, and overland hidden in cars, trucks, and trains. A related topic is illegally passing a border oneself as a stowaway. The high level of duty levied on alcohol and tobacco in Britain has led to large-scale smuggling from France to the UK through the Channel Tunnel.
• The combination of acknowledged corruption at the border and high import tarrifs led smugglers in the 1970s and ‘80s to fly electronic equipment such as stereos and televisions in cargo planes from one country to clandestine landing strips in another, thereby curcumventing encounters at the frontier between countries.