MONTREAL—The U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency says a Canadian man shouldn’t credit his iPad for helping him enter their country.

The agency responded Wednesday to the case of Martin Reisch — a Montrealer who says he used a scanned copy of his passport and a regular driver’s licence to cross into the U.S.

“The assertion that a traveller was admitted into the U.S. using solely a scanned image of his passport on an iPad is categorically false,” Jenny Burke, a spokeswoman for U.S. Customs, said in a statement.

“In this case, the individual had both a driver’s licence and birth certificate, which the CBP (U.S. Customs) officer used to determine identity and citizenship in order to admit the traveller into the country.”

Reisch, however, has said he only handed the officer his iPad and driver’s licence — and nothing else.

Burke said border guards will not determine someone’s identification from scanned or digital copies of passports or any other form of documentation compliant with the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative.

The Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative is a program that has imposed tougher entrance requirements in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the U.S. Tighter border-documentation rules have been in place for Canadians since 2009.

The documents accepted under the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative include a passport, an enhanced driver’s licence or a trusted traveller card, such as the Nexus pass.

Still, Burke said a Canadian traveller can cross the 49th parallel, by land or sea, without presenting one of those documents.

But there are no guarantees.

“If a traveller does not present WHTI-compliant documents, CBP officers must determine identity and citizenship using a variety of other means, or deny entry,” Burke said.

Reisch said he was about a 30-minute drive from the Vermont border last Friday when he realized he had left his passport at home — a two-hour journey in the opposite direction.

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He quickly remembered that a digital image of his passport was stored on his iPad and decided to head for the U.S. border anyway.

Reisch said the agent took his computer tablet and the driver’s licence into the border office for about five minutes before allowing him to continue into the U.S.