here s a large industrial one for almost $5,000. reporter: the machines make pills to deceivingly accurate, even veteran agents have trouble telling the difference. the machines themselves are not illegal but buying them without proper registration is. the number of illegal imports has spiked 19 fold since 2011. you just put the product in here and then you turn it and then it shoots out. this was seized? this was seized, yes, and this machine came from china. reporter: cheryl davies leads the anti-terrorism contraband team at america s largest seaport in long beach, california. finding pill presses among millions of tons of goods is no small challenge. one container here is processed every 7.8 seconds. customs and border protection opened up its secret warehouse for cnn, showing us the seized pill press machines with