ICE Has Assembled a 'Surveillance Dragnet' with Facial Recognition and Data, Report Says
Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, "now operates as a domestic surveillance agency," according to a new report by Georgetown Law's Center on Privacy and Technology based on a two-year investigation.
The report details how, since the agency was established in post-9/11 legislation, ICE has moved beyond cooperating primarily with other law enforcement agencies to assemble an infrastructure that enables it to pull detailed information on Americans, immigrants and non-immigrants alike, with data from private data brokers and state and local governments.
ICE's "surveillance dragnet" also uses facial recognition, especially the scanning of driver's license photos for immigration enforcement, according to the report, which involved hundreds of Freedom of Information Act Requests and reviews of the agency's contracting and procurement records.
