Let’s take a look at some of the technology ICE is using to conduct its activities in the US.
Tangles and Webloc
Tangles is a monitoring tool that scrapes sites for posts and personal information. When ICE adds individuals to a watchlist, they are alerted whenever that person posts on social media. It can also be used with AI to tag keywords and analyze the sentiment of the post.
Webloc collects a phone’s location data and compiles a list of commonly visited areas, helping users to determine where that user lives and works. It works by accessing online advertising information for apps. If you have ever seen an ad while on social media or playing a game on your phone, you would potentially be at risk of this software accessing your location information.
When used together, these apps allow ICE to choose an area of interest on a digital map and gather all the location data of phones in the area with the tap of a button. This information is then used to track and identify individuals who were present in that area of interest.
ELITE
Palantir’s Enhanced Leads Identification & Targeting for Enforcement (ELITE) is an app that uses collected information to create a digital map of potential deportation targets. Each target comes with a detailed file containing information such as name, date of birth, immigration status, and a photo. This app also allows ICE agents to photograph or scan a person’s face and search the database for matches.
Individuals are not allowed to decline being photographed, and the photos can be stored for years, whether there is a match or not, according to a Department of Homeland Security document about the app.
Graphite
Developed by Paragon Solutions, an Israeli-founded company that makes spyware, Graphite is a hacking tool that can be used to monitor a phone, including encrypted messages. Once activated, this tool can take control of a person’s phone, providing unfiltered access to their location data, messages, photographs, and files. This includes information on encrypted applications like Signal and WhatsApp. Graphite can also be used to activate a phone’s recorder, thus acting as a listening device.
Stingray
A “cell-site simulator”. This tool basically acts as a fake cell tower and tricks a user’s phone into automatically connecting. Once connected, ICE agents can use the phone to track a user’s location. This tool can be used against everyone in a large area at the same time, regardless of whether the phone belongs to an ICE target or not.
ICE’s use of these tools violates Americans’ Fourth Amendment protections, allowing the agency to track and monitor citizens without their knowledge or permission. We live in a digital world, so it makes sense that the US Department of Homeland Security would do anything to keep up. But this type of technology is dangerous, and its easy use should alarm you. If the American public allows ICE agents to use this kind of technology freely, without opposition, there is nothing keeping Trump and his administration from weaponizing it against anyone who disagrees with him.
