As U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents have swarmed cities across the United States, American politics has appeared to enter a new phase, one in which armed federal forces turn civilian neighborhoods into active conflict zones. Part of what is driving this political shift is a potent technical infrastructure: ICE operations are now expedited by mobile surveillance and targeting systems, where agents’ most powerful weapon can fit in the palm of their hands.
Recent reporting has revealed ICE is relying on at least two applications to guide its crackdown. The first is ELITE (Enhanced Leads Identification & Targeting for Enforcement), a new geospatial system built by the data analytics firm Palantir for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and designed for use on smartphones and tablets. ELITE “populates a map with deportation targets, brings up a dossier on each person, and provides a ‘confidence score’ on the person’s current address,” according to a user manual published late last month.
The second is Mobile Fortify, a facial recognition application manufactured by the biometrics company NEC that allows immigration enforcement officers to identify both citizens and undocumented migrants. ICE and other DHS agents have reportedly photographed and scanned the faces of Americans in cities like Minneapolis and Chicago — images that are cross-checked with biometric databases, compiled into dossiers, and stored for up to 15 years.