Immigrants Sue US Over Surveillance Program
Immigrant advocates and legal groups say the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency is collecting personal through their controversial alternative to detention program.
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Immigrant advocates and legal groups, including Just Futures Law, Mijente Support Committee and Community Justice Exchange, have filed a lawsuit against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency to obtain information about the data the agency is collecting on migrants surveilled through their controversial alternative to detention program (ATD), reports The Guardian. In January there were more than 182,600 people in the program, up 60,000 from six months prior, with more than 200,000 people in ATD today.
BI Inc, a subsidiary of the Geo Group, the largest prison corporation in the US, helps ICE keep tabs on more than 200,000 migrants in the US using ankle monitors as well as voice recognition, and a facial recognition app called Smartlink. The company’s privacy policy, and status as a private company, allows them to withhold a majority of information on what the company does with the biometric and location data it collects through its app. The groups who filed suit sought information about the types of data BI collects through its app including “location data, video footage, voice recording, biometric data, information about the mobile network, and/or any other data about the mobile device or its uses” as well as the length of time this information is stored.
