ICE Wants to Build Out a 24/7 Social Media Surveillance Team
Published by WIRED
A source is testimony, not proof. Citing one is a provenance fact — it records who said what, where — and never a verification that the claim is true.
Who is named
The characters and things this document talks about — 29 in alls. Each links to everything else the record knows about them.
Organisations 14
Paragon Electronic Privacy Information Center Biden White House The Intercept ICE Paragon Solutions American Civil Liberties Union Clearview AI reddit.com Palantir Technologies Trump Administration Babel Street YouTube 404 Media
Claims made
Every claim in this document. Firsthand = asserted on its own basis; secondhand = recounted from elsewhere, carrying no independent weight.
-
Immigration and Customs Enforcement has awarded Clearview AI a $9.2 million sole-source contract for facial recognition against a database of tens of billions of internet-scraped images and BI2 Technologies successive contracts totaling more than $29 million for mobile iris scanners and access to a private five-million-record iris database.
-
ICE awarded Paragon Solutions Graphite spyware capable of remote phone access.
Parallel awards cover Paragon Solutions Graphite spyware capable of remote phone access and PenLink tools that aggregate real-time commercial location data from hundreds of millions of devices without warrants.
-
The initiative is still at the request‑for‑information stage.
The initiative is still at the request‑for‑information stage, a step agencies use to gauge interest from contractors before an official bidding process.
-
Draft planning documents show the scheme is ambitious: ICE wants a contractor capable of staffing the centers around the clock, constantly processing cases on tight deadlines, and supplying the agency with the latest and greatest subscription‑based surveillance software.
-
The National Criminal Analysis and Targeting Center sits in Williston, Vermont.
The National Criminal Analysis and Targeting Center sits in Williston, Vermont.
-
The Pacific Enforcement Response Center is based in Santa Ana, California.
The Pacific Enforcement Response Center, based in Santa Ana, California, oversees the western region and is designed to run 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
-
Vermont would see a team of a dozen contractors, including a program manager and 10 analysts.
Vermont would see a team of a dozen contractors, including a program manager and 10 analysts.
-
California would host a larger, nonstop watch floor with 16 staff.
At all times, at least one senior analyst and three researchers would be on duty at the Santa Ana site.
-
The scope of information contractors are expected to collect is broad. Draft instructions specify open‑source intelligence: public posts, photos, and messages on platforms from Facebook to Reddit to TikTok.
-
Contractors would have access to commercial databases LexisNexis Accurint and Thomson Reuters CLEAR.
They would also be armed with powerful commercial databases such as LexisNexis Accurint and Thomson Reuters CLEAR, which knit together property records, phone bills, utilities, vehicle registrations, and other personal details into searchable files.
-
Urgent cases, such as suspected national security threats or people on ICE’s Top Ten Most Wanted list, must be researched within 30 minutes.
High‑priority cases get one hour; lower‑priority leads must be completed within the workday.
-
ICE expects at least three‑quarters of all cases to meet those deadlines, with top contractors hitting closer to 95 percent.
-
ICE did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
ICE did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
-
Earlier this year, The Intercept revealed that ICE had floated plans for a system that could automatically scan social media for “negative sentiment” toward the agency and flag users thought to show a “proclivity for violence.”
-
Procurement records previously reviewed by 404 Media identified software used by the agency to build dossiers on flagged individuals, compiling personal details, family links, and even using facial recognition to connect images across the web.
-
ICE’s main investigative database, built by Palantir Technologies, already uses algorithmic analysis to filter huge populations and generate leads.
-
Planning documents say some restrictions are necessary to head off abuse. Contractors are barred from creating fake profiles, interacting with people online, or storing personal data on their own networks. All analysis must remain on ICE servers.
-
The Biden White House quickly froze the deal under an executive order restricting spyware use.
The Biden White House quickly froze the deal under an executive order restricting spyware use
-
ICE reactivated the Paragon contract in August 2025 under the Trump administration.
but ICE reactivated it in August 2025 under the Trump administration.
-
Last month, 404 Media filed a freedom of information lawsuit demanding ICE release the contract and related records, citing widespread concern that the tool could be used to target immigrants, journalists, and activists.
-
The Electronic Privacy Information Center has similarly sued ICE, calling its reliance on data brokers a “significant threat to privacy and liberty.”
-
The American Civil Liberties Union has argued that buying bulk datasets—such as smartphone location trails gathered from ordinary apps—helps ICE sidestep warrant requirements and helps it pull in vast amounts of data with no clear link to its enforcement mandate.
-
In 2020 and 2021, ICE bought access to ShadowDragon’s SocialNet, a tool that aggregates data from more than 200 social networks and services into searchable maps of a person’s connections.
-
Around the same time, the agency contracted with Babel Street for Locate X, which supplies location histories from ordinary smartphone apps, letting investigators reconstruct people’s movements without a warrant.
-
ICE also adopted LexisNexis Accurint, used by agents to look up addresses, vehicles, and associates.
ICE also adopted LexisNexis Accurint, used by agents to look up addresses, vehicles, and associates, though the scale of spending on that service is unclear.
-
ICE argues it needs these tools to modernize enforcement.
ICE argues it needs these tools to modernize enforcement.
-
Privacy advocates warn that any surveillance that starts as a method of capturing immigrants could soon be deployed for ulterior purposes.
-
ICE is seeking private vendors to run a multiyear surveillance program out of two targeting centers.
Federal contracting records reviewed by WIRED show that the agency is seeking private vendors to run a multiyear surveillance program out of two of its little‑known targeting centers.
-
ICE’s proposal to track “negative sentiment” is a clear example of how the agency’s threat monitoring bleeds into the policing of dissent.
-
The program envisions stationing nearly 30 private analysts at Immigration and Customs Enforcement facilities in Vermont and Southern California.
No claims match this filter.
Questions it bears on
Open questions this document's claims are offered as answers to.
Syndication
Who is repeating whom. This is shown as structure, and it is the reason a chorus never moves a belief bar: forty tellings of one assertion are still one.
- possibly restates 50-plus military spouses, parents detained in immigration crackdown unconfirmed
What it cost
Reading this document into the graph cost $0.03.
30 claims in all. Content fingerprint fdd76049eda0… —
the document's text itself is not republished here; follow the link above to read it at
its source.