<\/p>\n
During the height<\/span> of President Donald Trump\u2019s winter immigration enforcement surge in Minneapolis, a new AI-driven \u201calien\u201d targeting app appeared on the phones of U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement deportation officers.<\/p>\n Created by tech giant Palantir, a CIA-backed firm known for data mining<\/a> and using artificial intelligence for everything from warfighting to \u201cpredictive policing<\/a>,\u201d <\/strong>the ELITE app helps ICE target immigrants and issues a \u201cconfidence score\u201d for how accurate the information on a target is. The app analyzes data<\/a> from government agencies and other sources, producing dossiers on targets, compiling them into lists, and mapping their locations.<\/p>\n The debut of ELITE \u2014 Enhanced Lead Identification and Targeting \u2014 came just as ICE added over 12,000 employees<\/a>\u00a0through an expedited hiring surge<\/a>, placing a badge and a gun in the hands of new recruits in record time, thanks to cuts to ICE\u2019s training curriculum<\/a>.<\/p>\n Thousands of the new ICE hires, then, were able to hit the streets without cleared background checks, according to reporting<\/a> by Reuters in early 2026.<\/p>\n \u201cSome of these guys should\u2019ve never been hired, let alone have access to the information on ELITE.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n The hiring spree at ICE\u2019s Enforcement and Removal Operations division, coupled with the powerful new handheld technology of the ELITE app, created potential civil liberties nightmares and threats to national security, according to ICE whistleblowers, former Department of Homeland Security officials, and legal experts who spoke to The Intercept.<\/p>\n \u201cNo one should have been hired by DHS before background reviews were completed. This never happened in previous administrations,\u201d said Mary Ellen Callahan, former chief of staff to the deputy secretary of Homeland Security. \u201cFurthermore, giving the newly hired ICE ERO staff access to sensitive databases such as ELITE threatens public safety by allowing non-vetted teams to access and potentially misuse data.\u201d<\/p>\n The ELITE app, Callahan said, did not go through the usual process government tools undergo to prevent abuses and ensure privacy rights.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s one of the first applications they give new officers so they can start working,\u201d said one ICE deportation officer who came through the hiring surge. \u201cYou can access it without full background clearance.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSome of these guys should\u2019ve never been hired, let alone have access to the information on ELITE,\u201d the officer, who asked for anonymity to protect their livelihood, told The Intercept.<\/p>\n Every ICE deportation officer is issued a phone, where the ELITE app comes standard, according to five ICE officials who spoke to The Intercept. (Neither the Department of Homeland Security nor Palantir responded to requests for comment.)<\/p>\n The five ICE officials, who each work in different regions across the country, said deportation officers without completed background checks continue to work in all their jurisdictions, some of whom were hired nearly a year ago.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n ELITE\u2019s user guide<\/a> identifies a dozen distinct sources that the app draws from. The databases include sensitive data sets like addresses, criminal histories, immigration records, court rulings, and other personal information about both immigrants and U.S. citizens.<\/p>\n Much of that information would constitute what the government calls PII, or personally identifiable information. According to a Department of Homeland Security document<\/a> that catalogs the agency\u2019s use of artificial intelligence, the ELITE app does involve PII.<\/p>\n A 2002 law, however, says that government agencies must conduct and publish the findings of a \u201cprivacy impact assessment\u201d for \u201call new or substantially changed technology that collects, maintains, or disseminates personally identifiable information (PII),\u201d according to a Justice Department summary<\/a> of the statute.<\/p>\n The processes are designed to assess how technology affects personal privacy and outline what safeguards are in place to ensure accountability if systems are misused.<\/p>\n \u201cYou can access it without full background clearance.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n Yet the Department of Homeland Security privacy office hasn\u2019t published an assessment for ELITE, according to Callahan, the former Homeland Security official, who also served as the department\u2019s chief privacy officer.<\/p>\n \u201cThe DHS privacy office should have worked with ICE to publish a privacy impact assessment,\u201d said Callahan, noting a general lack of productivity by the privacy office. \u201cIn fact, the DHS privacy office has only published one PIA all year. In comparison, I published 228 PIAs in my three-and-a-half years as privacy officer.\u201d<\/p>\n The failure to conduct a privacy impact assessment has a profound impact on transparency and accountability, the very aspects of privacy policy the E-Government Act of 2002 was intended to regulate.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is not a technicality,\u201d said Clare Garvie, a privacy lawyer and deputy director of technology policy at the New York University Law School\u2019s Policing Project. \u201cPIAs are an essential component of transparency and privacy governance, they are how the public understands what information is collected about us, how long it is kept, who can use it, and what remedies exist if it is wrong or subject to misuse.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIf ICE can\u2019t fulfill this prerequisite,\u201d Garvie said, \u201cI lack confidence in its ability to use the tool in a lawful, privacy-protective manner in the field.\u201d<\/p>\n\n
No Privacy Assessment<\/strong><\/h2>\n
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