Biometric Tech Used against Immigrant Communities

Meet Eddie:

ICE has taken face scanning and fingerprinting on the road to conduct raids and surveil immigrants. The “EDDIE” app is a large component of implementing ICE’s vision of immigration enforcement through militarized police and surveillance technologies. The following report, “ICE’s EDDIE Program: How ICE Uses Biometric Scanner Tech to Ramp Up Raids,” was prepared by Mijente and Just Futures Law after a multi-year investigation and lawsuit against ICE and DHS under the Freedom of Information Act. 

EDDIE, which stands for “EAGLE Directed Identification Environment,” is a little known ICE program developed to capture the biometrics information of individuals that ICE encounters, questions, and detains in raids. Using EDDIE and a smartphone, ICE agents capture biometric data of those that it detains such as face and fingerprint information. Then, it stores and crosschecks the biometric information in federal and local government databases.

WHAT IS EDDIE?

MORE RESOURCES

Press Release: Report Exposes Hyper Surveillance Biometric Technology Used By ICE To Target Immigrant Communities (November 23, 2020). Download 

EDDIE Know Your Rights Summary. Download 

EDDIE Documents Released by FOIA. Learn More 

Comments of Just Futures Law and National Immigration Law Center on Proposed Rulemaking, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Dept. of Homeland Security, Collection and Use of Biometrics by USCIS, October 13, 2020. Download