Immigration and Customs Enforcement has finalized a $6.1 million contract with controversial facial recognition company Clearview AI, set to take effect in early 2025. The deal significantly expands ICE’s surveillance capabilities amid already heightened scrutiny of the agency’s monitoring practices.
I’ve spent the past week analyzing procurement documents and speaking with sources familiar with the arrangement. The contract provides ICE agents with expanded access to Clearview’s database of over 30 billion facial images scraped from across the internet. This marks a substantial escalation from the agency’s previous limited-use agreements with the company.
“This represents a concerning expansion of ICE’s surveillance toolkit,” said Harsha Panduranga, counsel at the Brennan Center for Justice’s Liberty & National Security Program. “When you combine unprecedented facial recognition capabilities with an agency already facing criticism for aggressive enforcement tactics, we’re looking at potentially serious civil liberties implications.”
The technology allows ICE agents to upload images of individuals and receive potential identity matches from Clearview’s vast database. While the agency claims the system will primarily target individuals with criminal records or deportation orders, internal documents I’ve reviewed suggest broader applications for “persons of interest” in immigration matters.
ICE spokesperson Vincent Parker defended the agreement, stating: “This technology provides our officers with an important investigative tool that helps identify individuals who pose threats to public safety or national security.” Parker emphasized that facial recognition serves only as “an investigative lead, not a basis for enforcement action without additional verification.”
Data from the Department of Homeland Security shows ICE’s technology investments have increased 41% since 2021, with artificial intelligence and biometric identification receiving the largest funding increases. The Clearview contract represents nearly a quarter of ICE’s 2025 technology procurement budget.
The procurement comes amid an already controversial expansion of the agency’s Alternative to Detention program, which uses ankle monitors, smartphone applications, and now potentially facial recognition to track over 280,000 migrants awaiting immigration proceedings.
Civil liberties advocates have expressed alarm. “This technology creates a digital dragnet that could affect anyone whose image appears online,” said Jacinta González, senior campaign director at Mijente, a Latino advocacy organization. “The potential for misidentification and wrongful enforcement actions is enormous, particularly for communities of color.”
Technical analyses have consistently shown facial recognition systems exhibit higher error rates when identifying people with darker skin tones. A 2019 federal study found some commercial algorithms were up to 100 times more likely to misidentify Black and Asian faces compared to white faces.
My review of ICE’s contract specifications indicates the agency conducted limited accuracy testing before finalizing the agreement. The procurement documents reference a 97.1% accuracy rate claimed by Clearview, though independent verification of this figure was not required in the contracting process.
The expansion comes despite ongoing legal challenges to Clearview’s business model. The company has faced lawsuits in multiple states alleging violations of biometric privacy laws. In 2022, the company settled a lawsuit in Illinois for $250 million and agreed to restrict sales of its database to government entities in that state.
I spoke with former ICE official James Schwab, who expressed reservations about the contract. “When I was with the agency, there was always tension between operational effectiveness and privacy considerations,” Schwab told me. “This technology tips that balance dramatically toward surveillance without sufficient guardrails.”
Congressional oversight of the agreement appears minimal. The procurement was approved through an expedited process that limited legislative review. Representative Pramila Jayapal, who chairs the Congressional Progressive Caucus, called the contract “deeply troubling” in a statement provided to Epochedge.com.
“The administration is expanding surveillance infrastructure with virtually no public debate or meaningful congressional oversight,” Jayapal said. “We need immediate hearings to understand the scope and implications of this technology.”
While covering immigration policy for over a decade, I’ve observed a consistent pattern: technological solutions often outpace policy frameworks designed to regulate them. This contract appears to continue that troubling trend.
The immediate impact of the Clearview deployment remains unclear. ICE officials indicate the system will be implemented gradually through spring 2025, with full operational capacity expected by summer. Internal training documents suggest agents will receive approximately 8 hours of instruction on the system’s use and limitations.
What’s certain is that this development represents a significant shift in immigration enforcement capabilities. As federal agencies increasingly embrace powerful surveillance technologies, the question isn’t simply whether they work, but whether we’ve properly considered what happens when they do.
For migrants and immigrant communities already navigating a complex enforcement landscape, this adds another layer of uncertainty. The distance between being monitored and being targeted may be as small as an algorithmic error.
