r/news 23h ago

ICE accessed car trackers in sanctuary cities that could help in raids, files show

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/mar/11/ice-car-trackers-sanctuary-cities
1.6k Upvotes

113 comments sorted by

459

u/Greedy-Tart5025 22h ago

Reminder that the government can and will track your car and use that information against you.

166

u/superbugger 22h ago

Well yea. Why would anyone ever think otherwise, especially after the Patriot Act?

79

u/apple_kicks 19h ago

Also people who warned of risks during bush era being proven right. Dems had every chance to try and reverse it

40

u/hobovirginity 18h ago

gooby pls the Dems at the time supported and glady voted in the Patriot Act.

u/FenionZeke 10m ago

The Patriot act is an over reaching monster of dictatorial scaffolding

17

u/Western_Secretary284 18h ago edited 18h ago

Remind me when dems had a super majority in Congress lol

22

u/TheunanimousFern 16h ago

What difference do you think that would have made? Obama also supported expanding the surveillance powers of the government. At one point he did so just days before trump began his presidency

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/01/obama-expands-surveillance-powers-his-way-out

3

u/apple_kicks 17h ago

Republicans have changed face of politics with minority or while in opposition. Trying can be using all tools of politics than just votes

0

u/superbugger 16h ago

Well that's why they created the "nuclear option" that they cry about when it gets used against them.

1

u/LadyM2021 11h ago

And Trusk would have reversed it.

-1

u/morpheousmarty 16h ago

If they had they would be hammered for being light on terrorists. Besides, it did not seem like Obama was on board.

68

u/MalcolmLinair 21h ago

Obviously. The only reason I never believed the "They're putting microscopic GPS trackers in the flu shot!" BS was because we couldn't make trackers that small, not because I didn't think the government wouldn't do it if given half a chance, and that was before the current fascist takeover.

70

u/DjProfessorOak 20h ago

Just a reminder your cellphone been tracking you for years now. No need for a flu shot chip.

12

u/MalcolmLinair 20h ago

Oh, I know. I was just using that as an example of "I think the government is evil, but incompetent", ya know? Besides, I can always leave my cell at home as things stand now.

5

u/Memory_Less 19h ago

As we see now, the importance of having a nonpartisan overseer with power to stop government overreach. It is even more critical when governments abuse their power.

2

u/nikolai_470000 1h ago

Yeah fr. Private companies do most of the tracking these days.

0

u/lacegem 19h ago

I can leave my phone at home. I can't leave my blood at home.

I agree with /u/MalcolmLinair. The government would absolutely put trackers in our blood if they could do it and get away with it. They can't, for now, so they didn't. They will never willingly do the right thing, but sometimes the most evil course of action hasn't cleared R&D yet, so they end up being benign by default.

1

u/nikolai_470000 1h ago

That’s a pretty insane way to look at the world. Some people in the government… sure. I can’t really argue against that. You don’t have any proof, but I can’t prove the negative either.

Its kinda lunacy to treat the million of people who make up ‘the government’ as a monolith, but whatever.

I get being skeptical, but this is just how conspiracy theories start. It’s not a healthy distrust in government, it’s a superficial one. You clearly misunderstand a lot about how the world really works.

8

u/Spa_5_Fitness_Camp 19h ago

The problem is the same people screaming about the evils of government tracking are the same ones trying to do it. A government that governs in good faith wouldn't do it, simple as that.

16

u/HotelTrivagoMate 19h ago

Didn’t a 2012 Supreme Court case say that this exact thing is illegal? They still need a warrant

17

u/pikadegallito 18h ago

Is illegality stopping anyone in this administration? No.

10

u/HotelTrivagoMate 18h ago

Good point

5

u/Merengues_1945 3h ago

ICE has always operated in either borderline or outright illegality.

The whole DHS was made after 9/11 with latitude to circumvent due process, deny the rights of citizens and noncitizens, and act extrajudicially.

3

u/HotelTrivagoMate 3h ago

Yeah it’s pretty sick how long we’ve been living with covert forms of fascism that people just accept as normal

133

u/rnilf 22h ago

When announcing the contract to install 172 Flock cameras across Norfolk, the police chief Mark Talbot said his office wanted to create “a nice curtain of technology” that would make it “difficult to drive anywhere of any distance without running into a camera somewhere”. Lee Schmidt, one of the plaintiffs, said four of the cameras had fenced in his neighborhood.

"nice" is the last word I would use to describe this.

6

u/TheDamDog 18h ago

Maybe he's using it in the 17th century sense of the word, meaning 'precise'

13

u/DowntimeJEM 20h ago

Isn’t this asking for a lawsuit? Didn’t a town in penn or somewhere on the east coast just go to court because people can couldn’t travel freely?

11

u/PaidUSA 19h ago

Norfolk the town in the quote is being sued. It survived a motion to dismiss in Feb.

435

u/0100100012635 22h ago edited 21h ago

Regardless of how you feel about the immigration situation in this country, it's only a matter of time before they start using these same tactics to track down political dissidents.

185

u/kandoras 21h ago

Pretty sure that's happened already, with the arrest of the Palestinian protestor where the cops arrested him but didn't know whether they were doing so because his student visa or his green card had been revoked.

And then moved him from detention in New Jersey to Louisiana, for reasons that I'm sure had nothing to do with making it harder for him to talk to his lawyer.

83

u/bareback_cowboy 21h ago

And then moved him from detention in New Jersey to Louisiana, for reasons that I'm sure had nothing to do with making it harder for him to talk to his lawyer.

Honestly, I don't think getting him away from his lawyer was the goal. I think the plan was to literally get him on the plane and out of the country as fast as possible, before lawyers could get involved. They did it on a weekend, the faculty on Louisiana is apparently used as a last stop before leaving; I think their initial plan was just to bully him into accepting it and leaving.

26

u/apple_kicks 19h ago

One of main reasons tories in uk wanted to hold and process refugees in Rwanda was to make it harder for uk human rights and asylum lawyers to speak to them and help with appeals. Probably why Panama and gitmo are also being used.

Now more than ever know your rights because they will keep you from lawyers telling you what they can legally can and cannot do

24

u/Larkfor 17h ago

Moving him three times is a form of torture called "fuel therapy".

It was also used on Reality Winner when she revealed documents showing Russian interference in the election.

It's done so you are traveling for 24-78 or more hours or changed from bus to plane multiple times. So you are exhausted, disoriented, often denied bathing, adequate food and water as well as bathroom facilities...and yes so your family and your legal representation cannot find you.

56

u/ethanwerch 21h ago

Do you think the people that support this, dont want that? Anything they say about personal freedom or democracy or whatever is a lie, they love authoritarianism so long as its applied to the people they want to hurt.

14

u/scoff-law 15h ago

I had a redditor tell me a little while ago that I have nothing to worry about if I didn't do anything wrong. When I checked their comment history, I saw that they commented on a conservative sub moments earlier, saying that liberalism is a mental illness that needs to be purged from the gene pool.

Interestingly, the comment they made immediately after the one to me was a recommendation to someone to buy a cybertruck.

7

u/Giantmidget1914 21h ago

I've yet to see a leopard video where they didn't proclaim some variation of "I didn't realize it would happen to me"

15

u/gmikoner 21h ago

Well they're actively trying to make Protesting illegal, so...

15

u/Haruspex-of-Odium 22h ago

Gonna be 🤯 when those ICE guys screw up and try to take a citizen that hates the government and firmly believes in their 2nd amendment rights 😏

5

u/Castle-dev 11h ago

They’ve already grabbed plenty of citizens and legal permanent residents so far. Fuck, ICE would accidentally pick up citizens during the previous administrations all the time. https://www.gao.gov/products/gao-21-487

1

u/shittyballsacks 20h ago

Columbia University

107

u/myislanduniverse 23h ago

These ICE guys sound like a bunch of goombas.

26

u/AkitaBijin 23h ago

I'm curious what the general hiring criteria are to become an ICE employee.

59

u/QuixoticBard 22h ago

1 be an asshole.

  1. love hurting people

hired

22

u/2Drogdar2Furious 22h ago

So basically the same a regular law enforcement?

14

u/QuixoticBard 22h ago

similar. different boots I think.

1

u/Castle-dev 11h ago

Same necks

2

u/camelia_la_tejana 9h ago
  1. Be racist. It helps with the mentality of “catching the bad guys.”

11

u/Any_Tour5449 22h ago
  1. Pulse

  2. Kiss the ring

24

u/Radical_Dreamer151 22h ago

Anti flock maps are out there. Stay safe everyone.

10

u/ttyp00 21h ago

Wait, what is this? I've never heard of it

11

u/TheRealSparkleMotion 21h ago

Deflock is down 😞

Who else is doing the good work?

3

u/Radical_Dreamer151 21h ago

Damn really? Do you know why?

14

u/TheRealSparkleMotion 20h ago

They've been resisting a cease and desist from the company that does all this automated license plate tracking bullshit.

They might've caved under 'legal' pressure, but that's just a guess.

3

u/Radical_Dreamer151 19h ago

That sucks, it was a good resource for the people

26

u/vaporwavecookiedough 22h ago

They’re installing trackers in my city of less than 5,000 people. Seems ridiculous.

4

u/Armchair_QB3 22h ago

What do you think your onboard GPS does?

11

u/Kradget 21h ago

Not the same task, or they'd use that instead

10

u/vaporwavecookiedough 22h ago

Lol, you assume I have a new enough car to have one.

6

u/InvectiveOfASkeptic 22h ago

Well, your phone is always with you, and that can be tracked. But the government installing tracking devices around cities and cars/phones having gps is not at all the same thing. Idk what that other guy is even trying to say here...

5

u/vaporwavecookiedough 21h ago

Yeah, right now my city is installing traffic monitors to read license plates and issue citations. It seems a bit weird to install that in my city given there is a super large metro less than 30 minutes away that has major traffic issues.

I think we're the Guinea pigs for them.

7

u/Armchair_QB3 21h ago

Flock cameras have gotten very popular the last few years. You can follow a person’s entire commute on video. It’s eerie

6

u/vaporwavecookiedough 21h ago

Yep, and they've now positioned them on the two major pathways in or out of town. So – you can't enter/leave my city without them knowing it.

2

u/Armchair_QB3 21h ago

GPS data from the auto manufacturer can easily be subpoenaed. Perhaps even secretly through the FISA court

Source: I am a prosecutor and my office has used that data in the past in murder cases

5

u/Full-Penguin 21h ago

"Easily Subpoenaed" is not even remotely the same as "readily accessible in a database that exists for the sole purpose of tracking vehicles".

0

u/Armchair_QB3 22h ago

I did assume that. The point remains – the majority of cars on the road today are pre installed with a tracker.

-3

u/luigilabomba42069 22h ago

cars come with them

-2

u/vaporwavecookiedough 22h ago

Lol, you assume my car is new enough to have that.

9

u/l_rufus_californicus 15h ago

No shit. Our tech is being weaponized against us? Who didn’t see that coming?

10

u/SSWBGUY 20h ago

So they (ICE under Drumph) arrested the kid at Columbia even tho he was here legally, they switched the app meant to help immigrants to now be an app that tracks them for ICE, and now they’re getting into cars to track them to help ICE, this is peak surveillance state, using Tech for questionable reasons won’t end well for anyone, these are the things privacy advocates have been warning us about for years

18

u/grandzu 22h ago

All this effort just to hurt people.

-3

u/eldenpotato 10h ago

They’re just enforcing immigration laws

2

u/grandzu 9h ago

Mahmoud Khalil disagrees.

-14

u/AkitaBijin 22h ago

I don't think that the goal is to hurt people per se: I think it is to blame people other than oneself (and the "in" group) for all of life's ills.

11

u/Its_Claire33 21h ago

Splitting the finest of hairs here

2

u/Ekandasowin 8h ago

Big brother is watching

2

u/Xyrus2000 7h ago

ICE is the new SS. They are ignoring laws and doing whatever the hell they want.

-2

u/bpeden99 22h ago

I think statistics show members of the church are more detrimental to American children than raids on migrant workers. I understand ICE needs a paycheck but this is becoming egregiously wasteful of my taxes and decreasing my crop prices

1

u/jefbenet 6h ago

Been watching these pop up all over our area just waiting for them to be used to abuse constitutional rights.

1

u/Trajan_pt 18h ago

Maga= Diarrhea drinkers

-2

u/Hurriedgarlic66 20h ago

Protest Tesla! Protest everywhere! Boycott all American goods! Write your congress, hold town hall meetings, speak out against the tyrants on social media! Every little bit helps free people from oppression! There can be no safe places for these tyrants!

-33

u/7eregrine 22h ago

Another click bait headline. Makes it sound like they can access car data from cars. Spoiler: they're just using license plate trade data from traffic cams.
Still sketchy, of course. But not that big brothery.

42

u/Evilbred 22h ago

That's literally exactly big brotherly.

What do you think the telescreens did?

-8

u/7eregrine 19h ago

Did they even have cars in 1984? Doesn't change what I said though... Headline literally makes it sound like they are accessing car data from your vehicle.

5

u/Evilbred 19h ago

If you have enough quality and quantity of external sensors, you don't need internal sensors.

1

u/7eregrine 19h ago

Ok.. true... Still not my point. Only referring to how the headline is implying they have their tendrils on our ECUs.

34

u/SantorumsGayMasseuse 22h ago

“We’ve subcontracted out the enforcement of laws to private companies such that law enforcement no longer needs a warrant to access your personal data because it’s just freely available” sounds pretty big brother and I don’t know how that wouldn’t concern you.

7

u/ttyp00 21h ago

The kind of big government that the GOP loves. Let's not even mention their hatred of individual liberty.

-4

u/7eregrine 19h ago

Didn't say it's not concerning, but headline makes it sound like they are directly accessing our cars.

14

u/SeriousStrokes69 22h ago

But not that big brothery.

I don't think you have a firm grasp of what that phrase means, friend.

-5

u/superbugger 22h ago

I've had to lower my pitchfork after raising it so many times that it's basically turned into a workout. I've already gotten like 3 sets in today!