Did You Know You Had a LexID? No. Worth Checking Maybe
April 22, 2021
With ICE’s contract with Thomson Reuters’ CLEAR expiring, The Intercept reports, “LexisNexis to Provide Giant Database of Personal Information to ICE.” Apparently the company could not resist the $16.8 million contract despite downplaying its ties to the agency in the past. Once focused on providing data to legal researchers and law firms, reduced sales compelled LexisNexis to branch into serving law enforcement. The firm will be supplying Homeland Security agents with billions of records that aggregate data from sources both public and private, like credit histories, bankruptcy records, license plate photos, and cell phone subscriber info. Naturally, these profiles also come with analytics tools. Reporter Sam Biddle writes:
“It’s hard to wrap one’s head around the enormity of the dossiers LexisNexis creates about citizens and undocumented persons alike. While you can at least attempt to use countermeasures against surveillance technologies like facial recognition or phone tracking, it’s exceedingly difficult to participate in modern society without generating computerized records of the sort that LexisNexis obtains and packages for resale. The company’s databases offer an oceanic computerized view of a person’s existence; by consolidating records of where you’ve lived, where you’ve worked, what you’ve purchased, your debts, run-ins with the law, family members, driving history, and thousands of other types of breadcrumbs, even people particularly diligent about their privacy can be identified and tracked through this sort of digital mosaic. LexisNexis has gone even further than merely aggregating all this data: The company claims it holds 283 million distinct individual dossiers of 99.99% accuracy tied to ‘LexIDs,’ unique identification codes that make pulling all the material collected about a person that much easier. For an undocumented immigrant in the United States, the hazard of such a database is clear.”
Biddle notes that both LexisNexis and Thomson Reuters are official data partners of Palantir, which insists it is not, itself, a data company. It is, however, a crucial partner to law enforcement agencies at all levels across the US, as well as the security departments at several corporations. The firm supplies its clients, including ICE, with huge datasets, analysis tools, and consultants to help organizations track anyone of interest. Despite these partnerships, both Thomson Reuters and LexisNexis have largely escaped the controversy that has surrounded Palantir.
Biddle has trouble reconciling LexisNexis’ new contract with its insistence it is actually on the side of detainees because it supplies them with access to an e-library of legal materials. For its part, the firm takes pains to note the contract complies with President Biden’s Executive Order 13993, which revised immigration enforcement policies and DHS interim guidelines. We are reminded, though, that despite the new occupant of the Oval Office, those running ICE remain the same. It is their hands into which this astounding trove of personal data is being delivered.
Cynthia Murrell, April 22, 2021
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