The Pulse
ICE Seeks AI to Analyze Detainees’ Calls, Messages and Video
ICE posted a request for information on October 9 for an AI system that could analyze detainees’ calls, messages, video visits and facility camera footage. The proposed system would build voice profiles, link contacts and movement records,
AI.info Team · Written with AI ·
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement posted a request for information on October 9 seeking an AI-powered system to analyze calls, messages, video visits and camera footage from detention facilities. The proposal would connect communications to voice profiles, movement records and investigative files, giving analysts a way to search across information ICE says staff cannot manually correlate in time. The agency has not announced a contract award: the SAM.gov notice is an early-stage request for information, not a purchase commitment.
ICE wants voice profiles and relationship maps
The draft work statement describes a shared database that would link detainees’ calls and messages with video visits, camera events, housing assignments and movement records. It could build voice profiles from calls ICE has already recorded, without requiring detainees to provide a separate voice sample. Analysts could then see contacts and activities on a timeline or relationship map, while software scans communications for slang, “coded language” and phrases appearing more often than usual.
The proposed system could flag a call when the voice does not match the detainee associated with the account. It could also compare the person answering with a profile associated with the number dialed, potentially bringing relatives and other people outside detention into the analysis. The draft allows vendors to offer identity enrichment using public or commercial data, but says ICE would need to authorize that use. Those capabilities are proposals in the draft, not evidence that ICE has deployed them.
Camera alerts would cover distress as well as security
For facility video, the statement describes alerts for fights, self-harm and signs of distress, along with activity it labels “isolation or withdrawal,” “unusual congregation” and “unusual movement or interaction.” The system would also connect records of who interacts with whom over time. Project Salt Box, which reviewed the accompanying work statement, notes that the document does not explain whether alerts about distress could also be used for security or discipline, or how detainees and family members could challenge an incorrect voice match.
The draft calls for a human to review the system’s findings and says those findings cannot be the sole basis for enforcement or punishment. It also points to ICE contract language barring certain uses to predict a person’s future behavior or emotional state when that could lead to discriminatory or unlawful action. The safeguards do not answer every question about how alerts would be handled or how errors could be corrected.
The October deadlines mark a market-research stage
ICE says questions from potential vendors are due October 16, 2026, and responses are due October 26. Those dates belong to the information-gathering process; the notice does not name a selected supplier, announce a budget or set out a deployment date. A request for information lets the agency assess what vendors can offer, and the scope could change or lead to no purchase.
ICE already monitors some detainee calls, while calls about legal matters receive separate protections. The proposed system would broaden the analysis by connecting communications with voice recognition, facility video and records of detainees’ movements. In comments to The Washington Sun, FWD.us president Todd Schulte said, “It’s basically bringing AI into the game of superpowering ICE even more.”
Human review leaves questions about mistakes
Steven Hubbard, a senior data scientist at the American Immigration Council, told The Washington Sun that biometric errors could become difficult to trace once entered into the system. The concern is not limited to a mistaken voice match: the proposal would assemble call content, identity signals and movement information into linked profiles, including information about people who are not detained. ICE’s draft sets human review as a condition, but does not describe a process for those people to learn about or contest a mistaken match.
For now, the concrete next step is vendor feedback, with responses due October 26. ICE has described a possible system; it has not shown that the system exists or that it will buy one.