Maryland Legislators Mull Warrant Requirement for ICE’s Biometric Searches

Legislators in Maryland are considering a proposed bill that would require Immigration and Customs Enforcement to obtain a warrant before using facial recognition to scan the Maryland Image Repository System, or MIRS.

The legislation, Senate Bill 649, was prompted by revelations that ICE had conducted numerous searches of the state’s MIRS using facial recognition technology in an effort to track down undocumented immigrants.

As VentureBeat reports, Maryland first starting issuing driver’s licenses to immigrants in 2013, at least partly under the public safety rationale of ensuring that everyone on the road has gone through the same standard licensing process. ICE’s searches of the MIRS, which includes driver’s license photos, is cause for concern among state officials and legal advocates who argue that it erodes immigrants’ trust and amounts to a ‘bait and switch’ in which illegal immigrants are punished for obtaining legal driver’s licenses.

With those concerns in mind, Bill 649 was specifically designed to deny ICE warrantless access to the records, while excluding other Department of Homeland Security agencies like the TSA and Customs and Border Protection from the legislation.

Nevertheless, at least one senator has expressed concern about provoking retaliation from the federal government by enacting legislation that restricts cooperation with a federal agency, and has requested input from Maryland’s Attorney General.

A report from The Washington Post last summer revealed that ICE had been using facial recognition to scan DMV records in at least Utah and Vermont, both of which grant driver’s licenses to undocumented immigrants. Before that, a 2016 report from the Government Accountability Office revealed that the FBI had been collecting face images from multiple databases including DMV and passport records.

Source: VentureBeat

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March 3, 2020 – by Alex Perala