Brown Leads Oversight Letter to DHS on ICE’s Troubling Mass Surveillance Tech

Washington, DC – Congresswoman Shontel Brown (OH-11), has led a letter with Oversight Committee colleagues demanding answers regarding the Department of Homeland Security’s use of powerful surveillance tools to collect and analyze cellphone location data across entire neighborhoods. 

Reports indicate that DHS and ICE have acquired various surveillance tools that can track every cell phone in certain communities, which it has used to – among other objectives – intimidate legal observers and peaceful protestors. 

Brown serves as Ranking Member on the Committee on Oversight’s Cybersecurity, Information Technology, and Government Innovation Subcommittee. The letter is signed by 12 members. Brown’s letter was sent to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem earlier today. 

“Trump’s ICE has been a public safety and civil rights disaster, and now we have heard reports of tools that could enable dragnet digital surveillance of entire communities,” said Congresswoman Brown. “Technology that can map where people live, work, worship, seek medical care, or attend protests demands the highest level of legal scrutiny, not secrecy and silence. DHS must immediately explain its legal authority and its privacy safeguards. Mass location tracking without a warrant should alarm every American, regardless of party. I do not trust this Department to police itself when it comes to sensitive personal data, and Congress will not look the other way.”

In October 2025, Rep. Brown led a separate letter with Reps. Summer Lee and Yassamin Ansari demanding information regarding ICE’s use of Paragon Solutions, a spyware company capable of covertly accessing private data on Americans’ cell phones without their knowledge or consent. 

The letter is cosigned by Rep. Yassamin Ansari, Rep. Greg Casar, Rep. Jasmine Crockett, Rep. Ro Khanna, Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, Rep. Stephen Lynch, Rep. Dave Min, Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton, Rep. Emily Randall, Rep. Lateefah Simon, Rep. Rashida Tlaib, and Rep. James Walkinshaw. 

The text of the letter is as follows: 

February 19, 2026

The Honorable Kristi Noem 

Secretary 

Department of Homeland Security 

2707 Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue, 

SE Washington, DC 20528                        

Dear Secretary Noem:                                                                                          

We write as members of Congress concerned about recent reports that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has acquired surveillance tools from Penlink designed to collect and analyze cellphone location data across entire neighborhoods.^[1] Mass surveillance of entire communities or city blocks raises serious questions about data privacy and potential violations of civil liberties.

Penlink reportedly collects cellphone location data and allows users to search this data to understand which cellphones were in certain locations at certain times and what other locations those cellphone users have visited.^[2] Location data can reveal intimate details of a person’s life, including where they live, work, worship, go to school, or seek medical care. DHS could use these tools to identify individuals for targeting based solely on their presence in certain locations, without a warrant or probable cause and regardless of their citizenship or residency status. The indiscriminate collection of such data poses significant risks to privacy and civil liberties, particularly as federal agents are reportedly identifying and tracking individuals observing the actions of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).^[3] As the ACLU recently declared, “This is a very dangerous tool in the hands of an out-of-control agency.”^[4]

DHS’s acquisition of Penlink’s surveillance technology comes shortly after DHS awarded a contract with the foreign spyware company Paragon, which operates a software that can reportedly gain full access to all information on a mobile device without the device owner’s knowledge or consent. Using this technology, DHS can potentially access encrypted applications, the phone’s location data, and messages and photographs saved to the phone.^[5] The continued acquisition of such spyware technology suggests DHS is relying on mass data collection techniques that the Department can use without cell phone users’ knowledge and which may operate outside of constitutional guardrails. 

Americans should be able to trust their government to uphold the Constitution and respect fundamental rights. Instead, DHS appears to be engaging in broad surveillance practices to monitor entire communities, violating Americans’ basic civil rights and civil liberties to punish dissent and advance the President’s cruel and unconstitutional mass deportation agenda.

Given these serious implications, I ask that you provide a briefing for committee staff on the following topics by March 5th,  2026:

1. Internal DHS communications and messaging regarding DHS acquisition of location-based electronics surveillance, including Penlink and other technologies that monitor electronic devices via location data;

2. Any legal justification DHS has identified that would justify mass electronic surveillance of individuals without a judicial or administrative warrant; 

3. How DHS intends to store, use, and dispose of data collected through the Penlink system; and

4. Who will be granted access to data collected using Penlink technologies, the processes for granting access, and the process for monitoring for any abuses of such access. 

The Committee on Oversight and Government Reform is the principal oversight committee of the House of Representatives and has broad authority to investigate “any matter” at “any time” under House Rule X.  If you have any questions about this request, please contact Committee Democratic staff at (202) 225-5051. Thank you for your prompt attention to this request.

Sincerely,

[Signatures]