The Expanding Use of Technology to Manage Migration
by Marti Flacks, Erol Yayboke, Lauren Burke, and Anastasia Strouboulis
PHOTO CREDIT: KTSDesign/AdobeStock
The Expanding Use of Technology to Manage Migration
U.S & EU Use Case Studies from Central America and West and North Africa
As home, transit, and destination country governments expand their use of migration management technology, stronger guardrails against its misuse are necessary. Through two case studies of migration, this report analyzes the use of migration management technologies by origin countries, the growing influence of destination countries over their decisionmaking, and the human rights risks associated with these uses.
Executive Summary
Seeking to manage growing flows of migrants, the United States and European Union have dramatically expanded their engagement with migration origin and transit countries, including in providing and supporting the deployment of sophisticated technology to understand, monitor, and influence the movement of people across borders.
In recent years, the U.S. government has deployed a host of tools and resources to address the unprecedented immigration situation on the southern U.S. border, including the deployment of new technologies. The U.S. government is encouraging migrants, for example, to use the CBP One app to file paperwork from their home countries—seeking authorization in advance for parole in the United States for certain eligible populations— rather than applying upon arrival. U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) have deployed drones and utilized cell phone data to track and analyze the movement of people across borders, as well as people already in the United States, and have dramatically expanded collection of information about travelers both to and from the United States.
Countries in Europe have also increasingly utilized technology to address the volume of migrants seeking to enter their countries. Frontex, also known as the European Border and Coast Guard Agency, relies heavily on data collection from EU member states and non-EU partners, organizations, and open sources and has established third-country partnerships, such as the Africa-Frontex Intelligence Community, to monitor irregular migration and human smuggling. Frontex also routinely deploys surveillance airplanes and drones for real-time monitoring of land and sea borders and provides assistance to EU member states in their own operations, which it is able to do remotely. At the same time, the European Union has launched eu-LISA—the European Union Agency for the Operational Management of Large-Scale IT Systems in the Area of Freedom, Security and Justice—which is meant to increase the interoperability of the European Union’s security, border, and migration management systems.
Importantly, these efforts do not end at the borders of the United States or the European Union. Both have increasingly exported migration management technologies to their neighbors, including some of the major migration origin countries, expanding the spheres of U.S. and EU interest to include the movement of people within their respective regions. In some cases, migrants are tracked long before they arrive at their ultimate destination.
Through two case studies of migration—(1) toward the United States from Central America and (2) toward Europe from West and North Africa—this report analyzes the use and exportation of migration management technologies by origin countries, as well as their motivations in doing so, including the growing influence of destination countries. It then assesses the human rights risks associated with these uses and provides recommendations for origin, transit, and destination governments as well as businesses supplying technology for migration management.