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Peter Thiel’s data-mining firm could help Trump vet and deport immigrants
BGR ^ | December 22, 2016 | Jacob Siegal

Posted on 12/22/2016 1:03:59 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet

While policy wasn’t exactly the primary focus of Trump’s campaign, he did make several direct promises to the American people while he was running for president. One of the most common refrains was that he would overhaul the vetting process and deport millions of undocumented immigrants, but without providing any specifics, many of his critics understandably questioned his ability to accomplish this goal.

Trump’s promises might have been empty ones, but newly released documents show that Palantir—the data-mining technology firm founded by Trump transition team member (and Gawker public enemy number one) Peter Thiel—has been secretly helping US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) by building and operating a system called the Analytical Framework for Intelligence (AFI) that tracks and analyzes immigrants.

According to the documents, the AFI has access to information from federal, state and local law enforcement databases, which includes names, addresses, known associates, all the way down to scars and tattoos.

Other law enforcement agencies can gain access to the AFI, including the Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) office of Enforcement and Removal Operations, which happens to be the group responsible for deporting undocumented immigrants and immigrants have who committed crimes.

Everything you just read might still be under wraps had the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) not gotten its hands on the documents through a lawsuit. While much of the information within the documents has been redacted, there are dozens of references to Thiel’s startup throughout, making it clear that the company is heavily involved in the process of identifying and analyzing immigrants and visitors to the US.

“AFI generates risk assessments for travellers,” John Tran, an attorney with EPIC involved in the lawsuit, told The Verge. “But we don’t know how the scores are being generated and what the factors are. What if there’s an error? Users should have an opportunity to correct the error, users should have an opportunity to understand what goes into generating the score.”

Whether or not Trump’s plans to instate a “Muslim registry” or mass deport millions of immigrants ever come to fruition remains to be seen, but it’s now clear that has the means to get the ball rolling, at the very least.


TOPICS: Computers/Internet; Government
KEYWORDS: aliens; deportation; illegals; thiel; trump

1 posted on 12/22/2016 1:03:59 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

or set up Prayer Rooms and arrest whoever shows up


2 posted on 12/22/2016 1:14:17 PM PST by butlerweave
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Immigrants are people who applied in their home country to be Americans, paid their fees, learned the language, waited their turn and complied with the laws. No one is going to deport them unless they commit serious crimes.

Illegal aliens are not immigrants and all of them should be deported.


3 posted on 12/22/2016 1:22:58 PM PST by Lurkinanloomin (Natural Born Citizen Means Born Here Of Citizen Parents)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Illegals have phones, transfer money, pay bills, rent apartments, and drive vehicles. It is laughable to claim it eould be difficult to find illegals.


4 posted on 12/22/2016 1:56:04 PM PST by Vince Ferrer
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

WONDERFUL!!!!!


5 posted on 12/22/2016 1:57:42 PM PST by WashingtonSource
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

“...policy wasn’t exactly the primary focus of Trump’s campaign...”

Yet another idiot blogger speaks from the exhaust end of his alimentary canal.

Dummy, his policies are precisely what got him elected.


6 posted on 12/22/2016 2:12:18 PM PST by Windflier (Pitchforks and torches ripen on the vine. Left too long, they become black rifles.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Whether or not Trump’s plans to instate a “Muslim registry” or mass deport millions of immigrants ever come to fruition remains to be seen, but it’s now clear that has the means to get the ball rolling, at the very least.

Trump never had plans for a "Muslim Registry". This was 'fake news' put out based on an interview from 2015. The interviewer kept ASKING Trump if he would do something like this, and Trump never said anything about it. Of course, the news read that a muslim registry was discussed in the interview, but the only one discussing it was the interviewer.

7 posted on 12/23/2016 2:31:10 PM PST by SuziQ
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