Immigration and Customs Enforcement has purchased records linked to immigrants' tax identification numbers from a commercial data broker, according to a $10 million contract reviewed by 404 Media in June 2026. The records target Individual Taxpayer Identification Numbers — ITINs — which the IRS gives to people without a Social Security Number, including those in the country illegally.

What Are These Numbers and Why Do They Matter?

ITINs let people file taxes and use the financial system even if they lack legal immigration status. The IRS created them to encourage tax compliance. Think of an ITIN as a number designed specifically to help people participate in the economy — not to track them.

Data brokers are companies that collect personal information — names, addresses, purchase histories — and sell it to government agencies and businesses. Here's the key issue: the government cannot legally collect certain personal information directly without a warrant or court order, but it can buy that same information from a private company. A data broker is a legal workaround to a constitutional protection.

ICE is using this loophole. The agency already receives immigrant tax information through official channels — in 2025, the IRS and Department of Homeland Security agreed to share data for criminal investigations. But according to Bloomberg Tax, the IRS gave ICE far more records than the agreement allowed. Buying tax records from a broker creates a second path to the same information, this time without the limits that the official agreement includes.

The Bigger Picture

This ITIN purchase is just one part of a larger system ICE has built using commercial data. Customs and Border Protection has used location data from online advertising networks to track where people go. Police departments have connected their software to a private company's network of AI-powered cameras that photograph license plates — and ICE can search that data. ICE also has a mobile app that can identify people on the spot.

ICE systems also use a Thomson Reuters product called CLEAR, which gathers public records and personal information in one searchable database. Together, these tools — advertising data, license plate cameras, business databases, identification apps, and now tax records — let ICE build detailed profiles and track individuals.

The Law's Missing Piece

The reason all of this is legal comes down to a gap in the law. The Fourth Amendment protects people from unreasonable searches — but only when the government does the searching. If the government buys information from a private company instead, the Fourth Amendment does not apply. Civil rights groups have asked Congress to close this loophole, and the House passed a bill in 2024 that would address it, but no law has been passed yet.

Each purchase ICE makes is technically legal on its own. But together, they create a surveillance system that would have been nearly impossible to build ten years ago. Back then, law enforcement would have needed court orders and permission from multiple agencies to access this much information. Now it is available for purchase.

The use of tax IDs adds a particular problem. The IRS created ITINs based on an implicit promise: people would not be targeted for using them. That promise is now in question.