Cambridge, MA – Workers in the technology sector have organized in recent weeks to compel the companies they work for to drop controversial projects, part of a growing movement dubbed “The New Tech Resistance”. In June, Google engineers organized to close the Project Maven contract, a Pentagon AI drone program. Similar organizing efforts at companies like Amazon, Microsoft and Salesforce have started especially against support contracts for the controversial Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency within the Department of Homeland Security.

A panel on July 11th at MIT’s Stata Center (room 32-155) is addressing “where this moment of mobilization came from and how we can help it grow.” Unicorn Riot is streaming the event at 7PM eastern time.

[Link to video recording of event]

Panelists:

• Sasha Costanza-Chock is a scholar, activist, media-maker and currently Associate Professor of Civic Media at MIT; they are also an author of a recent open letter calling on Microsoft to drop their ICE contract.
• Kade Crockford is the director of the Technology for Liberty program at the ACLU of Massachusetts and MIT Media Lab Director’s Fellow.
• Valeria Do Vale is the Lead Coordinator at the Student Immigrant Movement and an undergraduate at Northeastern University.

Panel moderator is Ben Tarnoff, a tech worker, Guardian columnist, and founding editor of Logic magazine.

The panel is co-hosted by Tech Workers Coalition, ACLU Massachusetts, Science for the People, and Radius. [Facebook event link]

During 2018 Unicorn Riot has been releasing internal ICE/Homeland Security Investigations policy handbooks in the #Icebreaker series. Check our reports to gain insight into ICE’s internal organization and patterns of activity.

#Icebreaker Series - Unicorn Riot series on ICE policy manuals

• Icebreaker Pt 1 – Secret Homeland Security ICE/HSI Manual for Stripping US Citizenship (Feb. 14, 2018)
• Icebreaker Pt 2 – Confidential Homeland Security Asset Forfeiture and Search and Seizure Handbooks (Feb. 22, 2018)
• Icebreaker Pt 3 – Confidential Homeland Security Fugitive and Compliance Enforcement Handbooks (Feb. 28, 2018)
• Icebreaker Pt 4 – Homeland Security Special Agent On-the-Job Training Manual (Apr. 27, 2018)
• Icebreaker Pt 5 – Confidential Homeland Security Undercover Operations Handbook (Jun. 22, 2018)
• Icebreaker Pt 6 – Leaked ICE Special Response Team Handbook for Planning and Executing Armed Raids (Sept. 18, 2019)
• Icebreaker Pt 7 - ICE Case Management Handbook Based on Federal Law Enforcement "System of Systems” (Dec. 13, 2019)
• Icebreaker Pt 8 – Leaked ICE Handbooks for T and U Visa Application Investigations (Dec. 18, 2019)
• Icebreaker Pt 9 – Leaked Interrogation and Arrest ICE Manuals (Jan. 1, 2020)
• Icebreaker Pt 10 – Leaked ICE Agent Private Bill and Commercial Trade Fraud Investigation Handbooks (Jan. 4, 2020)
• Icebreaker Pt 11 – Bush/Clinton Era Customs Investigators Manuals (Feb. 13, 2020)

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