U.S. Immigration Authorities Are Adding Children’s DNA To a Criminal Database

New reports offer more insight on the extent of the U.S.'s biometric surveillance of immigrants. As if the regular detainment of children isn’t bad enough, documents show that U.S. immigration authorities are adding their DNA to a criminal database. In less than five years, the U.S. has collected DNA samples from over 130,000 minors, including children as young as four. Since 2020, the US Customs and Border Patrol has ramped up its contributions to the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS) overseen by the Federal Bureau of Investigations. CODIS stores DNA profiles from convicted offenders, unsolved crime scenes, and missing persons cases for local, state, and federal law enforcement use. The actual, physical DNA samples are stored indefinitely by the federal government. Excluding forensic ones, CODIS currently has 23 million DNA profiles, and as many as 133,539 of them belong to detained children and teenagers, according to documents reviewed by Wired. According to Wired’s report, CBP c ... Read full article.