Why a developer created this app to alert ICE sightings

[bnew]

https://www.cnn.com/2025/06/30/business/video/iceblock-app-immigration-duffy-digvid

Why a developer created this app to alert ICE sightings

Joshua Aaron, a musician and developer, created an app called ICEBlock, where people can post sightings of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers across the country. CNN's Clare Duffy speaks to Aaron about what motivated him to create the application and the efforts he has made to keep it accurate and prevent it from identifying users.

Why this developer created an app to alert ICE sightings


https://inv.nadeko.net/watch?v=EuKiq2ioUNo

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Description

Spoiler

Joshua Aaron, a musician and developer, created an app called ICEBlock, where people can post sightings of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers across the country.

CNN's Clare Duffy speaks to Aaron about what motivated him to create the application and the efforts he has made to keep it accurate and prevent it from identifying users.

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Transcripts

Show transcript

 

[bnew]

Kristi Noem responds to ICEBlock app: 'Obstruction of justice'

The secretary of Homeland Security said that the app, which warns people of where ICE officers are operating, could encourage attacks against government agents.

www.newsweek.com

Kristi Noem Responds to ICEBlock App: 'Obstruction of Justice'​

Today at nullToday at null

Kristi Noem Confirms ICE Has Detained Family Members Of Mohamed Soliman

By Theo Burman

Live News Reporter

Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem has criticized an app that enables users to track the locations of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, branding it an "obstruction of justice."

Noem issued a statement on X, formerly Twitter, after the creator of the ICEBlock app, which uses an anonymous reporting system to maintain a real-time map of ICE activity, described its purpose as helping people avoid contact with ICE officers.

"This sure looks like obstruction of justice," she wrote. "Our brave ICE law enforcement face a 500% increase in assaults against them. If you obstruct or assault our law enforcement, we will hunt you down and you will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law."

U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem delivers remarks at the Palacio Nacional de la Cultura in Guatemala City, Guatemala, on June 26, 2025.Getty Images

The app's creator, Joshua Aaron, told CNN that he did not want anyone to use the app to target ICE officers, and that it was designed to help people "avoid them altogether if they want."

Newsweek contacted Aaron and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) via email for more information on the legality of the app.

Why It Matters​

The ICEBlock app's emergence highlights growing tensions over U.S. immigration enforcement as the Trump administration intensifies deportation efforts across major cities.

The DHS says assaults on ICE agents have risen more than 500 percent in the past year, a statistic cited by both Noem and ICE Acting Director Todd Lyons.

What To Know​

The app, known as ICEBlock, launched in April and now has tens of thousands of users. It is designed to crowdsource sightings of ICE agents, allowing users to mark agent locations on a map with optional notes such as vehicle descriptions or uniforms. Other users within a five-mile radius receive alerts.

Aaron told CNN that he developed the app in response to what he described as a frightening increase in immigration raids.

"We're literally watching history repeat itself," Aaron said, likening the government's actions to Nazi Germany. "When I saw what was happening in this country, I wanted to do something to fight back."

The ICEBlock app is currently only available on iOS, in part because of the app's privacy infrastructure. Aaron told CNN the platform collects no user data—no IP addresses, device IDs or geolocation beyond sighting proximity—to protect those who use it.

"This is 100 percent anonymous and free for anybody who wants to use it," he said.

White House officials have accused CNN of "sabotaging" federal operations through its coverage of ICEBlock.

Aaron has denied encouraging any interference with ICE actions, noting the app's explicit warning that it is for notification only and not for inciting violence.

What People Are Saying​

ICE Acting Director Todd Lyons said in a statement given to Newsweek: "CNN's promotion of an 'ICE spotting' app is reckless and irresponsible."

"Advertising an app that basically paints a target on federal law enforcement officers' backs is sickening. My officers and agents are already facing a 500% increase in assaults, and going on live television to announce an app that lets anyone zero in on their locations is like inviting violence against them with a national megaphone.

"CNN is willfully endangering the lives of officers who put their lives on the line every day and enabling dangerous criminal aliens to evade U.S. law. Is this simply reckless 'journalism' or overt activism?"

Newsweek reached out to CNN via email for comment.

A statement on the ICEBlock app tells users: "Please note that the use of this app is for information and notification purposes only. It is not to be used for the purposes of inciting violence or interfering with law enforcement."

Stephen Miller, a White House deputy chief of staff, said in a post on X: "CNN is openly helping invaders and insurrectionists sabotage ICE."

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Monday: "Certainly it's unacceptable that a major network would promote such an app that is encouraging violence against law enforcement officers who are trying to keep our country safe."

What Happens Next​

Noem's language suggests the administration may explore prosecutions for aiding or abetting interference with law enforcement duties.

Update 7/1/25, 9:31 a.m. ET: This article has been updated with a statement from Todd Lyons.

 

[bnew]

Trump Team Has Full Meltdown Over CNN Story on ICE-Tracking App

Attorney General Pam Bondi said she was looking into the app’s creator.

newrepublic.com

Edith Olmsted/

July 1, 2025/10:23 a.m. ET

Trump Team Has Full Meltdown Over CNN Story on ICE-Tracking App​

Attorney General Pam Bondi said she was looking into the app’s creator.​

Mehmet Eser/AFP/Getty Images

Donald Trump’s sycophants are seriously pissed that people are trying to track ICE’s sweeping deportation efforts.

CNN aired a segment Monday night highlighting ICEBlock, an app that allows users to anonymously log sightings of ICE agents, serving as an “early warning system” about immigration enforcement, according to app creator Joshua Aaron. Users can provide additional information about what ICE officers are wearing, and details about their vehicles, to make their communities aware of ICE’s movements.

One by one, members of Trump’s team hit back at the report, touting the dubiously increasing rates of assault against ICE agents and threatening Aaron with legal action.

Attorney General Pam Bondi claimed during an appearance on Fox News’s Hannity that the government was investigating Aaron, and fretted that the app might “hurt” law enforcement officers.

“He’s giving a message to criminals where our federal officers are, and he cannot do that, and we are looking at it, we are looking at him, and he better watch out,” Bondi said. “Because that is not protected speech, that is threatening the lives of our law enforcement officers throughout this country, and shame on CNN!”

Crucially, the majority of people swept up in ICE’s sweeping raids aren’t criminals at all. Seven out of 10 people arrested during ICE’s crackdown in Los Angeles last month had no criminal convictions, and six out of 10 had never even been charged with a crime.

ICE acting Director Todd Lyons released a statement following CNN’s report, claiming that ICEBlock “basically paints a target on federal law enforcement officers’ backs” and touting the number of alleged assaults against ICE agents.

Border czar Tom Homan also railed against CNN for elevating the app. “This is horrendous that a national media outlet would be out there trying to forecast law enforcement operations throughout the country,” Homan said. “It’s incredible where we’re at as a country, and I think the [Department of Justice] needs to look at this and see if they crossed a line.”

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said that the app “sure looks like obstruction of justice” in an X post Monday. “If you obstruct or assault our law enforcement, we will hunt you down and you will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” she wrote.

CNN hit back at the implication that they’d crossed a legal line by reporting on ICEBlock. “This is an app that is publicly available to any iPhone user who wants to download it. There is nothing illegal about reporting the existence of this or any other app, nor does such reporting constitute promotion or other endorsement of the app by CNN,” a CNN spokesperson said in a statement to The New Republic.

This story has been updated.

 

[bnew]

Spoiler: text

Commented on Tue Jul 1 17:36:38 2025 UTC

‎ICEBlock

For the curious

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│ Commented on Tue Jul 1 17:45:06 2025 UTC
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│ Going to download just to have it show better in the App Store
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│ │ Commented on Tue Jul 1 17:56:32 2025 UTC
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│ │ dude on apples store it’s #1 for social networking lmao. i love to see it.
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[bnew]

Spoiler: text

Commented on Tue Jul 1 17:36:38 2025 UTC

‎ICEBlock

For the curious

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│ Commented on Tue Jul 1 17:50:57 2025 UTC
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│ Great app, hope its on Android
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│ │ Commented on Tue Jul 1 18:11:43 2025 UTC
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│ │ It's not until they can figure out a work around.
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│ │ "Additionally, no data from users is captured or stored by the app, providing an extra layer of anonymity. This, unfortunately, is the reason that the app is exclusive to the Apple App Store, as an Android version would require a device ID registration in order to send push notifications. Attempting to maintain the app's anonymous approach would cause a problem with Android notifications."
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│ │ Read More: What Is The ICEBlock App & How Does It Work? - SlashGear
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[Richard Glidewell]

Kudos to that person........

 

[The Pledge]

Same reason someone would make Adblock. I salute it

 

[bnew]

Spoiler: text

Commented on Tue Jul 1 14:51:24 2025 UTC

Sorry, this is protected speech under the 1st amendment. That's why police haven't been able to stop Google and Waze from allowing users to mark traffic stops.

Edit: Just for the record, no, I don't believe it matters to this admin.

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│ Commented on Tue Jul 1 15:21:50 2025 UTC
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│ The claim that simply tracking the actions of public officials is “threatening their lives” is also completely absurd. Setting aside the CNN story, even, it's ridiculous to suggest that simply tracking government actions is, unto itself, a threat to public officials. Are the apps that identify speedtraps "threatening the lives" of police officers? Of course not. It's basic public accountability.
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│ │ Commented on Tue Jul 1 15:24:24 2025 UTC
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│ │ Why would they feel threatened? Its almost as if once you break a Law, you get the feeling you aren't protected by the Law.
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│ │ │ Commented on Tue Jul 1 15:41:51 2025 UTC
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│ │ │ It's almost like they know they are awful people that anyone who understood them would want to spit in their burrito.
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│ │ │ │ Commented on Tue Jul 1 16:22:49 2025 UTC
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│ │ │ │ It’s almost like they wear masks because they know that if people could identify them, they could be publicly named and shamed for disappearing people off the streets.
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│ │ │ │ │ Commented on Tue Jul 1 17:25:07 2025 UTC
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│ │ │ │ │ It's like that woman yelling at neo-nazis wearing masks.
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│ │ │ │ │ "I don't wear a mask! I'm not scared! You don't want people to know who you are because you know you're wrong! Take that off and say this is what I stand for if you think you're right. But you won't because you're a sack of fat out of breath marching in the hopes that someone gives you a handout!"
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│ │ │ │ │ DEA officers in some operations, SWAT Police as well, it's for their families safety, and I can get that, as some people really don't fk around with repercussions when their workers are removed. That's entirely removed from what these people are doing.
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│ │ │ │ │ But if it's just a lawful stop and detainment, why hide? Why deflect? Why say 'We don't have to show you anything?'
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│ │ │ │ │ And now we've got so many Proud Boys (should be ashamed boys) and Oath Keepers (their oaths are antithetical to our ideals) as 'bounty hunters' supplementing ICE, since honestly some really refuse to do this horrible work.
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│ │ │ │ │ │ Commented on Tue Jul 1 17:47:47 2025 UTC
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│ │ │ │ │ │ SWAT Police as well, it's for their families safety
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│ │ │ │ │ │ As an aside, more people should know that LAPD invented SWAT in order to fukk with the Black Panthers. They even used a tank in their first attack.
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│ │ │ │ │ │ 50 years ago, SWAT raided the L.A. Black Panthers. It's been targeting Black communities ever since
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│ │ │ │ │ │ Yes, the Panthers were armed and certainly might be dangerous if provoked. But that hadn’t stopped the LAPD from detaining or arresting any number of them over the preceding several months. There were no hostages at 41st and Central Avenue, and the Panthers weren’t barricaded in. The wanted members had to leave the building at some point, where waiting officers could arrest them.
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│ │ │ │ │ │ Across the country at the time, police antipathy toward the Panthers was rising, in part fueled by dirty tricks from the FBI’s conintelpro unit. As McKinley, who participated in the raid, said: “We had to take them out.”
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│ │ │ │ │ │ The Panther raid also has to be looked at in the context of the department’s racial history. Until just a few years before the raid, the LAPD had been headed by William Parker, who once complained during a television news interview that an influx of African Americans moving to L.A. to escape the Jim Crow South had “flooded a community that wasn’t prepared to meet them. We didn’t ask these people to come here.” For most of his tenure he refused to hire black officers to police their own communities and instead sought white recruits from across the country.
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│ │ │ │ │ │ In its Panther deployment, SWAT was transformed from a tool of surgical precision into a blunt-force battering ram, and that’s ultimately how it would find its calling in police departments across the country — especially in African American communities.
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[bnew]

Spoiler: text

Commented on Tue Jul 1 14:42:25 2025 UTC

It seems like normally this would be a slam dunk 1st amendment case but with this SCOTUS who knows?

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│ Commented on Tue Jul 1 14:59:13 2025 UTC
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│ The SC gave away the game last week.
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│ The constitution is irrelevant in American life now.
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│ │ Commented on Tue Jul 1 15:14:36 2025 UTC
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│ │ https://media.discordapp.net/attach...460e81a1fafd9d&=&format=webp&quality=lossless
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[Silver Surfer]

 

[bnew]

ICE-Tracking App Skyrockets in Popularity After Trump Team Freaks Out

ICEBlock, an app that alerts users to nearby ICE presence, has launched to the top of the App Store.

newrepublic.com

Robert McCoy/

July 1, 2025/4:59 p.m. ET

ICE-Tracking App Skyrockets in Popularity After Trump Team Freaks Out​

ICEBlock, an app that alerts users to nearby ICE presence, has launched to the top of the App Store.​

archive | archive.is | view archive​

Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images

Federal agents detain a woman at her hearing in immigration court.

Trump officials got a lesson in the Streisand effect—whereby attempts to suppress information only circulate it further—as their outrage over ICEBlock, a free iPhone app that monitors the activity of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, propelled the app to the top of Apple’s App Store on Tuesday.

On Monday, CNN published an article about ICEBlock, which anonymously crowdsources information about ICE agent sightings in order to create an “early warning system,” according to the app’s developer, Joshua Aaron. Users have turned to ICEBlock as fear grips communities where federal immigration enforcement has ramped up operations in recent months, often led by agents conducting arrests and raids in masks and plain clothes.

In a Monday night Fox News appearance, Attorney General Pam Bondi chastised CNN for its reporting and

twstalker | archive.org(save) | archive.is | archive.is(X) | nitter | xcancel | xcancel(save) against Aaron, saying, “He’s giving a message to criminals where our federal officers are, and he cannot do that, and we are looking at it, we are looking at him, and he better watch out, because that is not protected speech, that is threatening the lives of our law enforcement officers throughout this country.”

The app also drew condemnations from Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, ICE acting Director Todd Lyons, and Trump border czar Tom Homan.

By Tuesday morning, ICEBlock had rocketed to the top of the App Store charts, becoming the #1 free app in the marketplace’s social networking category. It remains in that top social networking slot as of this writing on Tuesday afternoon, and it also appears to have more than tripled its user base: While the CNN story published Monday stated that the app had more than 20,000 users, Aaron on Tuesday afternoon posted that it now boasts over 70,000.

Thanking the app’s users, Aaron wrote, “I am so incredibly grateful that this little idea has become so popular. All I wanted to do was help protect people and #resist this downward spiral to authoritarianism.”

 

[CopiousX]

Yeah he's obviously going to be arrested for obstructing justice. It reminds me of those apps that tell you when there's a police checkpoint or a speed trap on the road and the municipality sues

 

[benjamin]

get merked for creating an app, crehs

 

[bnew]

Yeah he's obviously going to be arrested for obstructing justice. It reminds me of those apps that tell you when there's a police checkpoint or a speed trap on the road and the municipality sues

those apps still exist even on google maps and waze.

 

[xCivicx]

Kudos to that person........

Why do you say that?