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Of all the things that give me pause about ICE's draft ERO ONE statement of work, a section titled "Network, Link, and Relationship Analysis" is the most eyebrow-raising. I spent close to 20 years as an intel analyst. Here's what section 4.6 says and means, paragraph by paragraph.

"Network analysis" is intel parlance for mapping how people connect. Who someone lives with, works with, travels with, and talks to. Paragraph 1 tasks contractors with assessing relationships among "individuals, organizations, locations, events, activities, data points, and other entities."

Paragraph 2 is pattern-of-life analysis. "Areas of convergence" and "temporal or geographic connections" mean: where does a person go, when, and who else is there. How does a person spend their days? That last part is how this analysis generates new names and potential targets of interest.

What information are they working from? The statement of work never says. It refers only to "authorized sources." It does say the work environment may involve "classified national security information." That's a strange line to find in a law enforcement contract.

Remember, ERO is not part of the intelligence community, though ICE has lobbied for years to join. Meanwhile it's been buying up the inputs. Our reporting over the past year has tracked ICE purchases of Palantir systems, trucks that can spoof a cell signal and pull data off phones, and more.

It bears remembering that ICE's description of the work in this document is vague for a reason. A statement of work like this is a public document. You don't put sources, methods, or procedures in one. A lot is left to be read between the lines. Read the doc for yourself here.