Marketplace Tech · Monday, August 31, 2026
The DHS's DNA collection program reportedly includes individuals lawfully applying for asylum and children as young as four, despite agency statements suggesting it only applies to those 14 and above. This practice is being challenged as lacking proper checks and a valid purpose.
“In the immigration context, the only precondition for DHS to take someone's DNA is that someone be detained. And there's really no definition of what it means for someone to be detained. Here, we're seeing people who are lawfully applying for asylum. People who are following all the rules to like come into the country and ask for refuge. Those people are all getting their DNA taken.”
“So basically, the government is searching people and seizing their most intimate information without checks and without a proper purpose.”
“But they have said that that's the limit. That we won't take DNA from people under 14. But time and again, we've shown through their own records that they're taking DNA from children, children as young as four, five, six.”