Apple said Thursday it is removing an app that allows users to share information about sightings of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, which the head of ICE had criticized.
ICEBlock was removed from Apple’s App Store along with other apps like it, Apple said.
“We created the App Store to be a safe and trusted place to discover apps,” Apple said. “Based on information we’ve received from law enforcement about the safety risks associated with ICEBlock, we have removed it and similar apps from the App Store.”
Trump administration officials have complained about assaults and threats to ICE agents, among them that they face being “doxxed,” a term that means personal information is shared online.
ICEBlock does not involve the sharing of personal information about agents, but it notifies people within a 5-mile radius of sightings.
The app was launched in April, around three months after President Donald Trump was inaugurated following a campaign in which he vowed to crack down on people in the country without legal authorization. Downloads took off in June, the month immigration raids were launched in Los Angeles.
Fox Business, which first reported that the app had been pulled Thursday, reported that Justice Department officials asked Apple to remove ICEBlock at the direction of Attorney General Pam Bondi.
The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment from NBC News.
Bondi said in a statement to Fox Business, “We reached out to Apple today demanding they remove the ICEBlock app from their App Store — and Apple did so.”
Bondi told the news outlet that “ICEBlock is designed to put ICE agents at risk just for doing their jobs.”
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt and acting ICE Director Todd M. Lyons also criticized the app in July.
A message seeking comment from ICEBlock’s founder or others affiliated with the app, which was sent through its website, was not immediately returned Thursday night.
The app is being removed a little more than a week after a 29-year-old Texas man, Joshua Jahn, opened fire on people at a Dallas ICE facility sally port, killing two detainees and then himself. No ICE agents were injured.
After the shooting, Marcos Charles, the ICE field office director of enforcement and removal operations, said Jahn used ICE tracking apps. He did not say which ones.
There have been more than 1 million downloads of the ICEBlock app, according to app tracking firm Appfigures. Downloads took off in June, according to the firm.
Google told NBC News that it also removed similar apps from the app store for Android devices, although ICEBlock was never available on the Google Play store.
That month, ICE ramped up immigration raids in Los Angeles. Demonstrators protested the raids, and some downtown stores were looted. The Trump administration sent the National Guard to the city without a request from California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a controversial move that critics called political theater and an attempt to intimidate and terrorize residents.
A federal judge ruled Sept. 2 that the deployment of National Guard personnel and Marines to Los Angeles was illegal. U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer in San Francisco ruled that it violated a 19th century law that prohibits the use of soldiers for civilian law enforcement activities.
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