ICE accidentally posted identities of 6,000 asylum seekers to agency website

• The information was posted Monday morning while the agency was performing routine updates. Federal regulation dictates that the personal information of asylum seekers be kept confidential.
• Immigrant advocacy group Human Rights First first flagged the data breach to ICE, per an agency official.

What they're saying: "Upon notification, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement took swift action to immediately rectify the error," the agency said in a statement.

• "Though unintentional, this release of information is a breach of policy and the agency is investigating the incident and taking all corrective actions necessary. ICE is notifying noncitizens impacted by the disclosure."

Worth noting: The government plans to contact people who downloaded the information to ask them to delete it, the official said.

• ICE is also placing high-interest notice alerts on impacted immigrants to ensure the agency does not take further action before determining if the disclosure affects their protection claim.

The big picture: With ICE ramping up efforts to track migrants, immigration advocates and civil rights groups have warned against the misuse or abuse of data, emphasizing the stakes for people fleeing persecution.

• "Any breach of asylum seeker information in such a public way could quite literally have life or death consequences and the government must take every precaution to protect their safety," Blaine Bookey, the legal director at the Center for Gender & Refugee Studies at the UC Hastings College of the Law in San Francisco, told the Times.