January 17, 2007 (Revised)

ICE Compliance Enforcement Unit

The Compliance Enforcement Unit (CEU), an investigative component of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), is charged with tracking and pursuing foreign students, exchange visitors and other non-immigrant visitors who violate their immigration status. The CEU draws upon various government databases to gather and analyze leads on visitors to the United States, identify potential security or criminal threats, and ensure full compliance with immigration laws.

As the largest investigative arm in the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), ICE unites the functions, resources, and legal authorities of several previously fragmented border and security organizations into an integrated homeland security agency focused on investigations and enforcement. The ICE mission is to prevent terrorist and criminal acts by targeting the people, money, and materials that support terrorist and criminal networks.

How the CEU Works

The CEU develops leads on immigration violators by collecting and examining data from three key national databases:

• The U.S. Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology (US-VISIT) program, administered by DHS, verifies the identities of incoming visitors and ensures compliance with visa and immigration policies. US-VISIT collects travel information and biometric identifiers such as fingerprints to verify the identity of visitors to the United States upon their arrival and departure.
• The Student and Exchange Visitor Information System (SEVIS) is an Internet-based program, administered by ICE, that maintains data on roughly one million non-immigrant foreign students and exchange visitors during their stay in the United States. SEVIS was developed in 2002 to improve nationwide coordination and communication in monitoring student visa activity.
• The National Security Entry Exit Registration System (NSEERS) is a DHS administered registry of selected foreign visitors who, based upon country of origin or other intelligence-based criteria, may present an elevated national security concern.

Since its creation in June 2003, the CEU has reviewed more than 550,000 leads compiled from these databases. Of these leads, nearly 16,000 revealed potential violations of U.S. visa or immigration law and were immediately referred to ICE field offices for investigation. To date, these investigations have resulted in approximately 3,190 arrests.