DOGE is the Most Comprehensive Domestic Surveillance System in History

Narativ has pieced together DOGE's plan to build a powerful, interconnected data infrastructure across the US government will track your every move in real time.

This is part five of our multi-part investigation: The New Feudalism: Read Part 1 here, Part 2 here, Part 3 here, and Part 4 here.

The Digital Cage Being Built Around You

The USCIS Data Lake is not a real lake – it's a cloud-based database created for the US Customs and Immigration Service within the Department of Homeland Security. It's the central nervous system of a surveillance apparatus being assembled piece by piece – not with concrete walls and steel bars, but with code, databases, and facial recognition.

Based on extensive reporting from WIRED, court filings, and whistleblower testimony, DOGE is rapidly building a powerful, interconnected data infrastructure across the US government, utilizing advanced technologies and potentially granting unprecedented access to sensitive personal information.

It is the most comprehensive domestic surveillance system in history.

This part of Doge’s mission is being slapped together by four members of Elon Musk’s Goon Squad - Edward Coristine, Kyle Schutt, Aram Moghaddassi, and Payton Rehling. The under 25-year olds have gained access to the USCIS systems – and are meticulously connecting databases that were deliberately kept separate to protect privacy and civil liberties - into the most elaborate spying system ever imagined. Their work isn't merely about "efficiency" – it's about giving the select few data about everything about everyone, all the time.

At the core of thew Data Lake project is Databricks – a platform that allows for data warehousing, real-time data processing, and machine learning – enables large-scale data integration and analysis, aligning with DOGE's stated goals. The fast sweep of DOGE through Treasury, Social Security and the IRS has already integrated much of this data, meaning the privacy rights you take for granted are already being eroded.

But that is only part of what's coming. In another corner of DOGE’s mission something far more sinister is coming.

Clearview AI: The Eyes of the System

At another DHS branch ICE has been actively using Clearview AI, a controversial facial recognition system that has scraped billions of images from social media and public websites. ICE agents have conducted over 8,000 searches using this technology, which can identify individuals in photos, surveillance footage, and public spaces.

This facial recognition isn’t explicitly being added the USCIS Data Lake yet but it’s easy to see how the integration is on the roadmap. The end result will be a system that doesn't just monitor your digital footprints but can identify and track you physically in real time. Your face becomes your permanent ID, searchable against a database containing:

• Your Social Security information from the Numident database

• Your tax records and financial history from the IRS

• Your voting history from state voter rolls

• Your immigration status and history from USCIS

• Your biometric data from government ID systems

• Your social media footprint via Clearview AI

The integration of all this data creates a surveillance apparatus that can:

1. Identify you on the street through facial recognition

2. Pull up your entire government record instantly and your voting history

3. Track your real-time location through your IP address

4. Instantly analyze your your social media and search activity

5. Flag you for enforcement based on algorithmic assessments

This isn't speculation – it's the documented technical architecture being assembled by DOGE. As one whistleblower told investigators, the system gives operators "God mode" access to Americans' most sensitive information.

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The Pervasive Digital Prison

What's being built is essentially a prison without walls – a system where your every movement, transaction, and interaction can be monitored, flagged, and used against you. Unlike physical incarceration, this surveillance doesn't require your arrest or conviction. It follows you constantly, building a profile of your life that can be accessed at any moment.

The consequences are already visible but they are largely understood in terms of immigration, political surveillance and nationalism; but no-one has addressed the costs a total surveillance system can have on the market of ideas, of free capitalism and indeed of the human spirit.

The next brilliant idea you may have in a creative brainstorm with friends, the spark of brilliance that may strike you on that impromptu bike ride, the chance meeting that saves a fortune for your small business, or the inspiration we all derive from sharing ideas and learning from each other in a free society - are all things we will be giving up in Elon Musk’s version of the American future. Replaced by loyalty tests, tributes to the ruling class, and capitulation to their every need and desire. What happens to all those moments that have made life in America so special when there’s always someone watching you? Does America even really exist when everything is out of your control?

This is what happens when authoritarian states crush the human spirit, when they take the American dream, a right imbued in every American, and turn your life from an exercise of “work hard to achieve the most” into a world where success is met with loyalty pledges or adherence to a system.

This is what happens when you tackle a burgeoning democracy and turn it into an autocracy. It starts with political dissidents and undocumented immigrants, but it ends with an intellectual capture and a downward spiral of corruption.

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Discover how DOGE's surveillance machine impacts everyday Americans, threatens innovation, and transforms democracy. Plus: the contracts, executive orders, and database integrations making it happen right now.

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