This book chapter surveys the growing use of AI and digital technologies across the immigration lifecycle, from forecasting migration flows and automating application processing to biometric border control and risk-scoring systems. It situates these developments within broader debates on algorithmic governance, discrimination, and the rights of migrants.

Focus

• Mapping where and how AI systems are being deployed in immigration and border management (e.g., triage, fraud detection, risk assessment, chatbots).
• Examining the motivations behind automation—efficiency, security, cost-cutting—and how they intersect with political and economic interests.
• Documenting harms and risks to migrants: opacity, bias, surveillance, lack of recourse, and the erosion of due process and privacy.
• Bridging technical perspectives (e.g., explainability, accountability) with insights from migration studies, critical race scholarship, and data justice.

Key Themes

• Explainability and transparency: Limits of interpretability in AI-based decision systems and the need for meaningful explanations for migrants and advocates.
• Accountability and redress: Gaps in oversight, appeal mechanisms, and institutional responsibility when AI systems make or shape immigration decisions.
• Coloniality and technocolonialism: How data infrastructures and predictive systems can reproduce historical hierarchies and unequal mobility regimes.
• Alternatives: Possibilities for rights-based, participatory, and accountable uses of digital technologies in support of migrants.

Status and Outputs

• Status: Chapter drafted and under revision.
• Output: A book chapter aimed at scholars and practitioners working at the intersection of AI governance, migration, and human rights, providing both a conceptual map and concrete case studies.