Knowledge is power.


Since 2003, the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement office has taken tips on a toll-free telephone number (1-866-347-2423). Tipsters can leave their contact information or remain anonymous. Tips also are called in regularly to the agency’s field offices around the country.

The agency’s highest priority is investigating cases involving national security or people being victimized (such as forced prostitution of immigrants), spokesman Michael Keegan said.

The tip line received about 27,000 calls from October 2003 to September 2004, and about 98,000 the following year, agency spokesman Michael Gilhooly said.

About half the tip line calls contain enough information for agents to pass them along to field offices, which decide how to follow up.

It’s unknown how many tips result in deportations of illegal immigrants or prosecutions of employers or smugglers,