Last week, the Cook County Board of Commissioners voted 7–0 to renew a one-year, $1 million contract with data broker Appriss Insights, with 10 commissioners voting “present.” In August, the Weekly reported that the county’s arrangement with Appriss could be allowing federal agents to obtain the personal data of thousands of immigrants, potentially exposing them to deportation.
Appriss manages the state’s Victim Information and Notification Everyday (VINE) system, which alerts crime victims and family members when an accused person’s jail or court status changes. The service is considered essential for public safety and compliance with victims’ rights laws, but a clause in the contract referencing “Risk Solutions” permits data to be shared or sold to third parties.
Advocates argue the county could continue offering the same service without relying on Appriss, whose parent company, Equifax, best known for consumer credit reporting. Under Cook County’s contract, a Risk Solutions clause allows Appriss to share jail data with other companies, including LexisNexis Risk Solutions.
This isn’t the first time the issue has come up. For years, advocates and commissioners have urged the county to take stronger action by specifically removing a “Risk Solutions” clause from the contract or by amending the county’s ICE Detainer Ordinance to eliminate any possibility that personal information could be accessed by federal immigration authorities through third-party vendors.
This year, the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office (CCSAO) proposed only one change to the contract: a single sentence meant to bar the company and its subcontractors from directly sharing data with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
While officials described the amendment as a step toward stronger protections, advocates and several commissioners questioned whether the fix actually closes the loophole.
During the meeting, Commissioner Alma Anaya (7th District) noted that other jurisdictions, such as New York City, have successfully strengthened their contracts to limit data sharing with law enforcement. “It means we can too,” she said.
After Thursday’s vote, Anaya told the Weekly that New York’s contract with Appriss does not contain a Risk Solutions clause. “This means that any data shared between New York City and Appriss stays entirely within New York. Third-party vendors are not allowed to gain access and are not allowed to share that data to others. It is critical that Cook County’s contract also eliminate the Risk Solutions clause.”
Laura Rivera, a senior staff attorney with Just Futures Law, said the amendment does little to stop ICE from obtaining Cook County data through other agencies.
“The amendment won’t be effective,” Rivera said. “Cutting off access to ICE through that pipeline won’t prevent other agencies from sharing access with ICE. We need to go upstream and strike the Risk Solutions clause entirely.”
Rivera called that clause language tied to Appriss’s “a euphemism authorizing Appriss to sell data to law-enforcement agencies across the country.”
Jacinta González, a member of Mijente and longtime immigrant-rights organizer, said the board’s inaction felt especially alarming given the ongoing federal raids in Chicago.
“It is incredibly disappointing to, in this moment where helicopters are going over neighborhoods, where parents are being shot in the street, that they’re not taking more decisive action,” González said. “We’re going to continue to push to not only ensure that the Risk Solutions clause is taken out of the current contract, but also ensure that the data loophole on the Detainer Ordinance is closed.”
González acknowledged that the amendment was an attempt to prevent ICE from obtaining data from VINE. “But sadly, it’s not enough,” she said. “Equifax and LexisNexis can still sell our information to anyone they wish. Our communities cannot afford to wait another year while this data sharing continues.”
During the board discussion, Anaya thanked the State’s Attorney’s Office for the new clause but said the county must ensure “any information we have is not turned over for the profit of private companies.” She noted that “other jurisdictions have been able to do it, which means we can too.”
Commissioner Bridget Gainer (10th District) pressed for a broader standard during the debate.
“We don’t sell public data,” she said. “If the answer to whether we’re selling or paying less for a contract because we allow data to be sold isn’t no, then we have to push back.”
Gainer also voiced frustration that the issue had already come up last year without resolution.
“This came up last year, and we were supposed to get a report back on what progress had been made,” she said. “We’ve had these conversations before, but we can’t keep having the same conversation over and over again.”
The State’s Attorney’s Office said this renewal will be the final extension under the 2021 agreement, and a new procurement for victim-notification services will begin before the next term starts in November 2026.
According to 2021 Cook County Board records, Cook County approved an initial $786,000 sole-source contract with Appriss Insights that included the clause referencing Risk Solutions, a brand tied to LexisNexis Risk Solutions, which holds multimillion-dollar contracts with ICE.
Since then, two consecutive increases have pushed the contract’s value to about $1.06 million. The amendment approved Thursday adds $278,764 for 2025–26, with funds coming from the State’s Attorney’s Office budget. It was introduced as a sole-source procurement, meaning no competitive bids were solicited.
A public-records request by Just Futures Law showed clear links between Appriss, LexisNexis, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement. From March to September 2021, ICE’s Chicago Field Office ran more than 13,000 searches in the LexisNexis database, generating about 1,800 reports for immigration enforcement. Nationally, ICE accessed data on more than 276 million people in just seven months, the kind of data-sharing risk Cook County’s sanctuary policy was meant to prevent.
The Weekly filed a similar FOIA in June asking for documents that would show how ICE’s Chicago Field Office has used LexisNexis and Appriss data since 2021. The agency still hasn’t responded.
Advocates said they’re not asking the county to get rid of the VINE system. They just want Cook County to remove the Risk Solutions clause. “We’re not against keeping survivors informed,” Rivera said. “But why are we paying for a system that also fuels deportations?”
The CCSAO refused to respond to the Weekly’s emailed questions about whether it conducted a privacy review before the renewal.
The renewal leaves the county with another year under a system its own leaders have warned could undermine its sanctuary promise. As raids intensify and the market for personal data expands, advocates say the clock is running out for the county to choose between public safety and private profit.
“If we had done this four years ago… who knows what impact that would have had,” González said. “We’ve been fighting against ICE for a long time. We’ve always known that ICE is a rogue agency that doesn’t respect people’s rights, that is violent, that will murder people. We’re in a moment where everyone can see it and the amount of data and information that is getting is getting bigger and bigger and I don’t think folks quite understand the magnitude of it.”
10/28: This story was updated to clarify that Appriss is owned by Equifax.
Alma Campos is the Weekly’s immigration reporter and project editor.
