Early last week, FBI Director Kash Patel announced that the bureau is investigating the use of the encrypted Signal messaging platform by "ICE Watch" activists to track and block federal immigration enforcement.

Just days later, Jill Garvey, co-founder of a group called "States at the Core," logged into a Zoom webinar to train a new crop of "rapid responders" on a military-grade intelligence gathering method called "SALUTE." An acronym for Size, Activity, Location, Uniform, Time, Equipment, SALUTE is a mnemonic device that typically instructs soldiers how to systematically track details about enemies. Garvey framed the work as operational surveillance against agents she had called "mercenaries" in an immigration authorities into at least 13 sophisticated databases, storing highly sensitive information, including license plate numbers, timestamps, geolocation data, uniform details, photographs, behavior patterns and, in at least one case, the names, email addresses and phone numbers of federal authorities. The network operates through at least 18 hubs nationwide in largely Democratic states and cities, coordinating traffic, verification and reporting.

"This is mind-blowing. We have an entire nation of collectors against our country’s law enforcement. It’s extremely dangerous," said retired U.S. Army Green Beret Eric Schwalm, who first learned the SALUTE framework as a newly enlisted Army private, later applying it during patrols in Iraq as he fought an insurgency and then in Afghanistan as he trained Northern Alliance fighters to defeat the Taliban government. 

After reviewing the civilian training, operations and databases uncovered by Fox News Digital, he said, "If Iraqi resistance ran this level of operation against us, we couldn’t have stayed past 2007. They didn’t even need to shoot at us. Protests like this would have created a narrative nightmare."

Indeed, these stakeouts have not only become deadly, with the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, but they have led to many confrontations and most often put federal authorities on the losing end of a narrative war. On Tuesday, a group of "rapid responders" in "Minnesota Ice Watch" federal immigration officers. 

"One of the things that our constitution has tried to be able to provide is an avenue for individuals to make sure that they are aware of any kind of tyrannical government," he said. "If we are supposed to be able to guard against foreign and domestic, there should be a mechanism for us to be able to identify that.

Already, Minnesota, there are at least 20 Signal chats. In Rhode Island, the Alliance to Mobilize Our Resistance sends out alerts over the WhatsApp messaging platform.

From there, the intelligence flows into databases.

Last June, Dominick Skinner, reportedly an Irish immigration activist based in the Netherlands, first published one of the most egregious databases, FBI investigation launched into the backend surveillance tactics on federal officials,  the database entries have almost doubled to 5,397 records of "confirmed" and "highly suspected" ICE vehicles and agents, with photos, locations, timestamps, and cross-referenced sightings. The database says it is "documenting & resisting against ICE, police, & all colonial militarized regimes," inspired by "movements towards liberation."

The data crisscrosses the nation. This past Sunday, at 7:03 p.m. ET, a user filed a "Critical" report on IceOut.org, a web-based reporting platform run by the Pueblo Project Foundation as part of its "People Over Papers" initiative, documenting "possible ICE activity." 

Earlier that day, on Arnett Street in Elizabeth, N.J., a user alleged that "3 men took a female. There were 4 different cars," reporting the incident as "Immigration Enforcement" and uploading photographs of the vehicles and alleged agents. Pueblo Project Foundation didn’t return a request for comment.

The "RESIST" platform, whose developers say their database "flips the script on surveillance," using "facial recognition and biometric tracking." 

"Mask or not, they can’t hide anymore," the platform promises, calling itself "civilian-powered intelligence" that "exposes bad actors" and "empowers direct action, public exposure and psychological disruption."

Another platform, ICEInMyArea.org, created by anonymous developers who didn’t respond to a request for comment, says it has 4,000 daily visitors with human reviews of new reports, making it "one of the most reliable tools for tracking ICE activity nationwide." 

But its developers promise users "completely anonymous" privacy.

Under "Recent Reports" over the past 24 hours, it details "ICE sighted in New Britain, CT," on Corbin Avenue near a McDonald’s, "ice agents using the target parking lot" on Colorado Boulevard in Los Angeles "as a base" and a silver Ford Explorer with "no front plate, whited-out/covered rear plate" on N. Aviation Boulevard in Manhattan Beach, Calif.

On the East Coast, Ahmad Perez, a former Biden administration political appointee and founder of Islip Forward, launched "Long Island ICE Tracker" to document "individuals and vehicles" in public, with "no reasonable expectation of privacy." He "strictly prohibited" the use of the information to "harass, threaten, intimidate, stalk, doxx or interfere" with "any person" or their "lawful activities."

Thursday on the site, Perez bragged "574 Verified Sightings" in the database, with a new listing at 1 p.m. of a weathered black Ford vehicle on Nottingham Avenue in Patchogue, N.Y., a decal saying "POLICE INTERCEPTOR" on the rear back door.

"Attempts to label community transparency efforts as ‘illegal’ or ‘surveillance’ often reflect discomfort with accountability rather than genuine concern for ethics or safety," Perez told Fox News Digital. "Oversight, documentation and public awareness are not threats to democracy — they are foundational to it."

Online tools even generate QR-codes for SALUTE templates that standardize civilian intelligence collection nationwide. 

In Minnesota, the Workers Defense Alliance of Twin Cities, a socialist group whose website features a graphic of Minneapolis police’s Third Precinct on fire, teaches SALUTE and a Spanish alternative, "ALERTA," for "Activity, Location, Equipment, Response requested, Time and date, Appearance." It pitches the framework as "community defense" while explicitly teaching structured surveillance. Its leaders didn’t return a request for comment.

"ICE Watch RI" and Alerta de Migra operate in Rhode Island with the Party for Socialism and Liberation, combining protest mobilization with logged sightings of federal officers.

The creator of another database — "Deportation Tracker" — said he puts in place "strict policies and moderation" so that any content that violates anyone’s privacy is "rejected immediately." Identifying himself as Sam Fletcher, a high school student, he said, "The platform does not represent any civilian intelligence and surveillance operation. Everything that is submitted must go through a human review before being posted to the site. We don’t allow any names, images or licence plates allowed on the site. Nothing that is personally identifiable to anyone."

"Any doxxing, harassing or stalking is unacceptable," he said.

Still, critics say, the database has the information for users to violate Fletcher’s "terms of service."

Meanwhile, in Portland, "Anti-Facist Aktion" hosts a "PDX ICE/DHS License Plates Community Surveillance Database," claiming to host 627 records. Its developers couldn’t be reached for comment. It notes: "WARNING: THIS INFORMATION IS DANGEROUS TO AUTHORITY."

Garvey, the blonde anti-ICE mom whose group leads new trainings every several days. In an interview with Wajahat Ali, the host of a podcast called the "The Left Hook," Ali lauded Garvey’s strategy: "Your camera is your weapon."

Overnight, local residents in the Seattle Signal chats got alerts that they would have their first "Seattle rapid response drill" on Sunday between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. local time.

The announcement will "follow the standard SALUTE format" to instruct responders where to go.

The alert warned: "don’t be running red lights to get there first, don’t be blowing whistles once you arrive."

Fox News Digital's Kiera McDonald contributed to this report.