A new investigation unveils how Chicago’s migrant shelter system mishandled asylum seekers’ private information.

The report from Borderless Magazine and the Investigative Project on Race and Equity discovered the company that oversees the shelter system, Favorite Healthcare Staffing, has had federal complaints filed against it.

Allegations say shelter staff used personal devices to access and share migrants’ information without proper security measures, leading to potentially compromised data.

“I was most shocked by the fact that there didn’t seem to be controls on who could access this very sensitive data — we’re talking medical information, immigration details, people’s contact information,” said Emeline Posner, a reporter with the Investigative Project on Race and Equity. “For there to be no limits on who can access and even modify these documents from their personal computers, it has huge implications.”

In a statement to WTTW News, the Department of Family and Support Services said the “contract with Favorite includes a confidentiality clause to protect data and other information shared with Favorite and their contractors. Favorite is responsible for ensuring that confidentiality is maintained. Favorite shares their confidentiality policy with their employees during onboarding in their employee handbook.” The department maintains that the city of Chicago prioritizes the privacy of all residents, including new arrivals.

Favorite did not respond to a request for comment.

One of Posner’s subjects, Reina Isabel Jerez Garcia, said that she and other asylum seekers living in the shelters were treated unfairly. She recalls being served small portions of food, including rotten chicken, and not being given winter clothes despite the public donations to the shelter.

Garcia was a practicing lawyer and advocate for the rights of victims in Colombia, and she said she’ll continue to speak out against injustices here in Chicago. Because of her outspokenness, Garcia said the shelter threatened to kick her out.

She now rents a shared home with friends in the city.

Posner wasn’t surprised by these revelations.

“These shelters have been so obscured from public access and there hasn’t been a lot of transparency,” Posner said. “Speaking with more than a dozen shelter staff, this really hasn’t been an experience limited to migrants staying in the shelters. Most of the staff that we’ve interviewed have also said that they feel fearful of speaking out internally and externally because of fears of termination.”

The city will be integrating the migrant shelters and the shelters for Chicago’s unhoused population under a unified system next year.

You can read the full investigation here and here.

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