Description
On March 4, 2025, the United Kingdom’s Home Office launched a digital campaign in the Kurdistan region of Iraq, using targeted advertisements to deter prospective migrants from attempting to enter the UK illegally. The campaign depicted mugshots of ‘failed migrants’ whose facial features were pixelated and concealed from view. Accompanying text, spread over the eyes of the migrant, cited the dangers associated with irregular migration, including testimonies of drowning and slavery. This digital campaign marked a significant development in the digitalization of deterrence strategies, leveraging AI-generated imagery and algorithmically targeted messaging to influence migration decisions at their source. While the literature on anti-immigration advertising has examined campaigns targeting domestic audiences in migrant-receiving states, less attention has been afforded to digital deterrence strategies aimed directly at potential migrants. The increasing role of digital technologies in migration governance requires a closer examination, including the visual politics underpinning these campaigns to understand the ways emergent technologies reframe migration as a risk to potential migrants. We examine how these visual images (re)construct migration as criminalised threat by eliminating the faces and individuality of people shown.
