Since the late 1990s, the government has used outsourced electronic monitoring (also known as tagging) in England and Wales for criminal sentencing and punishment. Under the Asylum and Immigration (Treatment of Claimants) Act 2004, s36, the use of this technology extended to immigration controls, and individuals deemed as ‘high risk’ of harm, reoffending or absconding can be fitted with an ankle device and subjected to curfew. The tagging of migrants is not authorised by the criminal court and therefore not considered a punitive sanction. It is managed by the immigration system and treated as an administrative matter. Nevertheless, people who are tagged experience it as imprisonment and punishment. Drawing on data from an eighteen-month ethnographic research project, this article examines the impact of electronic monitoring on people seeking asylum, who completed their sentences for immigration offences. It uncovers the psychological effects and mental health impacts of such technologies of control. The article sheds light on how tagging is experienced by racialised minorities, and adds to the literature on migration, surveillance studies, state racism and violence.

自1990年代后期以来，政府已在英格兰和威尔士使用外包的电子监控（也称为标签）进行刑事判决和惩罚。根据2004年《庇护和移民（索赔人的处理）法》第36条，这项技术的使用扩展到了移民控制领域，被认为具有“高风险”伤害，再犯罪或潜逃的个人可以安装脚踝装置并受到宵禁。标记移民罪是未经刑事法院授权的，因此不视为惩罚性制裁。它由移民系统管理，被视为行政事务。然而，被贴标签的人将其视为监禁和惩罚。利用来自一个为期18个月的民族志研究项目的数据，本文探讨了电子监控对寻求庇护的人的影响，这些人因移民罪而被判刑。它揭示了这种控制技术的心理影响和心理健康影响。这篇文章阐明了种族少数群体如何体验标签，并增加了有关移民，监视研究，国家种族主义和暴力的文献。