Apple CEO Tim Cook is holding the next generation of iPhone 17 at the Apple Special Event at Apple headquarters in Cupertino, California on September 9, 2025.
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apple On Thursday night, he said he was removing ice blocks and other apps from the App Store. This can be used to anonymously report sightings of US immigrants and customs enforcement agents.
The move comes after Attorney General Pam Bondi put pressure on Apple and amid a dispute over the Trump administration’s aggressive enforcement of immigration laws with ice agents and other authorities.
The FBI said last week that a gunman who attacked an ice facility in Dallas led to the deaths of two detained migrants, and the injury to a third detainee recently searched an app that tracks the presence of ice agents.
Joshua Yarn, who was meant to kill ice agents in an attack, authorities said.
“We have created the App Store to make it a safe and reliable place to discover apps,” Apple said in a statement Thursday to NBC News.
“We removed similar apps from the App Store based on information we received from law enforcement regarding safety risks related to ice blocks,” the company said.
Fox Business was the first to report launching Apple’s ice blocks and other similar apps.
Iceblock has been downloaded more than a million times since it was introduced this year, according to data provided to NBC News by app tracking company AppFigures. The app hit a high of around 114,000 downloads in one day, July 1st, the day after a CNN article about the app sparked criticism from the Trump administration.
Federal agents will face protesters outside the US immigration customs facility on September 28, 2025 in Portland, Oregon.
Mathieu Lewis-Rolland | Getty Images
“Today we reached out to Apple, requesting that Apple is requesting its ice block app removed from the App Store,” Bondi said in a statement in Fox News Digital on Thursday.
“Ice blocks are designed to put ice agents at risk just for their work, and violence against law enforcement is an unbearable red line that cannot be crossed,” Bondy said in a statement.
“This Department of Justice will continue to make every effort to protect our brave federal law enforcement officers who risk their lives every day to keep Americans safe,” she said.
“They’re going to investigate these people who put these apps up,” Trump administration’s border border Tom Homan said in an interview with Fox News on Thursday night.
CNBC is seeking comment from Joshua Aaron, creator of Iceblock.
Iceblock, which was introduced in the App Store in April, is free.
“The man who fired a shot at a Dallas ICE facility on September 24th was using one of these apps to track ICE agents,” White House press director Karoline Leavitt said in a post from X last week.
Iceblock became the App Store’s top social networking app shortly after Leavitt denounced the app at a White House press conference on June 30th.
That same day, CNN published an article about the app cited Aaron as citing its development of ice blocks after seeing the Trump administration’s deportation efforts escalate.
“When I saw what was going on in this country, I wanted to do something to fight back,” Aaron said at the time.
“We’re literally watching history repeat itself.”
On June 30, Ice’s acting director, Todd Lyons, said “I’m tired of promoting apps that basically draw targets on the backs of federal law enforcement officials.”
“My officers and agents are already facing an increase in attacks of 500%, and being on live TV and announcing an app that allows anyone to enter zero in their place is like inviting violence against them on national megaphones,” Lyon said.
However, Aaron called the Trump administration’s criticism of Ice Bloc “a scary tactic of another right-wing terror.”
He said he designed the app to help migrants who are afraid of being deported.
“I grew up in a Jewish family and am part of the Jewish community, so I had the opportunity to meet Holocaust survivors and learn about the history of what happened in Nazi Germany.
– Lora Kolodny of CNBC contributed to this story.
