From the Palestinian laboratory to the European borders: The role of surveillance technologies in the perpetuation of colonial-era systems

The digitalization of migration management has increased reliance on surveillance technologies, reshaping how states monitor, control and categorize people on the move. While governments, especially in the Global North, integrate smart border systems, biometric databases and automated decision-making systems, private companies also play a key role in developing these technologies with minimal oversight, raising critical concerns about accountability, human rights, and global inequalities. In actual fact, the use of surveillance tools hides peculiar mechanisms. This thesis explores how surveillance technologies serve as tools of political control, reinforcing colonial-like practices of domination over marginalized populations. Focusing on the Israel-EU relationship, it examines how Israeli surveillance technologies, tested on Palestinians, are exported and used at EU borders to regulate migration. In both cases, ultra-surveillance policies dehumanize people, framing them as security threats and merely economic commodities, justifying the implementation of such digital tools. Grounded in the theoretical frameworks of securitization (Buzan, Wæver and De Wilde, 1998), biopolitics (Foucault 1978, 2003), necropolitics (Mbembe 2003), coloniality of power (Quijano, 2000), border imperialism (Walia, 2013), surveillance capitalism (Zuboff, 2019), and digital colonialism (Couldry & Mejias, 2019), this work highlights how surveillance extends beyond borders, creating a global apparatus of control that disproportionately targets oppressed groups. Using a qualitative research approach, the study analyses primarily secondary literature, e.g., academic literature, NGO reports, corporate contracts, and EU policy documents, to critically investigate the intersection of surveillance, migration management, colonial practices and private-sector influence. By assessing empirical evidence from these sources, the study reveals how the implementation of surveillance technologies sustains colonial-era practices of power under the guise of security.