The Home Office has been accused of targeting non-whites and using "heavy-handed" tactics in a new immigration crackdown to tackle people working illegally in the UK.
Spot checks on people's immigration status are being carried out at London train and tube stations by UK Border Agency staff.
Witnesses claim the checks appear to be only targeting members of ethnic minority communities.
Sky News reporter James Banks said: "It is not just those who have been stopped who think these tactics are out of order, with some witnesses arguing the checks were prompted by race, not intelligence."
Phil O'Shea, who witnessed one of the operations earlier this week in north London, told the Kilburn Times: "I thought the behaviour of the immigration officers was heavy-handed and frightening.
"They appeared to be stopping and questioning every non-white person, many of whom were clearly ordinary Kensal Green residents going to work.
Border Agency officers detain two people in Brentwood, north London "When I queried what was going on I was threatened with arrest for obstruction and was told to 'crack on'."
Another onlooker told Sky News: "I think that when we are targeted like this - whatever you look like - I think it is absolutely terrible, and I think you are basing that on prejudice."
Immigration enforcement officers have also arrested 139 suspected immigration offenders in a series of intelligence-led raids at locations including London, Durham, Manchester, Wales and Somerset - and details of the raids posted online by the Home Office.
Updates on the campaign and heavily pixelated images of some of the arrests of suspects have been tweeted by the Home Office with the hashtag #immigrationoffenders - with the tweets linked to pages on the Government website providing more information. Those who have no right to be in the UK face being thrown out.
The move is the latest attempt by the Government to crack down on those illegally in the country, following a controversial "go home or face arrest" advertising van campaign.
Immigration Minister Mark Harper said: "We are sending a clear message to employers who choose to use illegal labour - we will find you and you will pay a heavy penalty. We will not allow the growth of a shadow economy for illegal migrants."
But concerns have been raised about recent anti-immigration operations in London, and Barry Gardiner, the Labour MP for Brent North, has written to Home Secretary Theresa May demanding an investigation into the spot checks which he said violated "fundamental freedoms".
"We do not yet live in a society where the police or any other officers of the law are entitled to detain people without reasonable justification and demand their papers," Mr Gardiner wrote.
Spot checks are a joint operation between UKBA and British Transport Police Shadow immigration minister Chris Bryant said: "Intelligence-led operations to remove illegal immigrants are to be welcomed. Racial profiling is not."
Newly-appointed labour peer Doreen Lawrence has pledged to speak out over the stop-and-check operations in her new role.
Asked about the claims of focus on non-whites, the mother of murdered teenager Stephen Lawrence said: "I'm sure there's illegal immigrants from all countries, but why would you focus that on people of colour? - and I think racial profiling is coming into it."
Mrs Lawrence told ITV1's Daybreak programme that stop-and-search has always been in the forefront of her mind, and she that she has campaigned on the issue for years.
Muhammed Butt, leader of Brent Council, told Sky's Boulton & Co that based on the complaints he had received from people, including white residents, who had witnessed the spot checks, he believed the checks did amount to "racial profiling because the people that have been targeted in Brent are predominantly black and Asian people". "Absolutely, it is random," he added.
Tony Smith, former head of UKBA, told the programme: "The guidance that's given to officers is very clear that it's not okay to profile anybody on the grounds of race or behaviour."
Writing in The Independent, Dave Garratt, the chief executive of charity Refugee Action, warned that the operations could "incite racial tensions".
The raids at various locations across the UK have been intelligence-led "Over the last few weeks we've seen some very visible signs of the Government's 'hostile environment' crusade. There have been vans out on the streets with threatening slogans and, reportedly, non-white people being visibly stopped and searched," he wrote.
"The Home Office is responsible for community cohesion. Yet we are increasingly seeing what appears to be hostility towards non-white immigration, which will do nothing but incite racial tensions and divisions within otherwise rich and diverse communities."
A protest against the spot checks and raids took place in Southall, West London, on Thursday. Members of the not-for-profit organisation Southall Black Sisters confronted two immigration officers in the area.
A Home Office spokesman defended the tactics: "We make no apology for enforcing our immigration laws and our officers carry out hundreds of operations like this every year around London.
"Where we find people who are in the UK illegally, we will remove them."
The department said it was looking into whether the stop checks outside London stations - a joint operation between British Transport Police and UKBA - were intelligence-led or random.
And it rejected claims that its tweets with the hashtag #immigrationoffenders may have prejudiced cases, because the suspects have not been identified.
It was unable to state how many of those arrested will face deportation, with some cases taking 72 hours to resolve and others much longer, it said.
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