[5] There is a giant Philips advertisement on the roof, facing Kowloon, publicised in 2007 as the largest LED display panel in Hong Kong.

[7] The tower was built as part of a large government development on an 18,500 square metre site within the Wan Chai reclamation.

[12][13] After this incident, the Architectural Services Department defended the standards of government building design and maintenance, stating that wind load tests for the curtain wall systems of the Immigration and Revenue towers were duly carried out in Florida, that the curtain walls met the wind load requirements of the Buildings Ordinance, and that the incident was an isolated occurrence caused by the strongest typhoon to hit Hong Kong in 16 years.

The massive queues were made worse by China's hardening stance toward Hong Kong, with Beijing announcing it would dismantle Hong Kong's democratic institutions following the handover, as well as the recent Chinese missile launches near Taiwan that Beijing admitted were intended to undermine the 1996 Taiwanese democratic presidential elections.

[19] That night, a queue of nearly 60,000 snaked from Immigration Tower to Wan Chai Sports Ground, which the government hired to accommodate the crowd.

[17] The tower suffered an accidental fire in March 2000 which began in a ground-floor transformer room and burned for two hours, spreading smoke as high as the 39th storey, and injuring one person.

[20] Around the turn of the millennium, the tower was the site of continual occupation by Mainland Chinese activists, led by Shi Junlong (施君龍), demanding right of abode in Hong Kong.

[21] At 2:00 pm on 2 August 2000, visa overstayers petitioned immigration officers to issue them Hong Kong identity cards on the spot.

[23] They refused to leave, staging a sit-in until closing time at 6:00 pm when staff attempted to evict the protesters, who responded by splashing highly flammable paint thinner around the 13th storey and setting it ablaze with cigarette lighters.

Senior Immigration Officer Leung Kam-kwong, who had tried to protect his colleagues from being splashed with the flammable liquid and had sustained burns to 65 percent of his body after being set on fire, died in hospital.

[21][23][25] Secretary for Security Regina Ip was "shocked and angered by this irrational and violent action" and said the incident would not pressure the government to accede to the demands of the perpetrators.

[27] After appealing, the arsonists were granted a retrial, at which they won sharply reduced sentences for pleading guilty to the lesser crime of two counts of manslaughter by gross negligence.

Spurred by the circumstances of Leung's death, the government added an exemption clause to the six-year exhumation policy in public cemeteries applicable to people who died carrying out an "exceptional act of bravery".

Hui Chun-kit, Mak King-yeung, Fung Tai- kwong, and Lo Shu-tsun were all awarded the Medal for Bravery (Bronze).

About one-fifth of the new West Kowloon Government Offices, which started construction in 2015, is designated to receive some of the displaced departments from Wan Chai.

[43] In 2017, however, the Chief Executive announced that Immigration Tower, along with other two government buildings, would be redeveloped as the new wing of Convention and Exhibition Centre rather than for private development.