MANILA, Philippines - Not only is the era of cheap air travel to the United States drawing to a close. If you ask American security authorities, so is the era of appropriated identities and “fakable” travel documents.
Are you really who you claim to be? To save you from making lengthy explanations, officials at Department of Homeland Security (DHS) would rather let your fingerprints do the talking.
New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport became the latest port of entry to the US to collect 10 fingerprints in lieu of the usual two from each arriving international visitor.
The development is part of DHS’s efforts to upgrade its biometrics system to enhance security by keeping out undesirable aliens and at the same time facilitate legitimate travel by more accurately and efficiently establishing and verifying visitors’ identities.
During a press conference at the recently concluded International Pow Wow at the Las Vegas Convention Center, US-VISIT Director Robert Mocny also presented to journalists two new devices designed to collect fingerprints and instantly match them with existing data gathered from America’s embassies and consular offices abroad.
For more than four years now, US Department of State (DOS) consular officers and US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers have been collecting biometrics—digital fingerprints and a photograph-from all non-US citizens between the ages of 14 and 79, with some exceptions, when they apply for visas or arrive at US ports of entry.
“Biometrics have revolutionized our ability to prevent dangerous people from entering the US since 2004. Our upgrade to 10-fingerprint collection builds on our success, enabling us to focus more attention on stopping potential security risks,” said Mocny.
Of the more than 10 million visitors who were subjected to the system, DOS authorities have so far identified close to 24,000 people who were inadmissible, for various reasons, to enter the US.
The department’s US-VISIT program currently checks a visitor’s fingerprints against DHS records of immigration violators and Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) records of wanted persons and known or suspected terrorists. Checking biometrics against a watch list helps officers make better visa determinations and admissibility decisions.
Collecting 10 fingerprints, as opposed to just two, also improves fingerprint matching accuracy and the department’s ability to compare a visitor’s fingerprints against latent fingerprints collected by Department of Defense (DOD) and the FBI from known and unknown terrorists all over the world, according to a DHS press release. Visitors’ fingerprints are also checked against the FBI’s criminal master file.
“Quite simply, this change gives our officers a more accurate idea of who’s in front of them. For legitimate visitors, the process becomes more efficient and their identities are better protected from theft. For those who pose a risk, we will have greater insight into who they are,” added Paul Morris, executive director of admissibility and passenger programs, office of field operations, CBP.
Rounding off the list of early adapters are Washington DC’s Dulles, Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson, Boston’s Logan, Houston’s George Bush, Chicago’s O’Hare and the international airports of San Francisco, Miami, Orlando and Detroit.
Oddly enough, an international airport as busy as LAX in Los Angeles isn’t included in DHS’s pilot program.
US-VISIT is evaluating the 10-fingerpint collection at these airports. It will use the results in its deployment of the technology to the remaining air, sea and land border ports of entry by December.
Copyright 2009 Philippine Daily Inquirer. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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