Technology that scans the faces of passengers as they board flights led U.S. Customs and Border Protections officers to identify 1,300 noncitizens who overstayed their visas in 2017, the Trump administration announced Tuesday.
A report by the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General used the biometric data, which is information based on a person’s fingerprints, face, or the iris of an eye, to determine 105,000 foreign visitors left the country and 1,300 of those stayed longer than their visa allowed.
“Notably, on the first day of the pilot, CBP officers at IAD airport identified a woman who had overstayed her visa period by almost two decades,” the report stated.
The facial recognition system, known as CBP’s Biometric Entry-Exit Program, was rolled out in 2017 to just nine airports, and only a small group of international travelers went through the system at airports.
CBP has touted the program’s ability to match 98 percent of passengers with information on file prior to their arrival or departure in recent months. In the initial months of the pilot program, the technology recognized only 85 percent of passengers, but it has been improved since then.
The inspector general found the most significant issues to the program’s being able to reach the goal of matching 100 percent of foreign departure passengers at the top 20 U.S. airports by Oct. 1, 2021 were network and Wi-Fi issues, staff shortages, and demanding flight schedules. Another issue was identifying people “of certain age groups or nationalities due to photo availability or quality,” the report added.
