"D/FW expands screening effort"

Sunday, September 26, 2004

D/FW expands screening effort
Airport to check 600 more foreigners daily under U.S. program
By MICHAEL GRABELL
The Dallas (TX) Morning News


A program that tracks foreign travelers using fingerprints and photographs
is being expanded in Dallas and around the country to include visitors from
the United Kingdom, Japan and 25 other previously exempt nations.

The additional screening, which begins Thursday nationwide, will apply to
33,000 more people entering and leaving the United States each day, 600 of
them at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport. It expands a program begun
nine months ago that applied mostly to non-European visitors.

The new requirement is the first of several efforts to meet a key 9-11
commission recommendation to extend the use of biometrics, such as
fingerprints, to monitor foreigners entering and leaving the country.

"It's one of the first programs that really seriously said we're going to
use biometrics," said Shonnie Lyon, director of implementation management
for the program, known as US-VISIT. "This is just the tip of the iceberg.
The use of biometrics in our travel system is going to happen more and
more."

But the government is struggling to figure out how to close several
loopholes as it casts the net of travelers it tracks more widely over the
next 15 months.

US-VISIT, or U.S. Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology, started
in January at 115 airports, including D/FW, and 14 major seaports.
Foreigners coming into the country have their photographs taken and submit
digital fingerprints as they pass through U.S. Customs.

Nationwide, authorities have intercepted more than 1,000 people on
government watch lists in nearly 9 million customs checks since the program
began, Mr. Lyon said last week at an airports convention in Houston. The
largest portion of the matches have been people who had been deported. He
declined to say whether the program had helped catch any suspected
terrorists.

In early November, US-VISIT will install computer stations at D/FW and 11
other airports to test a program in which foreign travelers can swipe an
electronic card to record their departure.

But tracking the exit of foreign travelers brings a host of problems:

. There is little to prevent someone from registering their exit and not
getting on an airplane.

. If the computers were placed at the gate, the person would already be in
the air before the government could realize that the person was wanted.

. With no checkpoint similar to the customs station, the burden to check out
is on the traveler, who might not be aware of the requirement. About 59
percent of travelers recorded their exits in a pilot project that began in
August at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport.

. Several test programs have been stalled by the lengthy process to obtain
security clearances for employees, who would demonstrate the new procedures.
For example, D/FW's exit kiosks were originally planned for early September.

Homeland Security officials hope the pilot projects will help them determine
which checkout method is most secure and efficient. Some computer stations
will be installed in the terminals, while others will be at the gate. In
addition, for some flights, an attendant will scan travelers' exits receipts
to verify that they leave.

"We really want to get some information in this pilot," Mr. Lyon said. "It
could be that we say none of these projects are worth a damn, and we've got
to come up with a different solution."

As US-VISIT expands, the government also faces the challenge of marketing
the program to foreigners who speak various languages. It must also convince
the public that the information will be kept private and that America's
doors are still open.

"For us, the primary questions are about the use of the information," said
Charlie Mitchell, legislative counsel for the American Civil Liberties
Union. "How is it going to be used? Who's going to have access to it? It
just hasn't really been answered."

After Thursday, US-VISIT will include nearly all foreigners except permanent
residents, children, the elderly, diplomats, Canadians and Mexicans with
border-crossing passes traveling within 25 miles of the U.S. border for less
than 30 days.

By October, all visa offices will be collecting biographic and biometric
information when they issue a visa.

Beginning Dec. 31, the program will also include those entering through the
nation's 50 busiest land border crossings.

By the end of 2005, US-VISIT will encompass arrivals at all U.S. land
crossings as well as entries and exits at all airports and seaports.


 Do you have an opinion about this story?
Share it with other readers in our CAA Discussion Forums

http://www.californiaaviation.org/dcfp/dcboard.php


*****************************************