US Expands Airport Biometric Data Collection

athloi sends word of an expansion of the US-VISIT program that now requires two fingerprints from foreign visitors arriving at scores of airports. Beginning later this year the US will be testing a system that collects 10 digital fingerprints, at 10 major points of entry. A US Homeland Security director assured EU officials that the program would operate under strict privacy rules. But he noted that the FBI and CIA will have access to the biometric data, which over time may expand beyond fingerprints.

Comments

"Points of entry"?

[sczimme]

Beginning later this year the US will be testing a system that collects 10 digital fingerprints, at 10 major points of entry.

That sounds painful... Eeek.

Re:"Points of entry"?

[rts008]

After DHS gets done with you, only 10 major points of entry will seem like a good thing.

After going through 'Security', you will leak like a sieve. But after that first deflowering, it shouldn't be that bad the next time.

But you'll never be able to fly Virgin Airways again.

Re:"Points of entry"?

[fbjon]

I think you misunderstood:

1. Anus
2. Urethra
3. Right ear
4. Left ear
5. Mouth
6. Right tear canal
7. Left tear canal
8. Right nostril
9. Left nostril
10. Brain access hole

You don't have a brain access hole? Don't worry, trepanation will soon be required for entry at US airports.

Vagina not on the list of major ports of entry? That would be sexual harassment, someone might get upset!

It doesn't help even on airports

[Anonymous Coward]

Suicide bombers don't care if you take their fingerprints or not. This is just means to get rid of people with liberal thoughts. And to create a false sense of security for the Sheep.

Re:It doesn't help even on airports

[Potor]

When I discovered I could no longer use non-approved locks on my luggage while transiting through the USA, I decided never to fly there again. I am sure nobody cares, but that's my decision.

If I lived abroad,

[cromar]

I would seriously consider never coming to the USA again. It's not that I have a huge concern with collecting information about non-citizen civilians, but that I would not trust DHS in any way, especially when it comes to technology. But hey, at least the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Government Oversight game them a security grade of "D" this year. That's better than an "F" anyway :(

~cromar

Re:If I lived abroad,

[VJ42]

I would seriously consider never coming to the USA again. I don't live in the USA, and have already come to the conclusion that I'm not going to visit*. My tourist ££s will go to France, Italy, Spain, Thailand etc. instead. The USA needs tourism; tourists don't need the USA, there's a big wide world that's not the USA still to visit. So, to the US govermet I say this: "it's your loss".

*I've been before, but before all this "security" and I would dearly love to visit again.

Re:If I lived abroad,

[Fred_A]

I don't live in the USA, and have already come to the conclusion that I'm not going to visit*. My tourist ££s will go to France, Italy, Spain, Thailand etc. instead. The USA needs tourism; tourists don't need the USA, there's a big wide world that's not the USA still to visit. So, to the US government I say this: "it's your loss".

As far as I can tell, more or less 3 out of 4 of my fellow Europeans feel that way. I went to the US before, found that it had some gorgeous scenery, lots of nice people (and quite a few weird ones, but I guess that's part of the charm of the country, sortof), but no longer. Especially while carrying a French passport, I'm not going to subject myself to the antics of room temperature IQ security goons (and that's in Celsius, thank you very much).

I even avoid long flights that have a connection there, simply because a lot of euro travellers I know have been hassled by the security drones to the point of missing their flight.

I'll probably reconsider in a few years when this lunacy is behind us, but for now, South America, the rest of Europe, Asia, the Pacific and Africa offer lots of travel opportunities for me (except that for some reason I still regularly have to point out that I'm not from the US in a lot of places before people get friendly, comes with English still being the world's ligua franca).

Quite sad really.

Re:If I lived abroad,

[BlackSmithNZ]

I have come to the same sort of conclusion.

I have never been fingerprinted before in my life; and the only thing I associate with fingerprinting is somebody being arrested in a police station.

If I have to travel to the US for business; I can live with it - I hopefully won't get sent off to somewhere 3rd world for a few years for holding an anti-bush political stance (at least not yet).

But if I am choosing a destination to travel to for a holiday, or even as a stop over on the way to Europe from NZ (i.e. not even entering the US), I don't want my kids marched off a plane, fingerprinted and photographed by some foreign power for stupid paranoid reasons. Would a US citizen want their kids treated like that by say Russian government agents if they were travelling to Asia?

Question is, while my 6 yr old daughter could be a terrorist threat or a drug dealer, so could any random American citizen. So how long before Bush admin starts thinking that taking 10 fingerprints and DNA samples from all American citizens is a good idea? My guess is that little project is already well under way.

So its probably no big deal to the US - I am just one individual not passing though the US lightly, but don't be surprised that in the future people like my kids have increasing apathy and even dislike of the US. When I was a young kid, I and my school friends all wanted to go to the US and Disneyland; as a sign of the times, my kids are now more keen to go to Paris.

Re:that's nice...

[metamatic]

It accomplishes even less than that. All the 9/11 terrorists had valid ID and weren't on watch lists.

Beyond fingerprint

[aepervius]

quote : "which over time may expand beyond fingerprints." What do they want in addition ? A retina scan ? a DNA sample ? WHAT FOR ?!?!? And why in the ninth hell, WE (the rest of the world) are not forcing the US to eat their own fudge at our frontier ? I find Brasil example to be a good one.

What the fuck?

[khasim]

About 100 million fingerprints have been taken so far, and more than 34,000 people whose names showed up on U.S. watch lists were denied entry, Wright said.

If they're dangerous enough to be on a "watch list" why aren't we arresting them when we catch them?

Oh, too dangerous to be allowed in ... but not dangerous enough to arrest.

You've been rejected at this border point. Please try another border point for entry.

And this wil help how?

[janrinok]

I'm sure that there are few on this thread that believe that this will help defeat terrorism. And I don't suppose it will improve the tourist trade very much either. I'm glad that America is the home of the brave; I cannot imagine what they might do if they were frightened...

Deduction Watson!

[SuperCharlie]

Since the terrorists wont be stupid enough to be fingerprinted, once we have everyone's fingerprints, those that are left MUST be the enemy! Brilliant!

Hidden Costs

[RManning]

I work for a very large multi-national company. Not long ago I sat through a talk that was given by the head of our European operations. He said that US airport security is getting so bad that people outside the US are avoiding coming here at all costs! Apparently, we're losing some serious business and tourism money, just because of our bone-headed "security" rules.

Ten fingerprints? I know I wouldn't travel anywhere where one was required!

Anyway, it's just something to think about.

Re:Hidden Costs

[kebes]

Indeed. Businesses will lose out because international partners won't be as interested (or able) to fly to the States for face-to-face meetings.

In my field, research science, the effects of the strict US rules are very apparent. Foreign scientists are having a harder and harder time coming to the US to study, collaborate, or even go to a conference. Scientists are being denied visas or putting on long waiting lists (so that they miss the conference!). The end result is a decrease in the amount of scientific collaborations between US groups and those outside the US, and more emphasis being put on non-US conferences (in Europe, Canada, Japan, etc.).

This is having a real (though difficult to measure) impact on US science. In a subtle way, there is a decrease in the flow of "advanced technical knowledge" into the US, which is to the detriment of US labs. Through these border policies, the US is isolating itself. Since ultimately science and technology are big drivers of the US economy, I see this as a very poor choice on the part of the US administration.

Re:Hidden Costs

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

<Obligatory trollish note> Given that a scarily high proportion of people in the US seem to think Intelligent Design is science, and three presidential candidates said on the record that they do not believe in evolution, I doubt these people have even noticed the decline in scientific advance, never mind questioned why it might be happening. </Obligatory trollish note>

Options:

[trolltalk.com]

[_] "You can have my fingerprints when you pry them from my cold dead hands!"

[_] "I don't have any fingers, you insensitive clod."

[_] "Fingerprints? I'll give you the finger, all right ..."

[_] (prominently displaying copy of Hustler) "You really want to take my fingerprints? Do you know where my hands have just been?"

[_] "A...CHOO! Oops - do you have a hanky? The kids ain't gonna believe the size of this greener ..."

... etc ...

All this means is more people avoiding the US rather than submit to being treated like criminals unless proven otherwise.

Ten Fingers is a Joke

[asphaltjesus]

A PHB probably said "Three fingers? Why only three fingers? Ten. Ten is better, it's more than three after all."

The system might be able to save 10 prints, but you only need 1 or 2 at most.

A couple of FYI's.
1. It's unlikely they'll store fingerprints. They typically store some kind of proprietary hash value of the fingerprint.
2. It's unlikely they'll make the authentication available to other agencies.
3. Interoperability with other countries is desired, but not likely as each system vendor makes certain that won't actually occur.
4. I will be very interested to find out if they actually get to a point where there are fingerprint readers in airports more than a couple of airports. The scale of the operation overwhelms current technology pretty quickly.

The time to be worried was long, long ago as most of your data has been collected by private agencies and sold to the government for decades now.

I'd beg to differ

[everphilski]

US's tourism accounts for 0.9% of GDP... that's nothing compared to china (5.4%), New Zealand (10%), Italy (12%), even Canada (2.5%) ... get the point? It is insignificant to the US, but critical to many other areas of the world ...

Re:I'd beg to differ

[DavidpFitz]

US's tourism accounts for 0.9% of GDP... that's nothing compared to china (5.4%), New Zealand (10%), Italy (12%), even Canada (2.5%) ... get the point? It is insignificant to the US, but critical to many other areas of the world ...

I get the point, alright. It seems the rest of the world are more interested in visiting places other than the USA!

Oh, and PS. It's not insignificant. ~1% of direct GDP accounts for a hell of a lot of indirect employment. Many, many people in your country would be up the creek without the proverbial paddle, claiming jobless assistance and generally severely weakening your economy in a quite short time.

And the strange thing is...

[msauve]

while we're busy trying to keep out the tourists and business people, we're also trying to pass laws which allow those who entered illegally to stay!

So good, it had to be repeated

[Presto Vivace]

It accomplishes even less than that. All the 9/11 terrorists had valid ID and weren't on watch lists.

Re:All the security is for nothing

[pclminion]

What I don't understand is how ANY sort of flying restriction is going to stop a determined attacker. What's to stop somebody from landing (a watercraft) somewhere along the enormous coastline of Hudson's Bay, and simply hoofing it through the Canadian wilderness to the US border and just walking into the country? If you're intent on blowing yourself up surely a little hiking isn't going to be a huge deterrent. And you get to see some beautiful country before you off yourself.

the real effect and reason for US-VISIT v2.0

[gsn]

I'm a student from India. I've been studying physics here, first as an undergrad and now as PhD student. I've also had the privilege of traveling to a fair number of countries (with the family or for research) in my relatively short life. Let me share my fun experiences with the US-VISIT program.

You land at one of the big international airports, for me O'Hare or Logan (both of which will be on this extended program). You have your passport with visa, an I-20 from your school and a filled out I-94 card ready. There are several queues, usually about 3-4 dedicated to American citizens, and a comparable number for foreigners. There is typically a lot more of the latter than the former so the queues meant for American citizens are typically empty, while the remaining queues are long and winding. I've seen a few elderly people faint during the wait in the queue before. There isn't any place to sit, and no way to get water. They've already been on long flights - the one from Madras, India where I am from usually takes ~20+ hrs with layovers.

You wait inching forward, and eventually you get to the yellow line - make sure you stand behind the yellow line (if you have a toe over you will likely get screamed at) until the Immigration official deigns to examine your papers. Not you mind - they never look at you - only your papers.

They always ask you what your name and the purpose of your visit is (never mind its on all three documents you've given them). Eventually they ask for your fingerprint. Left index finger. Scanner doesn't register that right. Do it again. Right index finger. Now pose for your mugshot. Now its going to be all ten fingers. I'm waiting for the DNA sample requests. As an added bonus they can ask you to boot your laptop up to take a look at it (the poor dears look so very confused by a slackware based distro with fluxbox)

I can tell you what US-VISIT v2.0 won't do. It won't make you safer or stop threats to the US of A from crossing your border. It hasn't so far. If it had we'd have heard about it. Going from two fingerprints to ten won't do shit either. Where the evil terrorists somehow able to defeat a hash from just two fingerprints? Can you somehow identify me to a higher confidence level now that you have all ten fingerprints instead of two? Making it ten fingers still isn't going to help unless there is some database with a bunch of terrorists with the fingerprints on file to check against. With two you can prevent people coming in under a different name. Funny how many of the 9/11 terrorists had to do that...

With ten fingerprints you can share more with other countries and see who has been visiting nasty places like Afghanistan to go to those evil terrorist training camps except that no other country I've ever visited collected my fingerprints. Ever. Nor have they made me wait in long queues to get in either. Occasionally they've even smiled at me! When we went to Canada for an APS conference in 2003, the border guard never checked my passport or visa (there was another Indian, and a Nigerian in our van along with three Americans) and joked about not bringing too many mini-kegs back with us.

I can tell you the effect this will have - it will increase the length of those queues. It will annoy more people. People who want to do business here. People who are old and want to just see their family, and have to wait in a line for two damn hours to be welcomed to America by a surly immigration official. Those people will stop coming. If everyone stops coming you will be safer! Its going to cost you and me more money (I get to pay taxes here too) since most of these airports won't be able to handle the load if a large number of international flights get here around the same time and will need larger waiting areas. It will probably create some new jobs for people who want to be surly immigration officials. And its going to get some DHS official a pat on the back and a promotion for actively fighting the terrorists. Lets not kid ourselves - that is what its about.

Re:Why don't I see this as a bad thing?

[The Angry Mick]

Because it won't defeat terrorism.

Try to remember that terrorism is not an import. Before 9/11 we had Timothy McVeigh, the Unabomber, Eric Rudolph, and host of serial killers and mass murderers that were entirely homegrown. Fingerprinting all civilians inserts the impression that all are suspect, and creates a strong resentment towards the people in power who appear to be immune from suspicion. Increased restrictions on freedom (yes, that's the same "freedom" our president claims to be protecting) only reinforces resentment, and this can lead to an overtly hostile populace. Stop to consider that this very same populace is fed a steady stream of stories about government corruption and you have a fine recipe for revolt.

This is not the idea that is "America", this is a perversion.

These are good security measures

[zoftie]

American government have much to worry about, since its total trade deficit and very weak currency, that is artificially propped up. Seeing this from perspective of economy, it may well be that government is preparing for a big one. Once the economy collapses and all the crooks of the white house and other hight governmental circles are exposed, with economy dead - people will take revenge.

Oil will get only more expensive, with weak currency, US might not afford the oil anymore.
Just a thought, It may well be all false.