Facial Recognition Is Coming To US Airports (theverge.com)

Facial recognition systems will be coming to U.S. airports in the very near future. "Customs and Border Protection first started testing facial recognition systems at Dulles Airport in 2015, then expanded the tests to New York's JFK Airport last year," reports The Verge. "Now, a new project is poised to bring those same systems to every international airport in America." From the report: Called Biometric Exit, the project would use facial matching systems to identify every visa holder as they leave the country. Passengers would have their photos taken immediately before boarding, to be matched with the passport-style photos provided with the visa application. If there's no match in the system, it could be evidence that the visitor entered the country illegally. The system is currently being tested on a single flight from Atlanta to Tokyo, but after being expedited by the Trump administration, it's expected to expand to more airports this summer, eventually rolling out to every international flight and border crossing in the U.S. U.S. Customs and Border Protection's Larry Panetta, who took over the airport portion of the project in February, explained the advantages of facial recognition at the Border Security Expo last week. "Facial recognition is the path forward we're working on," Panetta said at the conference. "We currently have everyone's photo, so we don't need to do any sort of enrollment. We have access to the Department of State records so we have photos of U.S. Citizens, we have visa photos, we have photos of people when they cross into the U.S. and their biometrics are captured into [DHS biometric database] IDENT."

Comments

Beard or no beard.

[psergiu]

Do you have a beard and you want to shave-it ?
Are-you planing to get a nice healthy tan for your white skin ?
Considering another hair colour or coloured contact lenses ?
If you need to fly, better reconsider until the software comparing the before & after photos gets at least a couple of updates :)

Re:Beard or no beard.

[Mitreya]

If you need to fly, better reconsider until the software comparing the before & after photos gets at least a couple of updates :)

Isn't it nice, that the guys running this system
1. Don't care how much they inconvenience you
2. Don't care how accurate the system is
3. Don't even care if it catches anyone, because clearly catching terrorists is not directly related to their job performance evaluation

The only thing they really care about is how much taxpayer money it will cost and maybe how much useful data it will generate for them.

So given the (theoretical) miracle of free market, where is non-TSA, pre-9-11 airport I can fly from?

Re:Beard or no beard.

[AHuxley]

Given unique distance data is gathered from all over the face e.g. the ears, eyes, facial hair would have been considered as one of the most easy ways to try and fool the systems over the decades of testing around the world.
In a very old system a person could try looking up, down, using a hat, very complex glasses, could try and bring a new hair style down over the face.
A human would quickly notice such attempts and ask the illegal migrant to look at the camera, remove the hat and ensure the system could get an image that matches entry to the USA.
This is not a CCTV image. Light, position, attempts at deceptive fashion, not been able to get a good image can all be taken into account and be corrected. A lot of funding and work has gone into getting a lot of information from any face in any image e.g. social media, CCTV, side on, a person looking up, down, left, right. More unique data is been capture from all over the face than in past attempts.

Yawn...

[Anonymous Coward]

We've been doing this in Australia for a decade. It's called "SmartGate"

Re:Isn't this backwards??

[AHuxley]

AC Re 'Why not check incoming faces"
The illegal migrants sneak in illegally or get help to enter the USA without documentation. So its hard to get an entry image.

Once in the USA the illegal immigrant might buy, create or use documents as needed domestically.
Different state and federal databases cant share a lot of details due to domestic privacy protections so some forged, borrowed or documents obtained by deception can be used to build a larger collection of real paperwork.
At some time on average the illegal migrant might feel so arrogant that they think they can travel out and then just return to the USA.
That is when reconciling exit images is so powerful. The illegal immigrant is finally detected and so is the full history of their forged documentation.
Citizenship or legal documents to be in the USA will soon be needed at the state and city level too finally removing the ability to obtain city or state cover to remain in the USA.

Re:Not so great for facial hair.

[rsilvergun]

Then you get extra scrutiny if you have a beard because, of course, you look like a threat.

This is America, so no change then?

I kid, kid.

Re:Not so great for facial hair.

[Kiuas]

This is America, so no change then?

I kid, kid.

I'm not american and I know this is offtopic but I have karma to burn. I admit i laughed at first toó but this doesn't feel like much of a joke after just seeing the recent dashcam footage of a legal firearm owner being summarily executed by an incompetent cop with inadequate/improper training and getting acquitted.

Forget about the talk of 'racism', this goes far beyond such things. What confuses me the most however is the deafening silence of groups like the NRA who normally make so much noise about upholding gun rights, but now that a law abiding citizen who even lets the officer now he's carrying a firearm in his vehicle just gets 4 shots at him from point blank range nobody says anything.

Think about what this case is signalling: it doesn't matter if you do everything right. It doesn't matter if you're not hostile and have a license to carry a firearm. If the cop is twitchy and panics, whether it's because he's racist and scared of you simply due to your skin tone or because he's an incompetent asshole makes no difference, he can just shoot you dead on the spot and face no consequences. All it takes is for the cop to say that he felt as if he's in danger. As feelings are subjective it doesn't need to be justified in any way.

Think about the stupidity of the argument in this specific case: they essentially convinced a jury that the officer in question hears the man saying he has a firearm and thought process in the immediate seconds following this statement is: "shit, this guy just informed me he has a legal firearm, the next thing he's probably going to do is pull it out and unload on me with his wife and kid in the car, that's how all the gangsters always operate. Best err on the side of caution and go directly to LETHAL FORCE'. You can clearly see in the video that the cop panics. He hears the word 'firearm' and goes from 'okay' to 'don't pull it out then' to four shots to the chest in like less than 5 seconds. The guy even mentions that the weapon is in his glove box. so there's no practical way for the him to get to his gun fast enough in order for him to present any actual danger to the officer. And the jury's like 'Oh that makes sense, he had reasonable cause'. What? This behavior would make more sense in a country like Japan where guns are banned almost entirely and the cops don't usually have to deal with armed citizenry. I was under the impression that american police training would deal with these kinds of cases a lot because you have the most guns per capita so these kind of encounters should be standard procedure for the cops.

Can anybody argue after this that the right of the people to keep and bear arms is not infringed if carrying one legally gets you killed by the law for doing nothing except following the rules?