Biometric processing of travelers using facial comparison technology “increased dramatically” in fiscal year 2020 despite a precipitous decline in overall travel to and from the U.S., Customs and Border Protection says in a report.
CBP says it processed more than 23 million travelers using facial comparison technology at entry, exit and preclearance locations with a match great above 97 percent.
“CBP sees biometric technology as the way of the future, a means of achieving faster processing times for travelers, and continuing the facilitation improvements that the agency has attained through other technologies and CBP’s Trusted Traveler programs,” the agency says in its Trade and Travel Report for Fiscal Year 2020. “Biometric technology has similarly been valuable in helping CBP accomplish its enforcement mission by confirming the identity of travelers exiting the country, providing a vital element of national security and enforcing U.S. immigration laws.”
During FY ’20, facial comparison technology for exit solutions was operated by CBP and its partners at 21 terminals at 20 U.S. airports. Simplified Arrival, which involves the use of facial comparison technology for travelers arriving on international flights to U.S. airports, was deployed to 20 terminals at 18 airports, including four preclearance locations.
CBP has also been evaluating facial comparison technology at land border crossings for pedestrians and occupied vehicles, and in partnership with the cruise line industry in the maritime environment. The report says that in FY ’20, CBP processed nearly 8 million pedestrian travelers at seven ports of entry, and processed nearly 1 million cruise line passengers at seven seaports.
Since 2018 when facial comparison technology evaluations began, CBP said that through FY ‘20 it has intercepted seven impostors that were denied admission to the U.S. and identified 285 impostors on arrival in the land pedestrian environment.
NII Savings
The report says that CBP used more than 350 large-scale non-intrusive inspection (NII) systems at land and sea ports of entry to conduct about 6.4 million examinations of conveyances and vehicles, resulting in the interdiction of more than 470,000-pounds of narcotics, $11.5 million in undeclared U.S. currency, and more than 270 seizures that led to people hidden in cargo and passenger vehicles. CBP says that it takes 8 minutes on average for an NII inspection versus 120 minutes for a physical examination, saving the agency $1 billion in annual operations and industry billions of dollars.
The report also says that CBP deployed more than 100 large-scale and small-scale NII systems at more than 25 air, land and sea locations during FY ’20. CBP expanded the use of handheld NII devices, which helped its agents identify illicit chemical substances, including fentanyl.
The agency also purchased 12 new high-energy NII systems to inspect rail cars to replace aging units at 12 southern and border locations that receive 60 percent of rail cars entering the U.S. annually, and it installed and commissioned a straddle carrier radiation portal monitor at Maher Terminal in Newark, N.J., allowing on-clock rail operations to be conducted at the port. The first straddle carrier portal was installed in 2019 at the Port of Tacoma in Washington.
CBP also made progress in the area of remote operations with radiation portal monitors (RPMs). The report says that the agency completed the first phase of its new remote operations at the Port of Los Angeles-Long Beach, and completed site designs for 10 new remote operations at the Ports of Miami, Everglades and Fort Lauderdale in Florida and at five piers at L.A.-Long Beach. Remote operations reduce the manpower required to work with RPM equipment.