UPPER MARLBORO, Md.—The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) in June began scenario testing at a facility here to evaluate the use of various biometric devices in passenger queuing processes at Customs checkpoints for entry and exit procedures for foreign travelers at the nation’s airports and is firming plans to lead to an acquisition effort, according to department officials.
The Air Entry and Exit Re-Engineering (AEER) project, which began just over a year ago and was disclosed last by DHS last summer, will eventually transition from scenario testing to field testing at an airport next year with the trial lasting into late 2015 or early 2016. Afterward, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) will review the results and plans to create an acquisition program in the FY ’17 budget request, DHS officials said in a briefing for media on June 27.
The drive toward establishing a biometric air exit solution has been a goal for Congress since the 9/11 as most of the terrorists involved in the attacks that day were in the United States legally but had overstayed their visas. Under a program formerly known as US-VISIT, CBP uses fingerprint checks to verify the identities of select foreign nationals entering the United States. but exit procedures only require biographic data to help verify that these travelers are departing the country.
Accenture [ACN] developed and implemented the biometric entry processing effort under US-VISIT.
Introducing a biometric check to the exit process—in airports, initially—is expected to increase the ability of DHS to verify that an individual who entered the country legally has left the country.
DHS in 2009 at several airports pilot tested different options for biometric exit solutions with CBP and the Transportation Security Administration and found that it is technically feasible but costly, with estimates ranging from $3 billion to $9 billion to implement these solutions, in part because of high levels of staff needed to collect the biometrics. The tests also slowed down the aircraft boarding process. The upper end of the cost estimates includes seaports and last fall one lawmaker said implementation costs are now in the half a million dollar range (Defense Daily, Sept. 27, 2013).
The goals of the AEER program include finding ways to “enhance and or increase the current capacity and throughput in today’s entry processes at U.S. ports of entry [and] assess and make recommendations on a corresponding biometric exit process,” according to Bob Burns, the program manager at the DHS Science and Technology (S&T) Directorate for the AEER project. While S&T is the lead for the AEER effort, Burns’ team is working closely with key stakeholders, including CBP and airports and airlines as it moves forward so that all voices are being considered and accounted for, he said.
The AEER effort is an Apex project, which means it is a joint, collaborative, interdisciplinary effort with the goal of solving an operational problem of strategic importance. As DHS was working through the establishment of the AEER project, department officials spent several months visiting 10 of the nation’s largest airports to understand CBP’s challenges and passenger concerns, Burns said.
The media briefing at the DHS Maryland Test Facility here was the fourth open house hosted by the department for AEER, which has generated a lot of interest, Burns said. Other open houses have included the department’s senior leadership, congressional staff, staff from the White House Office of Management and Budget, and officials from the National Institute of Standards and Technology and other government agencies, he said.
In the test scenarios for the media, DHS set up in one test bay two CBP entry processing stations to examine the use of two different types of iris capture devices in addition to the standard fingerprint capture that CBP officers currently use. In another test bay, Burns’ team demonstrated two self boarding exit solutions designed to mimic airline boarding gates. There are self boarding gates at airports in Boston and Las Vegas, and in some foreign airports where face and iris images are captured.
In one of the self-boarding exit scenarios, the traveler’s boarding pass is scanned and, if necessary, the face and iris sensors were automatically triggered to quickly capture images. In the media demonstration, it took just seconds to transit the gate system before the test subjects moved on through the mock airline gate. In the other scenario, the boarding pass is scanned and if necessary, triggers an iris capture sensor. In this case, the iris system had cameras at two levels in order to account for different individual heights.
Other exit concepts that DHS plans to test in addition to the self-boarding gate include passenger loading bridge, mobile operations, and centralized biometric capture.
Burns emphasized that for now the tests, which include 13 commercially available biometric devices from multiple vendors, are aimed in part at testing specific biometric modalities, not technologies. Just because a vendor’s technology isn’t being tested at the facility has nothing to do with whether it could ultimately be part of an exit solution, he said, adding that additional biometric devices may be tested as well.
Among other factors being assessed are process changes, space constraints, connection times, and staffing levels, a key factor in controlling costs, Burns said. The test facility can also simulate different lighting levels, which vary from airport to airport and terminal to terminal. It also includes an analysis lab where the scenarios can be monitored, recorded and analyzed in real-time to check passenger throughputs, sensor accuracy, biometric performance, and more.
It’s likely that entry and exit process solutions will vary depending on a particular airport, the officials said. Mobile biometric devices may be adequate for smaller airports that take on fewer foreign travelers, they said.
Burns also said DHS has a team looking at the various costs, including life-cycle costs, as part of plans for a business case recommendation.