The Office of Biometric Identity Management (OBIM) is requesting $274.1 million in fiscal year 2020 to continue development of its next-generation identity storage and matching capability while sustaining the start of that new capability and the system it is replacing.
The bulk of OBIM’s budget request is for operations and support of the new system, Homeland Advanced Recognition Technology (HART) and the existing IDENT system.
OBIM, which is now within the Management Directorate of the Department of Homeland Security, is asking Congress to provide $183.9 million toward program operations for HART and IDENT and $70.2 million for identity and screening program operations. The request is $23.2 million more than what Congress provided for O&S in FY ’19 due to the need to continue support for IDENT while HART is rolled out, according to budget documents DHS sent to Congress on March 18 detailing the department’s FY ’20 spending needs.
Northrop Grumman [NOC] is the prime contractor for HART.
DHS is also seeking $15.5 million for HART in acquisition funding in FY ’20. The funding will be used to support four overlapping increments of the program, including the first increment, which is the foundational infrastructure to operate and includes fingerprint matching and limited iris and facial matching.
In the fourth quarter of FY ’19, OBIM plans to achieve initial operating capability for HART.
Increment 2 is the addition of production-scale facial and iris matching, multimodal fusion capabilities, the completion of the full performance test environment, and the initial establishment of a data warehouse and data mart. The second increment is expected to be completed during the fourth quarter of FY ’20.
Northrop Grumman’s contract is only for the first two increments. In the third and fourth increments, OBM plans to add a web portal and person-centric capabilities, and additional biometric verification tools, which could include voice and DNA.
In FY ’20, OBIM plans to begin preparing a Request for Proposal for Increment 3.
Congress provided $20 million for the HART acquisition account in FY ’19.