DHS Outlines Mandatory Biometric ID At Airports For Foreign Travel
By Nicholas West
ActivistPost.com
JULY 15, 2017
What at first seemed like creeping tip-toe incrementalism toward the use of biometric ID for travel is quickly becoming a warp-speed reality.
Over the past couple of months I’ve been covering some disturbing developments at national airports that seem to show an acceleration of the plan to use biometric identification in a variety of ways.
On May 19th I reported on a new program initiated by Delta Airlines at Minneapolis-St. Paul airport to have automated baggage kiosks for “priority customers” that will first scan a traveler’s passport, then their face in order to match identity to checked luggage. It was promoted as a “pilot program” that Delta launched to seek customer feedback in the hope that it could be rolled out more widely in the future.
This announcement was followed by JetBlue who stated they will “test facial- and fingerprint-recognition technology at two U.S. airports to replace boarding passes, building on industry efforts to increase security and ease passage through airports.”
However, these stories were nothing compared to what followed on June 20th when U.S. Customs and Border Protection announced that they would integrate government databases with a private company to speed up biometric processing.
JetBlue is working with U.S. Customs and Border Protection and SITA, an information-technology provider for airlines.
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“This is the first integration of biometric authorization by the CBP with an airline and may prove to be a solution that will be quick and easy to roll out across U.S. airports,” Jim Peters, SITA’s chief technology officer, said in the statement. (emphasis added)
It’s a plan that has been in the making for 15 years, but is just now coming to fruition.
The Rest…HERE
