US plans major expansion of facial recognition authority at airports

US Customs and Border Protection has filed for a significant expansion in its authority to conduct facial recognition at airports. On November 19th, the agency submitted a filing to the Federal Register seeking to expand the ongoing biometric exit program, broadening the program’s scope to include all air and land ports. The filing also shifts the program’s focus entirely to facial recognition, at the expense of alternate methods like fingerprinting.

The filing is subject to public comment for a brief time after its submission. That comment period will end on Monday, December 21st.

First deployed in 2017, biometric exit has operated as a pilot program, limited to a handful of...

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