By Associated Press
Niagara Falls, NY – Juan Valencia was nonchalant Friday as his fingerprints were electronically matched against more than a million prints of criminals, suspected terrorists and others not welcome in the United States.
After a few minutes, a computer screen before the U.S. Customs agent processing Valencia flashed "no hit found," the all-clear for the Frenchman to enter the country.
"I guess it's fine," Valencia said after becoming one of the first foreign visitors to encounter the US-VISIT biometric entry procedures at the U.S.-Canadian border at Niagara Falls.
The Department of Homeland Security's new technology is meant to speed the processing of those traveling with passports or visas and flag those on terror or law enforcement watch lists.
Valencia, who lives in England, said he understood the privacy concerns some might have in submitting to the digital fingerprinting and face scan that are now mandatory.
But, "To me, it's not such a big deal ... So they have my fingerprints. So what?" he said before leaving the Rainbow Bridge inspection station with his wife, Jacqueline Blatiere, who also cleared the procedure.
"The only people it really affects are the people with something to hide, and it ferrets them out," said Robert Mocny, deputy director of the US-VISIT program, which will be in place in the country's 50 busiest land ports by the end of the month and at all 165 land border crossings by the end of next year.
It has been implemented this month throughout New York state, including at the Peace Bridge and Lewiston-Queenston bridges in western New York and at Massena, Ogdensburg and Champlain to the north.
Visitors are required to place their left, then right index fingers on a brick-sized reader and then look into an eyeball-shaped camera atop a tripod for a digital picture. An officer also scans the visitor's travel documents, saving him from filling out an I-94 arrival/departure form by hand. The biometric information is not only scanned against watch lists, but also verified with information taken when the travel documents were issued.
The program has processed 14 million travelers at 115 airports and 14 seaports since January, and has found "350 people who were somebody other than who they said they were," Mocny said, including people wanted for rape and manslaughter.
Most Canadians, who represent the bulk of visitors to the United States across the northern border, are visa-exempt and will not be subjected to the checks. Nor will children under 14 or adults over the age of 79.
Similarly, at the southern border, most Mexican visitors with certain visas allowing regular entry into the United States are exempt from the biometric checks.
DHS is developing an exit-tracking strategy at land borders, keeping in mind the need to keep the $1 billion in daily commerce between the United States and Canada flowing, authorities said. The need was outlined by the Sept. 11 commission, which endorsed US-VISIT.