Automated Entry-Exit System: Key to National Security

Every year, millions of foreigners enter the U.S. as “nonimmigrants” (visitors or workers) for a limited period. Although they are expected to return home at the end of their visit, there is no effective means for detecting those who do not.

Without entry-exit controls, the U.S. has no way of noticing whether a visitor unlawfully overstays his/her entry permit. In the absence of such a system, terrorists and other criminals can more easily enter the U.S. and remain to threaten us from within. Several of the September 11th hijackers did exactly this and overstayed their visas undetected, able to remain unnoticed for the years it took them to plan their attacks.

Mandates and Delays

Congress had mandated an entry-exit system in 1996 (as part of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act, or IIRAIRA), but due to objections from the tourism industry and others, full implementation was delayed until 2005.

After the September 11th atttacks, when it became clear that the nation's ability to track foreign visitors was critical to national security, the matter took on more urgency. The Border Security Act of 2002 again mandated the implementation of a computerized entry-exit database—but again not until 2005.

As an interim measure, a new registration program called NSEERS (National Security Entry-Exit Registration System) tracks males aged sixteen or older who are not naturalized citizens or permanent immigrants and who come from certain countries considered terrorist risks. They are required to register with the federal government and submit photographs and fingerprints to be checked against a database of known criminals and terrorists. Failure to register could result in deportation and criminal charges.

A New System Emerges

As the full entry-exit system—called the U.S. Visitor and Immigrant Status Indication Technology (US-VISIT) system—is implemented, it will replace NSEERS altogether.

US-VISIT will create an electronic check-in/check-out system for foreign visitors, including students, tourists, and business travelers, and will require the use of at least two biometric identifiers, such as fingerprints, when entering and leaving the country.

US-VISIT will be introduced at seaports, international airports, and land border crossings in 2004 and be fully operational by 2005.

A Possible Chink in the Armor

For the US-VISIT system to be fully effective, it must collect data on all foreign visitors. Otherwise, the system will offer the opportunity to terrorists to pass through under the guise of whoever is exempt. Yet U.S. Ambassador to Canada Paul Cellucci has publicly indicated that such an exemption for Canadians is under consideration. This would pose a serious security issue because Canada is the host to hundreds of thousands of immigrants and refugees and asylum claimants from around the world, including a large number of persons with known and suspected ties to Moslem terrorist groups. These people may have become Canadian citizens or they may simply be Canadian residents, but in either case they are likely to possess Canadian driver’s licenses and be largely indistinguishable from Canadians crossing the border. (Canadians themselves do not object to being included in the entry-exit system; more than 70 percent say the U.S. has the right to track the entry and exit of all foreign visitors, including Canadians.¹)

It is clear that developing the capability to track foreign visitors at the land ports of entry with Mexico and Canada will be the greatest challenge for the US-VISIT system. Of almost 42 million foreign visitors in 2002, 13 million were Canadians and nearly 10 million were Mexicans. But, if the system does not collect information on entry and exit of travelers at the land ports, then the system would be badly flawed—both because it could allow unwanted aliens to slip into the country and, more importantly, because it could allow visitors who entered by air and sea to leave by land and, therefore, undermine the system by giving false signals that foreigners were staying illegally in the country when that was not the case. This is what rendered previous attempts to collect entry-exit data on air travelers only eventually useless.

ACCOMMODATING Commercial Interests

Innovative solutions may be required to make the US-VISIT system fully operational while accommodating commercial interests. One possibility, because the vast majority of land border crossers are for short shopping and business trips in border areas, would be to exempt local border visits using a border crossing card from the new database. Then, only land port of entry travelers who were continuing on into the interior of the United States and for extended stays, and who now need a visa rather than the border crossing card, would be entered into the new database. That system requires continuing and probably strengthing the Border Patrol operation of secondary inspections at airports, bus and rail terminals along the border, and on highways leading into the interior of the country.

Another possible means to make the system more manageable would be a shared data collection responsibility with the Canadian authorities. Under this proposal, which is currently under discussion, U.S. and Canadian authorities would collect entry data on all entering travelers and then swap the data so that entries into Canada provided the same data as departures from the United States.

Any accommodations in the data collection system at land ports of entry for local visitors should be carefully evaluated to determine the possibility for exploitation by terrorists under worst case scenarios. While international trade and tourism and cross-border travel are extremely important, they cannot be allowed to override security, especially when the threat includes the possible use of weapons of mass destruction by terrorists.

[1] COMPAS Inc./National Post/Global National poll, April 2003.

Updated 1/04