GAO Reports on Implementation of Certain Recommendations for US-VISIT

US-VISIT Being Implemented in Four Increments

The GAO's report includes a discussion of US-VISIT's four-increment implementation, highlights of which include (see report for full details):

Increment 1 (Air and Sea). The first increment concentrates on establishing capabilities at air and sea ports of entry (POEs) and is divided into two parts:

(1) Increment 1 (air and sea entry) which includes the electronic capture and matching of biographic and biometric information for selected foreign nationals. This increment was deployed on January 5, 2004 for individuals requiring a non-immigrant visa to enter the U.S., and

(2) Increment 1B (air and sea exit) involves testing of exit devices to collect biometric exit data fro select foreign nationals at 11 airports and sea ports. At this time, three exit alternatives (self-service kiosks, mobile devices, and validator devices were pilot tested).

Increment 2 (Air, Sea, and Land). The second increment focuses on extending US-VISIT to land POEs. This increment is divided into three parts:

(1) Increment 2A (air, sea, and land) includes the capability to biometrically compare and authenticate valid machine-readable visas and other travel and entry documents issued to foreign nationals at all POEs. This phase was deployed on October 23, 2005 and also includes the deployment of technology to read biometrically enabled passports from visa waiver countries by October 26, 2006.

(2) Increment 2B (land entry), which was deployed as of December 29, 2004, redesigns the Increment 1 entry solution and expands it to be 50 busiest land POEs.

(3) Increment 2C is to provide the capability to automatically, passively, and remotely record the entry and exit of covered individuals using radio frequency (RF) technology tags at primary inspection and exit lanes. This process was deployed at 5 border crossings in August 2005. The results of this demonstration are to be reported in February 2006.

Increment 3 (Land). The GAO states that increment 3, which was completed as of December 19, 2005, extended Increment 2B (land entry) capabilities to 104 land ports.

Increment 4 (Future). According to the GAO, increment 4 is the strategic US-VISIT program capability, which program officials stated will likely consist of a further series of incremental releases or mission capability enhancements that will support business outcomes. The program reports that it has worked with its prime contractor and partners to develop this overall vision for the immigration and border management enterprise.

GAO Finds that DHS' Implementation of Recommendations for US-VISIT is Mixed

GAO explains that it has made many recommendations to improve the US-VISIT program, all of which the DHS has agreed to implement.

In addition, GAO states that DHS has implemented 2 of the 18 recommendations discussed in the GAO report (i.e., to define program staff positions, roles, and responsibilities and it also hired an independent verification and validation contractor).

The GAO adds that DHS has also taken steps to implement the other recommendations and has partially completed 11 and is beginning to implement another 5. However, considerable time has passed since the recommendations were made, and key actions have not yet been taken in such critical areas as: (1) assessing security risks and planning for cost-effective controls to address the risks, (2) determining - before US-VISIT increments are deployed - whether each increment will produce mission value commensurate with cost and risk, and (3) ensuring that each increment is adequately tested.

GAO Report (GAO-06-296, dated 02/14/06) available athttp://www.gao.gov/new.items/d06296.pdf