U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) recently announced the start of a facial biometrics pilot program at the Anzalduas International Bridge in Texas for travelers arriving in the United States. This process for international travel, known as Simplified Arrival, uses facial biometrics to automate the manual document checks that are already required for admission into the United States.

The new technology will be deployed at two inbound vehicle lanes at the Anzalduas International Bridge.

As travelers approach the vehicle lanes with the facial biometric system, the camera will attempt to take a photo of each occupant in the vehicle and match it to their corresponding traveler photos already in government holdings (images such as passport, visa, or prior encounters).

The pilot will run for 120 days, after which CBP will evaluate the system’s ability to capture a quality facial image for each occupant in the vehicle, as well as the accuracy of the biometric matching to inform future biometric enhancements for vehicle entry processing.