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DISRUPTING TERRORIST TRAVEL:

SAFEGUARDING AMERICA’S BORDERS

THROUGH INFORMATION SHARING

JOINT HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON INFRASTRUCTURE 

AND BORDER SECURITY

AND THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE AND 

COUNTERRORISM

OF THE

SELECT COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND 

SECURITY

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED EIGHTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

SEPTEMBER 30, 2004

Serial No. 108–60

Printed for the use of the Select Committee on Homeland Security

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/index.html
SELECT COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY

CHRISTOPHER COX, California, Chairman 

JENNIFER DUNN, Washington 

C.W. BILL YOUNG, Florida 

DON YOUNG, Alaska 

F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, JR., Wisconsin 

DAVID DREIER, California 

DUNCAN HUNTER, California 

HAROLD ROGERS, Kentucky 

SHERWOOD BOEHLERT, New York 

JOE BARTON, Texas 

LAMAR S. SMITH, Texas 

CURT WELDON, Pennsylvania 

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut 

PORTER J. GOSS, Florida 

DAVE CAMP, Michigan 

LINCOLN DIAZ-BALART, Florida 

BOB GOODLATTE, Virginia 

ERNEST J. ISTOOK, JR., Oklahoma 

PETER T. KING, New York 

JOHN LINDER, Georgia 

JOHN B. SHADEGG, Arizona 

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana 

MAC THORNBERRY, Texas 

JIM GIBBONS, Nevada 

KAY GRANGER, Texas 

PETE SESSIONS, Texas 

JOHN E. SWEENEY, New York 

JIM TURNER, Texas, Ranking Member 

BENNIE G. THOMPSON, Mississippi 

LORETTA SANCHEZ, California 

EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts 

NORMAN D. DICKS, Washington 

BARNEY FRANK, Massachusetts 

JANE HARMAN, California 

BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland 

LOUISE MCINTOSH SLAUGHTER, New York 

PETER A. DEFAZIO, Oregon 

NITA M. LOWEY, New York 

ROBERT E. ANDREWS, New Jersey 

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of 

Columbia 

ZOE LOFGREN, California 

KAREN MCCARTHY, Missouri 

SHEILA JACKSON-LEE, Texas 

BILL PASCRELL, JR., New Jersey 

DONNA M. CHRISTENSEN, U.S. Virgin Islands 

BOB ETHERIDGE, North Carolina 

KEN LUCAS, Kentucky 

JAMES R. LANGEVIN, Rhode Island 

KENDRICK B. MEEK, Florida 

BEN CHANDLER, Kentucky 

JOHN GANNON, Chief of Staff 

STEPHEN DEVINE, Deputy Staff Director and General Counsel 

THOMAS DILENGE, Chief Counsel and Policy Director 

DAVID H. SCHANZER, Democrat Staff Director 

MARK T. MAGEE, Democrat Deputy Staff Director 

MICHAEL S. TWINCHEK, Chief Clerk 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON INFRASTRUCTURE AND BORDER SECURITY

DAVE CAMP, Michigan, Chairman 

KAY GRANGER, Texas, 

JENNIFER DUNN, Washington 

DON YOUNG, Alaska 

DUNCAN HUNTER, California 

LAMAR SMITH, Texas 

LINCOLN DIAZ-BALART, Florida 

ROBERT W. GOODLATTE, Virginia 

ERNEST ISTOOK, Oklahoma 

JOHN SHADEGG, Arizona 

MARK SOUDER, Indiana 

JOHN SWEENEY, New York 

CHRISTOPHER COX, California, Ex Officio 

LORETTA SANCHEZ, California, Ranking 

Member 

EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts 

NORMAN D. DICKS, Washington 

BARNEY FRANK, Massachusetts 

BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland 

LOUISE MCINTOSH SLAUGHTER, New York 

PETER A. DEFAZIO, Oregon 

SHEILA JACKSON-LEE, Texas 

BILL PASCRELL, JR., New Jersey 

KENDRICK B. MEEK, Florida 

JIM TURNER, TEXAS, Ex Officio

(II) 
SUBCOMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE AND COUNTERTERRORISM

JIM GIBBONS, Nevada, Chairman 

JOHN SWEENEY, New York 

JENNIFER DUNN, Washington 

C.W. BILL YOUNG, Florida 

HAROLD ROGERS, Kentucky 

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut 

LAMAR SMITH, Texas 

PORTER GOSS, Florida 

PETER KING, New York 

JOHN LINDER, Georgia 

JOHN SHADEGG, Arizona 

MAC THORNBERRY, Texas 

CHRISTOPHER COX, California, Ex Officio 

KAREN MCCARTHY, Missouri, Ranking 

Member 

EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts 

NORMAN D. DICKS, Washington 

BARNEY FRANK, Massachusetts 

JANE HARMAN, California 

NITA M. LOWEY, New York 

ROBERT E. ANDREWS, New Jersey 

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of 

Columbia 

JAMES R. LANGEVIN, Rhode Island 

KENDRICK B. MEEK, Florida 

JIM TURNER, TEXAS, Ex Officio 

(III) 

(V)

C O N T E N T S 

Page 

STATEMENTS

The Honorable Dave Camp, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of Michigan, and Chairman, Subcommittee on Infrastructure and Border 

Security: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 1

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 4

The Honorable Loretta Sanchez, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of California, and Subcommittee on Infrastructure and Border 

Security ................................................................................................................. 20 

The Honorable Jim Gibbons, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of Nevada, and Chairman, Subcommittee on Intelligence and 

Counterterrorism .................................................................................................. 4

The Honorable Karen McCarthy, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Missouri, and Ranking Member, Subcommittee on Intelligence 

and Counterterrorism .......................................................................................... 24

The Honorable Christopher Cox, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of California, and Chairman, Select Committee on Homeland 

Security: Prepared Statement ............................................................................. 2 

The Honorable Jim Turner, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of Texas, and Ranking Member, Select Committee on Homeland Security .... 36 

The Honorable Robert E. Andrews, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of New Jersey ............................................................................................. 26

The Norman D. Dicks, a Representative in Congress From the State of 

Washington ........................................................................................................... 42

The Honorable James R. Langevin, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Rhode Island ........................................................................................... 34 

The Honorable Nita M. Lowey, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of New York .......................................................................................................... 31

The Honorable Bill Pascrell, Jr., a Representative in Congress From the 

State of North Carolina ....................................................................................... 28

WITNESSES 

Lieutenant General Patrick Hughes, Assistant Secretary for Information 

Analysis, Department of Homeland Security: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 5

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 6

The Honorable C. Stewart Verdery, Jr., Assistant Secretary, Border and 

Transportation Security Policy and Planning, Department of Homeland 

Security: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 9

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 11

Professor Lawrence M. Wein, Graduate School of Business, Stanford 

University: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 38

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 40

FOR THE RECORD 

The Honorable C. Stewart Verdery, Jr. and Lieutenant General Partrick 

Hughes Responses: 

Questions from the Honorable Christopher Cox ............................................... 49

Questions from the Honorable Dave Camp and the Honorable Jim Gibbons . 52
Page

VI

Professor Lawrence M. Wein Responses to Questions: 

Questions from the Honorable Dave Camp and Chairman Gibbons ............... 68 
(1)

DISRUPTING TERRORIST TRAVEL: 

SAFEGUARDING AMERICA’S BORDERS 

THROUGH INFORMATION SHARING 

Thursday, September 30, 2004

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

SELECT COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY, 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON INFRASTRUCTURE

AND BORDER SECURITY, 

AND THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE

AND COUNTERTERRORISM, 

Washington, DC. 

The subcommittees met, pursuant to call, at 1:05 p.m., in Room 

210, Cannon House Office Building, Hon. Dave Camp [chairman of 

the Subcommittee on Infrastructure and Border Security] Presiding. 

Present from Subcommittee on Infrastructure and Border Security: Representatives Camp, Dunn, Sanchez, Dicks and Pascrell. 

Present from Subcommittee on Intelligence and 

Counterterrorism: Gibbons, Dunn, McCarthy, Langevin, Dicks, 

Lowey and Andrews. 

Mr. CAMP. The joint hearing of the Subcommittee on Infrastructure and Border Security and the Subcommittee on Intelligence 

and Counterterrorism will come to order. The subcommittees are 

meeting jointly today to hear testimony on the Department of 

Homeland Security’s efforts regarding terrorists’ disruption of travel. The purpose of this hearing is to look at the recommendations 

made by the 9/11 Commission report and examine DHS’s efforts to 

obtain, analyze and disseminate terrorist travel information. 

On the first panel we have General Patrick Hughes, who is the 

Assistant Secretary for Information Analysis, and Assistant Secretary Stewart Verdery from the Border and Transportation Security Policy Office. And on the second panel we will hear from Professor Lawrence Wein from Stanford University, who will provide 

an overview of research he has done regarding the US-VISIT program. And I would like to officially welcome all of our witnesses. 

I ask unanimous consent that Member opening statements be included in the hearing record, and encourage members of both subcommittees to submit their opening statements for the record.
2

[The information follows:]

PREPARED OPENING STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE CHRISTOPHER COX, A

REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA, AND CHAIRMAN, 

SELECT COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY

Let me begin by commending Chairman Camp and Chairman Gibbons for working collaboratively to address the critical issue of terrorist travel and information 

sharing. I also would like to welcome and thank Assistant Secretary Hughes and 

Assistant Secretary Verdery for appearing before the panel today. 

Over the past 18 months, DHS has implemented several reforms to strengthen 

our Nation’s borders and improve information sharing—from enhancing the National Targeting Center to strengthening relationships with state and local law enforcement. Further, President Bush continues to provide strong leadership to 

strengthen our collective security, with the creation of the Terrorist Screening Center (TSC) and the Terrorist Threat Integration Center (TTIC), and now the National 

Counterterrorism Center. Although these reforms have made us safer, there is still 

more work to be done. Currently, Congress is considering a wide range of legislative 

proposals and will soon deliver a set of reforms designed to further facilitate information sharing between our intelligence and homeland security agencies, and to 

strengthen our security here at home. 

The 9/11 Commission report helped to energize the current debate in these chambers about homeland security and information sharing within our intelligence communities. The Commission’s report focused significant attention on the issue now 

commonly referred to as ‘‘terrorist travel.’’ The 9/11 Commission Report urges us to 

address the issue of terrorist travel with the same vigor and focus that we are 

brining to terrorist financing. 

I wholeheartedly agree and am glad to see that Speaker Hastert’s 9/11 Commission recommendations implementation bill incorporates many significant provisions 

relating to terrorist travel, some of which were proposed by this Committee. 

While limiting access to money hinders terrorists’ ability to carry out a mission, 

combating terrorist travel, especially into the United States, will significantly disrupt our enemy’s ability to move operatives into position to launch an attack. Today, 

we will examine how DHS currently is organized to address this critical issue, and 

discuss how the Department should move towards further implementation of the 

Commission’s recommendation in this area. 

In discussing the issue of terrorist travel, the Commission stated, ‘‘For terrorists, 

travel documents are as important as weapons. Terrorist must travel clandestinely 

to meet, train, plan, case targets, and gain access to attack. To [terrorists], international travel presents great danger, because they must surface to pass through 

regulated channels, present themselves to border security officials, or attempt to circumvent inspection points. In their travels, terrorists use evasive methods, such as 

altered and counterfeit passports and visas, specific travel methods and routes, liaisons with corrupt government officials, human smuggling networks, supportive travel agencies, and immigration and identity fraud.’’ 

Combating terrorist travel will require a multi-faceted approach that will reach 

across several DHS components and agencies. Potential terrorists may interact with 

the U.S. Government at an embassy or consular office overseas, a Border Patrol 

agent if they cross between ports-of-entry or are stopped at an interior checkpoint, 

a U.S. Customs and Border Protection inspector at our land and air ports-of-entry, 

and the U.S. Coast Guard on our waters and at our sea ports-of-entry.
3
4

Every encounter presents an opportunity for our front-line DHS personnel to disrupt terrorist travel. The ever-changing and developing intelligence and information 

related to terrorist travel techniques, documents, and trends needs to be effectively 

incorporated into the daily activities of our front-line DHS personnel, and we will 

discuss today how to make that happen as effectively as possible. 

In addition, international efforts also are required to effectively combat terrorist 

travel, and will involve our DHS personnel located overseas, working hand in hand 

with their State Department counterparts. If a terrorist’s ability to travel is limited 

before reaching our borders, our homeland security will be strengthened and we will 

move closer to winning the War on Terrorism. 

We need to continue to tear down the walls and improve sharing of information 

in order to make continued progress in homeland security. Success in this struggle 

depends upon good information getting to the right people at the right time. 

I look forward to your testimony this afternoon, and thank you for your appearance today.

Mr. CAMP. And because this is a joint hearing, Members will be 

recognized based on order of appearance. And having said that, I 

will submit my opening statement for the record. 

[The information follows:]

PREPARED OPENING STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE DAVE CAMP, A REPRESENTATIVE

IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF MICHIGAN, AND CHAIRMAN, SUBCOMMITTEE ON

INFRASTRUCTURE AND BORDER SECURITY

Disrupting terrorists in their efforts to enter into and freely travel within the 

United States is a critical part of fighting the War on Terrorism. The 9/11 Commission Report highlighted the flaws in U.S border and immigration laws that the 9/

11 hijackers exploited. Many of these gaps have been addressed since September 

11th, yet the Commission stressed that terrorist travel must remain a specific focus 

of security efforts. 

I hope to stress with this hearing that DHS must continue to develop and expand 

its ability to analyze terrorist techniques, patterns, indicators, and trends to enable 

front line personnel to identify, intercept, and disrupt terrorist seeking to travel to 

the United States. 

One thing that is very apparent is that DHS has a very wide range of resources 

and capabilities to disrupt terrorist travel. However, it is unclear to me how well 

all of these resources are utilized and coordinated. There is the National Targeting 

Center, the Fraudulent Documents Lab, Benefit Fraud Units, various BTS and 

Coast Guard intelligence offices, and Information Analysis Division. And that’s just 

to name a few. With resources spread across the department, one of the concerns 

I have is making sure that there is a dedicated focus to ensure that terrorist travel 

detection remains a priority and that there is Department-wide coordination effort. 

There is no doubt that combating terrorist travel will require a multi-faceted approach across all DHS components and several other Federal agencies. Potential terrorists may interact with the U.S. Government at an embassy or consular office 

overseas, a border and immigration inspector, or a TSA screener as they seek to 

travel within the U.S. 

Each of these encounters presents an opportunity to detect terrorist travel. In addition, numerous pieces of information are used throughout this process, including 

visas, passports, travel plans, and intelligence reports. Given these various pieces 

of information and encounters with potential terrorists, this information needs to be 

integrated across the Federal government to create a current threat picture that can 

be used to identify and stop terrorist travel. 

I look forward to hearing from our witnesses today as they seek to address these 

very important issues.

Mr. CAMP. And at this time I would recognize Mr. Gibbons. 

Chairman of the Intelligence and Counterterrorism Subcommittee 

is now recognized for any opening statement he may have. 

Mr. GIBBONS. Thank you very much, Chairman Camp. And to 

our guests today, welcome. General Hughes, it is great to see you 

back before us. And, Assistant Secretary Verdery, thanks very 

much for your presence here as well today. It is an important hearing we are going to have today and I know that your testimony is 

very valuable, and I, like Chairman Camp, am going to follow his 
5

lead and put my opening statement into the record so that we can 

move along quickly and expeditiously so that we don’t take more 

of your time. 

I know that you are both facing immense challenges right now, 

and it is an exceedingly important job, and we look forward to 

hearing your testimony today. 

And with that, Mr. Chairman, I will submit my testimony for the 

record. 

Mr. CAMP. All right. I think at this point—are there any other 

opening statements? 

All right. I think at this point we will go to our witnesses, and 

I again like to thank them for being here. General Hughes, we will 

begin with you. We have received your written testimony, and we 

will ask that you briefly summarize in 5 minutes your statement. 

Thank you. 

STATEMENT OF LIEUTENANT GENERAL PATRICK HUGHES, 

ASSISTANT SECRETARY, INFORMATION ANALYSIS, 

DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY 

General HUGHES. Thank you very much, and good day, Chairman Camp and Chairman Gibbons and distinguished members of 

the committee, joint committees I guess. 

As you know, the Department of Homeland Security was envisioned, formed and is now in operation. President Bush’s decision 

to establish the Department has enabled us to unify our diverse resources into one team to prevent terrorism in the whole land, to 

ready ourselves against our enemy, and to ensure the highest level 

of protection for our country and the citizens we serve. 

Through the Homeland Security Act of 2002, among other things, 

we are charged with integrating relevant information, intelligence 

analysis and vulnerability assessments to identify threats, to inform preventive priorities and to support protective measures. We 

are doing this in partnership primarily with Federal partners and 

State and local governments, agencies, and other organizations 

that we find at the State and below level, and with our partners 

in the private sector. 

The Office of Information Analysis, which I represent, is the 

heart of intelligence at the Department of Homeland Security. It is 

responsible for accessing and analyzing the entire array of intelligence related to threats against the homeland and making that 

information useful to our Federal partners, first responders, and 

anyone in the United States who can use that information and has 

the right to receive it. IA provides a full range of intelligence support to the Secretary and DHS leadership and to all of our components. Additionally, IA assures that the best intelligence information available informs the administration of the Homeland Security 

Advisory System. 

In order to perform these duties, we must receive intelligence 

from a number of sources, including not only the United States Intelligence Community and our State, local, territorial, tribal and 

private sector partners, but also from Department of Homeland Security entities with intelligence capabilities. The large amount of 

information we coordinate includes reporting from the United 

States Secret Service, the United States Coast Guard; the Border 
6

and Transportation Security Directorate; Immigration and Customs 

Enforcement, including the Federal Protective Service and the Federal Air Marshal Service; Customs and Border Protection; the 

Transportation Security Administration; the Office of Citizenship 

and Immigration Services; and the Federal Emergency Management Agency; 180,000 plus persons on the ground throughout the 

country acting as eyes and ears, enforcers, and workers, and policymakers in some cases in order to protect the country. 

We represent a primary element of the United States Intelligence 

Community, a powerful source of information and a powerful capability in order to use the information we have to protect our citizens. We have a sense of purpose, and we have embarked on what 

has likely never been done before with regard to information fusion: to fully understand the threat and the conditions that make 

that information useful at a utilitarian level for such a broad range 

of officials from city mayors to Border Patrol agents, to airport 

screeners, to critical infrastructure operators, to the cop on the 

beat. 

This concludes my oral statement. I would be happy to answer 

any questions you have today, and I am looking forward to our 

interaction. Thank you. 

Mr. CAMP. Thank you very much. 

[The statement of General Hughes follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF PATRICK M. HUGHES

Good morning Chairman Camp, Chairman Gibbons, and distinguished members 

of the Committee. I am privileged to appear before you today to discuss information 

sharing and collaboration, and the role of the Office of Information Analysis (IA), 

within the Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection Directorate (IAIP) of 

the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). 

In the aftermath of 9/11, the Department of Homeland Security was envisioned, 

formed, and is now in operation. Standing up the Department, the largest reorganization of government in fifty years, has been a great undertaking. Many employees of DHS have assumed new responsibilities, and all have put in long hours to 

ensure that while our strategies may change to meet the terrorist threat, our course 

as a nation will remain constant. President Bush’s decision to establish the Department has enabled us to unify our diverse resources into one team, to ready ourselves 

against our enemy, and to ensure the highest level of protection for our country and 

the citizens we serve. 

Through the Homeland Security Act of 2002, IAIP, and consequently IA, is 

charged with ‘‘integrating relevant information, intelligence analyses, and vulnerability assessments (whether such information, analyses, or assessments are provided or produced by the Department or others) to identify protective priorities and 

support protective measures by the Department, by other executive agencies, by 

State and local government personnel, agencies, and authorities, by the private sector, and by other entities.’’ In addition, Section 892 of the Homeland Security Act 

and Executive Order 13311 establish the Secretary of Homeland Security as responsible for information sharing across the Federal government and with State, Tribal, 

and local government, as well as private sector security responsible for protecting 

the nations critical infrastructure. The Secretary has delegated this to the Under 

Secretary for IAIP. 

IA is the heart of the intelligence effort at DHS. It is responsible for accessing 

and analyzing the entire array of intelligence relating to threats against the homeland, operational reporting from across DHS and State and local law enforcement, 

and assimilating disparate operational and intelligence information, making that information useful to federal partners, first responders, State, territorial, tribal, local, 

and major city governments, and the private sector. IA provides the full-range of 

intelligence support to the Secretary, DHS leadership, the Undersecretary for IAIP, 

and DHS components. Additionally, IA ensures that the best intelligence available 

informs the administration of the Homeland Security Advisory System. 
7

In order to perform these duties, IA must receive intelligence from a number of 

sources, including the United States Intelligence Community (IC), particularly the 

Federal Bureau of Investigation- the primary interface with law enforcement entities around the country, and our afore mentioned State, territorial, tribal, local and 

private sector partners, but also from all DHS entities with intelligence capabilities 

as well as DHS operational entities. The large amount of information IA coordinates 

includes reporting from the United States Secret Service (USSS), the United States 

Coast Guard (USCG), the Border and Transportation Security Directorate (BTS), 

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) including the Federal Protective Service (FPS) and the Federal Air Marshal Service (FAMS), Customs and Border Protection (CBP), the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), the U.S. Citizenship 

and Immigration Services (CIS), and the Federal Emergency Management Agency 

(FEMA). In addition, IA interfaces with our colleagues in the Infrastructure Protection (IP) Office of the IAIP Directorate to achieve one the cornerstones of the Department of Homeland Security, to deliver threat-informed vulnerability and risk 

assessments regarding our critical infrastructure, to our constituents and customers—notably the private sector that holds most of our nation’s critical national 

infrastructure. We are an integral part of the Homeland Security Operations Center 

(HSOC) effort to monitor and communicate on all matters of homeland security interest 24X7. We also relate directly to the Integrated Staff element of DHS, the operations directorate that is responsible for planning and developing operations concepts and orders to DHS components and to our partner organizations. We attend 

all IC and White House collaboration and coordination meetings, including many 

that are accomplished by secure video teleconference. Our involvement in information sharing and collaboration includes all of this and more. 

Information sharing and collaboration is not a one-way street. In addition to receiving information from these entities, IA delivers the intelligence it coordinates to 

our partners as appropriate. This requires IA to share information and collaborate 

at all levels, from the Federal Government and IC members to local officials and 

DHS entities that in turn provide threat information to their associates on the front 

line. DHS component organizations not only provide support to IA and to their associates, they also serve as a conduit through which relevant information can pass to 

DHS and the rest of government and information and warnings can be shared with 

stakeholders within their areas of responsibility—thereby increasing the practical 

benefits derived from intelligence analysis. 

IA analysts have access to the most classified and highly sensitive national intelligence from the Terrorist Threat Integration Center (TTIC) (whose responsibilities 

will eventually be assumed by the National Counterterrorism Center—NCTC), the 

Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the 

National Security Agency (NSA), the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), the Department of State (DoS), and other national-level agencies regarding international and 

domestic terrorist threats. This information is received formally through IA analysts’ connections to the Joint Worldwide Intelligence Communications Systems 

(JWICS), TTIC Online, the IA Automated Message Handling System (AMHS), the 

Homeland Security Information Network (HSIN), and a variety of other formal and 

informal (i.e., analyst-to-analyst) mechanisms that contain such intelligence. This 

information from other agencies is augmented by our own internal reporting from 

DHS components. 

From Border and Transportation Security (BTS) reports regarding individuals of 

interest trying to enter the United States illegally, to USCG reports regarding suspicious activity near critical infrastructure points, intelligence from DHS components that IA analyzes provides invaluable perspective and insight for the entire 

Federal Government. Such reports are provided to IA through the same methods the 

IC uses- the physical presence of DHS component liaison officers within both IA and 

the Homeland Security Operations Center (HSOC) and communication between analysts and leadership. In fact, the presence of representatives of 26 separate Federal 

and local representatives within HSOC provides a perspective and collaboration capability which is very valuable. Additionally, coordination within DHS is aided by 

regular meetings of the intelligence chiefs of each entity, lead by the Assistant Secretary for Information Analysis (ASIA). 

Information moves into and out of IA in the form of a number of different documents. Many are familiar with the Homeland Security warning products that communicate valuable threat information to such varied audiences as the public, first 

responders, and infrastructure owners. Homeland Security Information Bulletins 

provide a means to communicate information of interest to the nation’s critical infrastructures that does not meet the timeliness, specifics, or significant thresholds 

of warning messages. They are designed to provide updates on the training, tactics, 

or strategies of terrorists. Similarly, Homeland Security Threat Advisories identify 
8

a threat targeting critical national networks or key infrastructure assets and provide a means for DHS to communicate threat information to all DHS customers 

ranging from the IC to the general public. This information stream is augmented 

by other products, such as Special Assessments and Studies, Homeland Security Intelligence Articles, and Red Cell reports, which offer alternative or conceptual analysis. Additionally, Homeland Security Information Messages (HSIMs) are a valuable 

tool used to expeditiously communicate newly acquired, uncorroborated threat information to U.S. government agencies, state and local Homeland Security Advisors, 

and the private and public sectors. The HSIM contains a preliminary analysis of 

threat information received by DHS from the intelligence community, law enforcement community, private or public sector and have information that has not been 

fully evaluated. 

In addition to these products, IA employs a variety of reporting mechanisms to 

communicate with both IC members and the intelligence offices of DHS operational 

components. Intelligence goes to DHS component entities and the IC primarily 

through DHS Intelligence Information Reports (IIRs) and Homeland Security Intelligence Reports (HSIRs). The IIR quickly releases select raw intelligence reporting 

from DHS components to the IC, Federal Law Enforcement, and others as appropriate in a unified and recognizable format via the Automated Message Handling 

System (AMHS). Similarly, a HSIR provides DHS operational elements a vehicle to 

report case and potential terrorist information to DHS headquarters. It is a final 

report, containing a compilation of information where some processing or analysis 

has occurred and should stand alone as a semi-finished product. Lastly, information 

is shared and coordination occurs through the IA Executive Morning Brief (IAEMB), 

which is shared at the daily morning intelligence update and through the twicedaily Secure Video Teleconference (SVTC), as well as through direct analyst-to-analyst and leadership communication. 

It is IA’s singular focus on the protection of the American homeland against terrorist attack that is unique among its IC partners. This focus provides invaluable 

information and assistance not only to State, territorial, tribal, local, and private 

sector officials that receive accumulated threat information, but also to DHS components that use the information, trends, and indicators to inform and prepare operators and decision makers on the front line. The relationship IA has with the HSOC, 

BTS and other DHS entities translates into continuous information sharing and collaboration that provides a unique threat picture to those who are vital to protecting 

the homeland. 

The Department of Homeland Security is a prime example of how changes have 

been made within the Intelligence Community, the counterterrorism community, 

and the law enforcement community to work more cohesively as well as more collaboratively, to assure information is shared as fully and completely as possible. 

This represents a dramatic change from conditions as they existed before September 

11th, 2001. DHS plays a central role in the counter-terrorism and homeland security 

effort as we continue the work of communicating intelligence and information to our 

partners in the federal government as well as with the State, territorial, tribal, 

local, and private sector officials charged with protecting the people and infrastructure of this country. 

Building up IA, increasing our information capabilities, and coordinating intelligence information sharing and collaboration across the entire federal government 

are monumental tasks. We have accomplished much in a short period of time and 

we continue to press forward to strengthen our capabilities and our ability to support the overall DHS mission set. In order to better facilitate this effort the Department of Homeland Security has formed the DHS Information Sharing and Collaboration (ISC) Program, appointed a Director, and formed a staff including representation from all internal components. We are a participating member of the larger national effort to improve and enhance information sharing and collaboration and to 

integrate ISC concepts and capabilities into the changing intelligence community 

(IC) environment under the various transformation efforts brought forth by the 9–

11 Commission and by earlier and subsequent Administration and Congressional action. The DHS ISC Program has already begun the work of assessing the ‘‘here and 

now,’’ of envisioning and forming a future Information Sharing Architecture, and is 

engaged in building the business plan which will guide and govern efforts to construct the appropriate enterprise architecture to empower full and complete sharing 

throughout the entire Homeland Security environment. One of the major DHS programs the ISC Program now collaborates on is the Homeland Security Information 

Network (HSIN)–an overarching network for the Department to provide information 

exchange and real time collaboration between federal, state, local, tribal, and major 

city authorities. Using this network, federal, state, and urban area homeland security advisors are able to communicate with each other and with DHS. As a direct 
9

result of ISC Program efforts to cooperate and work jointly with other Federal partners, DHS and the Department of Justice (DOJ)/FBI have established the first ever 

capability to share information between the HSIN/Joint Regional Information Exchange System (HSIN/JRIES), the Regional Information Sharing System (RISSNet), 

Law Enforcement Online (LEO), and will soon be joined by the Criminal Information Sharing Alliance Network (CISANet). Through this technology demonstration 

project, Sensitive But Unclassified products of each department and network are 

posted to other networks thereby allowing users on any of the systems to see and 

use the products from the other organizations. 

Many of the efforts we are undertaking are technical in nature, but the primary 

effort is not merely technical but rather one of changing policy and procedure to motivate and empower necessary technical change in order to achieve our goals of functional interoperability and information transparency in order to accomplish the information sharing and collaboration mission. However, it must be noted that intelligence analytic tools such as link and nodal analysis tools, very dynamic search engines tailored for the intelligence data base environment, analytic workstations configured to empower the analysts in their work, and numerous other technical aids 

and capabilities. . .are key to our information sharing and collaboration success. 

We have accomplished much at DHS and in IA since our inception and we are 

on course with our partners and colleagues to continue to achieve. I firmly believe 

the American people are more secure and better prepared than before September 

11, 2001 directly because of the advent of the Department of Homeland Security. 

We are fully connected to the U.S. Intelligence Community and well informed. We 

are more fully integrated into the workings of the domestic security structure. We 

are connected with law enforcement. We have working analysts poring over the detail of intelligence and law enforcement reporting to discover the hidden patterns 

and concealed threads of terrorist activity and the manifestation of other threats to 

America from crime with national security implications and from other disasters 

and threatening conditions that come our way. We have a sense of purpose and we 

have embarked on what has likely never been done before with regard to information fusion. . .to fully understand the threat and the conditions to make that information useful at a utilitarian level for a broad range of officials from city mayors 

to border patrol agents to airport screeners to critical infrastructure operators to the 

cop on the beat. 

Chairman Camp, Chairman Gibbons, and Members of the Committee, this concludes my prepared statement. I would be happy to answer any questions you may 

have at this time.

Mr. CAMP. Mr. Verdery, you have 5 minutes. We have your written statement, and if you could summarize it, that would be helpful. 

STATEMENT OF C. STEWART VERDERY, JR., ASSISTANT 

SECRETARY, BORDER AND TRANSPORTATION SECURITY 

POLICY AND PLANNING, DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND 

SECURITY 

Mr. VERDERY. Of course. 

Chairman Camp, Chairman Gibbons and other members of the 

committee, thank you for the chance to be here today to join with 

General Hughes to testify about the efforts of the Department of 

Homeland Security to analyze and disrupt the travel of potential 

terrorists. 

The 9/11 Commission noted that, and I quote, ‘‘targeting travel 

is at least as powerful a weapon against terrorists as targeting 

their money. The United States should combine terrorist travel intelligence operations and law enforcement in a strategy to intercept 

terrorists, find terrorist travel facilitators and constrain terrorist 

mobility’’. The administration and this Department concur with 

this observation, and we have implemented a number of successful 

programs to deny terrorists the ability to travel freely into the 

U.S., identify potential travel facilitators, and constrain their mobility. 
10

This is a complex multiagency undertaking, and we are working 

in close collaboration with our interagency partners on this important task. We are reviewing how travel documents are produced 

and reviewed so we can better detect altered and fraudulent ones; 

improving and expanding watch-lists; and exploring ways to share 

data with our foreign counterparts that can help identify and 

thwart terrorists, and, of course, these efforts are designed to protect and respect the civil liberties and privacy of U.S. Citizens and 

residents, and of our visitors. 

I believe General Hughes in his written testimony ably described 

the role of Information Analysis Section of DHS in participating in 

the Intelligence Community. It is absolutely critical that actionable 

intelligence and actual information be provided to the front-line 

components of DHS, whether it is an inspector at a port of entry, 

a Federal air marshal, an aviation screener or a criminal investigator, and that capability is robust and improving. 

The BTS Directorate is current operations unit is responsible for 

ensuring a continuing productive relationship between the intelligence arms of BTS—Customs and Border Protection, Immigration 

and Customs Enforcement, and TSA—and IAIP. BTS analysts are 

assigned to IA, and there is a daily exchange of information between BTS agencies, IA and, of course, the Coast Guard. BTS analysts conduct follow-up research involving BTS incidents of interest 

and the Intelligence Community, and we have essentially set up a 

two-way street of information sharing where our components receive information immediately through IA, and IA is immediately 

alerted to significant operational activity. 

Let me focus briefly on some of the programs we think are really 

disrupting the patterns of terrorist travel. And I will focus on the 

National Targeting Center, US-VISIT and our efforts to find fraudulent travel documents. 

The National Targeting Center, operated by DHS’s U.S. Customs 

and Border Protection, working with numerous Federal agencies, 

provides tactical targeting and analytical research support for passenger and cargo targeting in the air, sea and land operations in 

inbound and outbound environments. 

NTC develops tactical targets, potentially high-risk people or 

shipments that should be subjected to additional scrutiny by CBP 

personnel, from raw intelligence, trade, travel and law enforcement 

data via the Automated Targeting System (ATS). The NTC supports DHS field elements including our container security personnel in 25 countries around the world, our visa security officers 

in Saudi Arabia, the CBP officers at ports of entry, and the Border 

Patrol, and is also working to support the pilot Immigration Security Initiative (ISI) operating in two airports in Europe to work on 

vetting passengers before they leave for international flights. 

During the heightened threat period last December and throughout the winter, NTC played a pivotal role in analyzing advance 

passenger manifest information related to several international 

flights of interest that were deemed to be at risk in order to secure 

those flights. DHS is committed to improving the current collection 

of manifest information over the coming months by standardizing 

formats, requiring departure information for outbound flights and 

finalizing crew manifest requirements, and these requirements will 
11

build on the passenger name record, or so-called PNR, data used 

for screening passengers. I personally served as the lead negotiator 

for the U.S. in our successful negotiations with the European 

Union that now allow that data to be transferred from Europe to 

DHS for analyzing incoming passengers. 

The US-VISIT program is a continuum of identity verification 

measures beginning overseas with the visa issuance process operating at 206 nonimmigrant posts, 115 airports and seaports of 

entry. Secretary Ridge deserves great credit for moving ahead with 

biometric components of this system ahead of schedule. 

And just to briefly summarize, as of the first 9 months of operation, we have now detected 838 individuals identified by the biometrics alone at ports of entry as subject to a watch-list information or other lookout, and about a third of those have had adverse 

action taken against them, being refused entry or being arrested. 

In addition, today, September 30th, is the first day the travelers 

in the Visa Waiver Program are being enrolled in US-VISIT. 

The Commission’s report noted that terrorists use altered and 

counterfeit travel documents to evade detection. Just yesterday I 

toured the ICE forensic document lab in northern Virginia. We 

have accumulated 130,000 legitimate and forged travel identification documents. They are accessible in seconds. The analysts at 

FDL develop hundreds of document alerts. They are sent to border 

inspectors, have the capability for front-line inspectors to have realtime review of suspect documents, and provides forensic investigation support and training. And I would encourage all Members interested in this issue to travel to northern Virginia to take a look 

at the FDL. It is truly a unique resource. 

Hopefully during the question-and-answer period we can talk a 

little bit about lost and stolen passport issues. We are addressing 

those through Interpol, through technology development and 

through our review of the Visa Waiver countries. This is a critical, 

critical program to secure those documents. 

Terrorism attacks in Asia, Europe and elsewhere are vivid reminders to us that terrorism is an international threat that cannot 

be conquered alone. We understand we must engage in a global effort each day through collaboration, information sharing and ongoing dialogue to bring the weight of our collective law enforcement 

intelligence capabilities to bear against those who seek to do us 

harm. 

Thank you for the opportunity to be here. I will look forward to 

your questions. 

Mr. CAMP. Thank you very much. 

[The statement of Mr. Verdery follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF C. STEWART VERDERY, JR. 

Chairman Camp, Chairman Gibbons, Ranking Members Sanchez and McCarthy, 

and other distinguished members, I am pleased to be here today to testify about the 

efforts of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to analyze and disrupt the 

travel of potential terrorists. I am especially pleased to be joined by my colleague, 

Assistant Secretary Patrick Hughes, from DHS’s Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection Directorate (IAIP). 

The 9/11 Commission noted that ‘‘[t]argeting travel is at least as powerful a weapon against terrorists as targeting their money. The United States should combine 

terrorist travel intelligence, operations, and law enforcement in a strategy to intercept terrorists, find terrorist travel facilitators, and constrain terrorist mobility.’’ 
12

The Administration and DHS concur with this observation and have implemented 

a number of successful programs to deny terrorists the ability to travel freely into 

the U.S., identify potential travel facilitators, and constrain the mobility of known 

and suspected terrorists. 

This is a complex multi-agency undertaking, and DHS works in close cooperation 

with its interagency partners on this important task. DHS works cooperatively with 

our colleagues at the Departments of State and Justice and the intelligence community to improve our ability to identify terrorists without impeding legitimate trade 

and travel. 

We are reviewing how travel documents are produced and reviewed so that we 

can better detect altered and counterfeit documents, improving and expanding 

watch lists and how they are vetted, and exploring ways to share data with our 

counterparts that can help identify and thwart terrorists. These efforts are also designed to protect and respect the civil liberties and individual privacy of U.S. citizens, residents, and visitors. 

I would like to focus today on our creation and use of the National Targeting Center (NTC) to identify both potential terrorists and patterns of terrorist travel, our 

US-VISIT biometric screening system which helps to fix the identities of individuals 

entering and departing the U.S., and our efforts to detect fraudulent travel documents. As described more fully in Assistant Secretary Hughes’s testimony, I will 

also briefly address how we analyze and pass intelligence information to and from 

our border officers.

National Targeting Center 

The NTC began around-the-clock operations on November 10, 2001, providing tactical targeting and analytical research support for anti-terrorism efforts. The NTC 

is primarily staffed by DHS’s Customs and Border Protection (CBP). The NTC staff 

consists of CBP Officers and field analysis specialists who are experts in passenger 

and cargo targeting for air, sea, and land operations in the inbound and outbound 

environments. The NTC develops tactical targets—potentially high-risk people and 

shipments that should be subject to additional scrutiny by CBP personnel—and it 

develops these targets from raw intelligence, trade, travel, and law enforcement 

data. 

The NTC has access to over 20 critical anti-terrorism and law enforcement databases, including the Terrorist Screening Data Base (TSDB) maintained by the Terrorist Screening Center (TSC), and receives strategic intelligence daily from CBP’s 

Office of Intelligence, our IAIP Directorate, and other law enforcement and intelligence entities. The NTC includes representatives from ICE, the FBI, the intelligence community, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), US-VISIT, 

the Department of Energy, the Department of Agriculture, the Food and Drug Administration, and the United States Coast Guard. 

NTC supports DHS field elements, here and overseas, including Container Security Initiative (CSI) personnel stationed in 25 countries throughout the world, the 

Visa Security Program, and CBP Officers at all of our ports of entry, as well as between the ports through support to CBP’s Office of Border Patrol. NTC also supports the Immigration Security Initiative, currently operating at Schiphol Airport in 

Amsterdam and Warsaw, Poland, where teams of CBP officers are deployed to work 

with local authorities in preventing the onward movement of people identified as 

presenting a security threat to the carrier or passengers on international flights destined to the U.S. 

During the period of heightened alert last December, the NTC played a pivotal 

role in analyzing advanced passenger information system (APIS) manifests related 

to several international flights that were determined to be at risk, in order to ensure 

that passengers on board did not pose risks to the flights. 

The NTC uses the Automated Targeting System (ATS) to identify and target highrisk passengers and cargo entering the United States. ATS permits the NTC’s 

trained personnel to process advance passenger information, to recognize anomalies 

and ‘‘red flags’’ and to determine which individuals and shipments should be given 

greater scrutiny at our ports of entry. 

DHS is committed to improving the current collection of passenger manifest information over the coming months by standardizing entry information formats, requiring departure information, and finalizing crew manifest requirements. 

The United States and the European Commission signed an international agreement on May 28, 2004 permitting CBP to access passenger name record (PNR) data 

to be used for screening passengers. I personally served as the lead for the U.S. 

interagency team which negotiated for over one year until we succeeded in establishing a mutually acceptable legal framework to allow CBP to receive PNR data 

from the airlines that carry passengers between Europe and the United States. In 
13

1996, the European Parliament and Council issued a ‘‘Data Protection Directive’’ 

that set forth detailed requirements for the utilization and sharing of personal data. 

Prior to our resolution of these issues with the Commission, airlines found themselves in a position where they could be subject to fines from EU member states 

if they provided PNR data to the United States. 

PNR information is just one of many tools used by CBP to fulfill its mission. PNR 

data is an essential tool allowing CBP to accomplish its key goals: (1) PNR data 

helps us make a determination of whether a passenger may pose a significant risk 

to the safety and security of the United States and to fellow passengers on a plane; 

(2) PNR data submitted prior to a flight’s arrival enables CBP to facilitate and expedite the entry of the vast majority of visitors to the United States by providing CBP 

with an advance and electronic means to collect information that CBP would otherwise be forced to collect upon arrival; and (3) PNR data is essential to terrorism 

and criminal investigations by allowing us to link information about known terrorists and serious criminals to co-conspirators and others involved in their plots, as 

well as to potential victims. Sometimes these links may be developed before a person’s travel, but at other times these leads only become available days or weeks or 

months later. In short, PNR data helps CBP fulfill its anti-terrorism and law enforcement missions and allows for more efficient and timely facilitation of travel for 

the vast majority of legitimate travelers to and through the United States. At this 

time, CBP is receiving PNR data, which is enabling us to link information about 

known terrorists. 

Over the course of our negotiations, both sides worked together to reach a workable solution that outlines the type of data that may be transferred, the period of 

time it can be retained, and the purposes for which it may be used. Additionally, 

the final arrangement includes requirements for aggressive and important passenger redress mechanisms, including a channel for direct access by European Data 

Protection Authorities to the Chief Privacy Officer at the Department of Homeland 

Security on behalf of European citizens. 

While this agreement was signed by the EU and the Secretary of Homeland Security in May, matters related to the agreement are currently being challenged by the 

European Parliament before the European Court of Justice. We are, nevertheless, 

confident that the agreement is legally sufficient and will improve the safety of air 

passengers. 

In addition, CBP continues to work on a version of ATS that, for the first time, 

will be able to identify potentially high-risk passenger vehicles and travelers at our 

land border ports of entry. The new version of ATS will also increase the amount 

of government data that the system can access and analyze and enable us to train 

more people on the use of the system. 

These, and many other U.S. intelligence analysis capabilities, are being used to 

help exploit terrorists’ vulnerabilities as they travel and to learn more about their 

activities and methods. In addition to our ongoing efforts to target terrorist travel 

to, from, and within the United States, the Administration is seeking, on both a bilateral and multilateral basis, to promote similar efforts by other responsible governments, and to provide those governments with relevant terrorist-related information.

US-VISIT 

Prior to the terrorist attack on September 11, Congress twice mandated the creation of an electronic entry-exit system. Following the events of September 11, Congress added the requirement that the entry-exit system focus on biometric technology as a means to verify the identity of foreign travelers. DHS established the 

US-VISIT program, and began implementing US-VISIT, as required, at 115 airports 

and 14 seaports of entry on January 5, 2004. In accordance with direction from the 

Secretary, US-VISIT incorporated biometric technology into US-VISIT even though 

biometrics were not statutorily mandated by that date. 

US-VISIT enhances the security of our citizens and visitors; facilitates legitimate 

travel and trade; ensures the integrity of our immigration system; and protects the 

privacy of our visitors. 

In addition to developing an integrated system that records the arrivals and departures of travelers and uses biometric technology to combat fraud, DHS is designing US-VISIT to: (1) provide information to CBP Officers and consular officers for 

decision making purposes; (2) reflect any pending or completed immigration applications or actions; (3) identify nonimmigrant overstays; and (4) provide accurate and 

timely data to appropriate enforcement authorities. US-VISIT is working to accomplish these objectives. 

US-VISIT represents a major milestone in enhancing our nation’s security and 

our efforts to reform our borders. It is a significant step towards bringing integrity 
14

back to our immigration and border enforcement systems. It is also leading the way 

for incorporating biometrics into international travel security systems. 

US-VISIT is a continuum of security measures that begins before individuals 

enter the United States and continues through their arrival and departure from the 

country. Enrolling travelers in US-VISIT using biometric identifiers allows DHS to: 

•Conduct appropriate security checks: We conduct checks of visitors against appropriate lookout databases, including the TSDB, and selected criminal data 

available to consular officers and CBP Officers at the ports of entry, including 

biometric-based checks, to identify criminals, security threats, and immigration 

violators. 

•Freeze identity of traveler: We biometrically enroll visitors in US-VISIT—freezing the identity of the traveler and tying that identity to the travel document 

presented. 

•Match traveler identity and document: We biometrically match that identity 

and document, enabling the CBP Officer at the port of entry to determine 

whether the traveler complied with the terms of her/his previous admission and 

is using the same identity. 

•Determine overstays: We will use collected information to determine whether 

individuals have overstayed the terms of their admission. This information will 

be used to determine whether an individual should be apprehended or whether 

the individual should be allowed to enter the U.S. upon her/his next visit. 

The DHS and Department of State (DOS) together have created a continuum of 

identity verification measures that begins overseas, when a traveler applies for a 

visa, and continues upon entry and exit from this country. The system stores biometric and biographic data in a secure, centralized database and uses travel and 

identity documents to access that information for identity verification and database 

checks. 206 nonimmigrant visa-issuing posts and 118 immigrant visa issuing posts 

capture finger scans and digital photographs of foreign nationals when they apply 

for visas, regardless of their country of origin. This process will be implemented at 

all 207 visa-issuing posts worldwide by October 26. In addition, today is the first 

day that nationals from Visa Waiver Program (VWP) countries will be enrolled in 

US-VISIT when they travel to the United States. 

At assigned U.S. border points of entry, designated visitors are required to provide biometric data, biographic data, and/or other documentation. This data is 

checked against various databases, which US-VISIT has successfully integrated and 

which contain visa issuance information, terrorist (through the TSDB) and criminal 

watchlists, and immigration status information. That information allows a CBP Officer at the border to verify the identity of the traveler and to determine whether 

the foreign national is a public threat or is otherwise inadmissible. In its first 9 

months of operation, DHS processed over 8.9 million foreign national applicants for 

admission through US-VISIT at its air and sea ports of entry. During that period, 

838 individuals were identified by biometrics alone as being the subject of a 

watchlist lookout. After a careful examination of all the relevant facts, DHS elected 

to take adverse action in approximately 33 percent of those cases where an individual was identified—such action included arrest or refusal of entry into the 

United States.

Examples of US-VISIT Success 

For example, At Newark international airport, an international traveler appeared 

for inspection. Standard biographic record checks using a name and date of birth 

cleared the system without incident. However, a scan of the traveler’s index fingers, 

checked against the US-VISIT biometric database, revealed that the traveler was 

using an alias and was, in fact, a convicted rapist. Additionally, he had previously 

been deported from the United States. US-VISIT’s search disclosed that the individual used at least nine different aliases and four dates of birth. He had previously 

been convicted of criminal possession of a weapon, assault, making terrorist threats, 

and rape. 

CBP Officers at JFK International Airport processing a passenger through the 

US-VISIT procedures found that the individual was using an alias. Further information uncovered two arrests for aggravated trafficking of drugs, a subsequent failure 

to appear, and visa fraud. The traveler had used this fraudulent visa to enter the 

United States over 60 times without being detected by standard biographic record 

checks, the last time only 11 days earlier. 

Recently, a traveler with four aliases, three social security numbers, and a criminal history going back to 1990, tried to enter the United States. He was not admitted because a comparison of his fingerscans against the US-VISIT biometric watch 

list determined that he had previously been deported from the United States. 
15

US-VISIT, as well as the student tracking system SEVIS, has developed mechanisms to facilitate the lawful and appropriate use of entry-exit data by law enforcement agencies such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation to enhance their ability 

to investigate terrorist travel patterns.

Secure Flight 

On August 26, DHS unveiled the concepts underlying our new Secure Flight program designed to improve security for domestic flights by improving the use of terrorist screening information. Under Secure Flight, TSA will take over responsibility 

for comparing PNR information of domestic air passengers to a greatly expanded list 

of individuals known or suspected to be engaged in terrorist activity—a function 

currently administered by each airline individually. The move will help reduce the 

number of false alerts caused by the current outdated system. 

When in place, following the completion of a pilot program and consideration of 

any issues that arise, and after the completion of a rulemaking, Secure Flight will 

help move passengers through airport screening more quickly and decrease the 

number of individuals selected for secondary screening—while fully protecting passengers’ privacy and civil liberties. 

This new system will implement a key recommendation of the 9/11 Commission 

for the government to continue improving the use of ‘no-fly’ and ‘automatic selectee’ 

lists by using the terrorist screening database maintained by the Terrorist Screening Center. 

Significant progress has already been made by the U.S. Government by providing 

greatly expanded No-Fly and Selectee lists to airlines to conduct checks on their 

own computer systems under the current prescreening program. New names are 

being added every day as intelligence and law enforcement agencies submit persons 

for consideration. As Secure Flight is phased in, TSA will be able to check passenger 

records against sensitive watch list information not previously available to airlines. 

Secure Flight differs from earlier enhanced prescreening systems by focusing 

screening efforts on identifying individuals known or suspected to be engaged in terrorist activity, rather than using it for other law enforcement purposes. As with previous proposals, the new program will also include a redress mechanism through 

which people can resolve questions if they believe they have been unfairly or incorrectly selected for additional screening. 

The development of the program will be as publicly transparent as possible without compromising national security. Testing and eventual implementation will be 

governed by strict privacy protections including passenger redress procedures, data 

security mechanisms, and limitations on use. 

Privacy-related documents and a proposed order compelling the submission of historical PNR data from the airlines to TSA for testing the Secure Flight program 

were released for public comment and published in the Federal Register on September 24. The notice addressed the purpose of the testing and set forth the limited 

purposes for which the information collected will be used in Secure Flight.

Alien Flight Students 

On October 5, 2004, TSA will assume the responsibility from the Department of 

Justice for the Alien Flight Student Program (AFSP) program and conduct security 

threat assessments on all non-U.S. citizens who apply to receive flight training from 

an U.S. flight school. 

Flight schools are required to submit training information, such as the type of 

training the candidate is requesting, and biographical information, including full 

name, passport and visa information. Applicants must also provide their fingerprints. 

All non-U.S. citizens who apply to U.S. flight schools will now have to undergo 

a security threat assessment regardless of the size of aircraft in which they wish 

to train. Previously, only students wishing to fly aircraft of 12,500 pounds or more 

underwent threat assessments. Another significant change is that flight schools will 

be required to submit a candidate’s photograph to TSA when the candidate arrives 

at the flight school to help ensure the person who was cleared by TSA is the person 

who actually receives the flight training.

Human Smuggling and Trafficking Center 

In July, DHS and the Departments of State and Justice established the Human 

Smuggling and Trafficking Center. The center is housed at the State Department 

and includes the participation of intelligence agencies. 

The Center analyzes and disseminates information, and provides related support 

to law enforcement, intelligence, diplomatic, foreign assistance, and other entities 

that take action against the threats of human smuggling and trafficking and against 

criminal support for terrorist travel. 
16

The Center is another measure that the Administration has taken to improve our 

ability to analyze and disrupt terrorist travel, and we are optimistic about its possibilities.

Deterring the Use of Fraudulent Documents 

The Commission’s report noted that terrorists use altered and counterfeit travel 

documents to evade detection. In the border and immigration enforcement arenas, 

biometric identifiers are tools that help prevent the use of fraudulent identities and 

travel documents. The purpose of the biometric identifier is to verify a person’s identity in order to run criminal history checks and to ensure that an individual cannot 

apply and/or be granted benefits under different names. Biometric visas issued by 

the DOS to travelers to the United States allow one-to-one matches, to verify that 

the person presenting the visa is the person who was issued the visa, and one-tomany matches, to ensure that the bearer is not the subject of a biometric lookout 

or enrolled in the system under another name. Like the biometric visa process, USVISIT enrollment fixes a person’s identity. When a VWP traveler enrolls in USVISIT, the person’s fingerprints will be electronically linked to the passport, thus 

preventing another person from using that passport by freezing identities at the border and ensuring that the person is not enrolled under another name. 

CBP Officers must use their expertise to recognize and block the fraudulent use 

of many types of identification documents presented by applicants for admission at 

our ports of entry. For example, there are more than 240 different types of valid 

driver’s licenses issued within the United States, and more than 50,000 different 

versions of birth certificates issued by U.S. States, counties, and municipalities. 

While advances in technology allow our dedicated and hardworking CBP Officers 

to examine and validate documents presented for reentry, that same technology also 

enables the perpetrators of fraud to produce, relatively inexpensively, high-quality 

fraudulent documents. Forgers and counterfeiters can produce high-quality fake 

birth certificates and driver’s licenses with off-the-shelf software programs and materials that are difficult to detect without sensitive instruments and sufficient time 

to examine them. 

Our CBP Officers are also charged with detecting look-a-likes or impostors who 

attempt to use valid documents which belong to another person. This is one of the 

fastest growing phenomena in travel document abuse. Document vendors solicit genuine, unaltered documents and match them up with ‘‘look-a-likes.’’ DHS’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has developed a training program to detect impostor documents, which it has conducted for both U.S. and foreign immigration and 

border officers around the world. 

Equipment costs money, and taking the time to examine thoroughly and in-depth 

every one of the approximately 460 million identity documents presented at our over 

300 land, sea, and air ports of entry would be an enormous undertaking with potentially serious secondary effects. And, even were we to do this, this effort would only 

permit us to detect fraudulent documents, not, legitimately issued documents that 

are based on fraudulent identity. 

The Administration continues to improve efforts in the area of identification security. Last month, the President signed Homeland Security Presidential Directive-12 

(HSPD–12) to set a common identification standard for Federal employees and contractors. HSPD–12 mandates the expedited, public, and open development of a uniform standard for Federal employee and contractor identification that ensures security, reliability, and interoperability; closes security gaps and improves our ability 

to stop terrorists and others from accessing or attacking critical Federal facilities 

and information systems; and improves efficiency among Federal agencies through 

more consistent systems and practices. 

Secure identification is a priority for the United States. As noted by the 9/11 Commission, birth certificates, drivers’ licenses, and most other forms of identification 

have traditionally been issued by State and local governments, not the Federal Government. 

At the Federal level, we are working closely with our State and local partners to 

find ways to strengthen the standards used to issue documents that people use to 

establish their identity without creating a national identity card. DHS has supported the efforts of the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators 

(AAMVA) in looking at the security of drivers’ licenses and strongly supports the 

States in their endeavors to improve the security of these documents.

Lost and Stolen Passport Data 

DHS is addressing security challenges posed by lost and stolen passports together 

with our colleagues in the Department of State, who are responsible for the U.S. 

passport system, and our foreign counterparts. 
17

CBP complies with the section of the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry 

Reform Act of 2002 which requires that lost and stolen passport data be entered 

into lookout systems within 72 hours. CBP incorporates lost and stolen passport information into its systems to aid in the detection and interception of persons using 

lost and stolen documents. 

Across the globe, international border control authorities continue to seek timely 

and accurate information concerning the validity of travel documents presented at 

consular posts and their borders. In most cases, countries are able to recognize the 

misuse of their own documents, but because of concerns about the use of personal 

data, many nations remain reluctant to share data on lost or stolen travel documents with other governments or international agencies. 

We are making progress in our efforts to encourage international cooperation in 

this area. For example through the efforts of the Departments of State and Justice, 

the U.S. has provided over 300,000 records of lost and stolen passports to the 

Interpol’s lost and stolen document database, which is available to border authorities worldwide. We hope that many more of our international partners will join us 

in this effort. 

We are working with our colleagues at the Department of State to exchange of 

information with the Government of Australia on lost and stolen passports. We expect that an agreement—the first of its kind will be concluded shortly. Efforts are 

also under way internationally to enhance such exchanges of information. At the 

June 2004 G8 Summit in Sea Island, G8 partners agreed to a U.S. proposal to start 

providing information on lost and stolen passports to the Interpol database by December 2004. This will allow participants access to real-time information on lost and 

stolen international travel documents. We want to advance this effort beyond the 

G8 and encourage all countries to submit relevant information to the Interpol database. We are promoting a comparable initiative among the APEC countries to 

develop Regional Movement Alert System. 

Additionally, the U.S. is initiating a study to assess a technology concept that 

could further address this concern. The Enhanced International Travel Security 

(EITS) concept would use distributed databases as a mechanism to allow real-time 

exchange of the basic information needed—i.e., a ‘‘yes’’ or ‘‘no’’ response—to assess 

the validity of a document without requiring visibility into the actual data used for 

that determination. The approach would be similar to the one already used worldwide by the banking industry to support ATMs. Developing better systems for international sharing of information, and expanding participation to more countries will 

improve our ability to identify and screen travelers before they enter our country. 

In addition, as DHS conducts the required reviews of countries participating in 

the Visa Waiver Program, each country has provided detailed information about lost 

and stolen passports, their law enforcement response to such incidents, and efforts 

made to tighten distribution and document security processes. How a country handles this key issue will be an important factor in how DHS, working with interagency teams, determines whether VWP countries shall remain eligible for the program. These reviews are due to be completed in October.

Integrating Intelligence Information 

DHS has developed sophisticated methods for identifying and targeting potentially high-risk cargo and passengers through the effective use of strategic intelligence. This intelligence is gained through a close relationship between our bureaus, ICE, CBP, and the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), our IAIP 

Directorate, the U.S. Coast Guard’s intelligence program, and the intelligence community. As a result of these relationships, we are able to review, analyze, and integrate information that resides in multiple government databases, various watch 

lists, and advance information received directly from travelers, airlines, and shippers. 

BTS’s Director of Current Operations is responsible for ensuring a continuing productive relationship between the intelligence arms of our BTS agencies—CBP, ICE, 

and TSA and IAIP. BTS analysts are assigned to IA and there is a daily exchange 

of information between the BTS agencies and IA. BTS and the Coast Guard have 

also exchanged personnel to enhance data sharing. 

The BTS analysts primarily conduct follow-up research concerning BTS incidents 

of interest to IA and the intelligence community. This relationship provides a twoway street of information sharing, where the component representatives are immediately alerted to significant information received through IA channels and IA is immediately alerted to significant operational activity. 

BTS intelligence representatives attend multiple, daily, meetings with IA where 

significant intelligence information is discussed. This includes intelligence derived 

from other elements of the intelligence community and law enforcement entities. 
18

BTS agencies send daily reports to IA about significant incidents encountered by 

BTS agencies. These incidents are usually associated with a watch listed individual 

intercepted at the border, a subject on the no-fly list attempting to board an aircraft, 

or information alleging potential terrorist-related activity gained from an investigation. 

BTS also works with IA to vet intelligence bulletins, reports, and assessments and 

to jointly assess relevant information. BTS ensures that intelligence is shared between intelligence analysts and operational personnel. BTS seeks to ‘‘operationalize’’ 

the intelligence we receive to ensure that the intelligence is incorporated into targeting and other decisions on an ongoing basis. For example, we may institute more 

targeted secondary inspections of travelers from regions that intelligence suggests 

warrant additional scrutiny, send priority leads based on intelligence to investigators in the field, or reassign Federal Air Marshals. 

ICE has created a Threat Analysis Section (TAS) to identify and address potential 

vulnerabilities relative to the national security of the United States. The TAS establishes associations between individuals or groups linked to potential national security threats, develops profiles based upon relevant investigative and intelligence reporting, and produces actionable leads for field offices. 

In addition, TSA’s Transportation Security Intelligence Service (TSIS) produces a 

daily intelligence summary and a weekly suspicious incidents report that is shared 

with Federal Security Directors Federal Air Marshals, and state, local, and industry 

transportation stakeholders.

Conclusion 

We have made much progress to deny terrorists the ability to travel freely into 

the U.S., identify potential travel facilitators, and constrain the mobility of known 

and suspected terrorists. In addition to the initiatives described above, we are working aggressively with our international partners to improve standards for travel documents, enhance aviation safety and port security, and speed the exchange of terrorist identifying information. The bombings in Madrid, the recent hostage crisis in 

Beslan, Russia and the Australian Embassy bombing in Jakarta also serve as vivid 

reminders to us that terrorism is an international threat that cannot be conquered 

alone. DHS understands that we must engage in a global effort each day, through 

collaboration, information sharing and ongoing dialogue to bring the weight of our 

collective law enforcement and intelligence capabilities to bear against those who 

seek to do us harm. 

I would be happy to answer any questions you have at this time.

Mr. CAMP. Thank you both for your testimony. 

General Hughes, given your extensive experience in intelligence 

and your understanding of this threat to our homeland, which, 

since 9/11, we have been focused on very intensely, how do you 

characterize our efforts to track potential terrorists attempting to 

enter the United States? How would you particularly—you know, 

in comparison to pre-9/11? 

Mr. HUGHES. Well, I think it is much improved; for one thing, 

the fact that we have standing watch-lists as a tool which we did 

not have before. The fact that we have a variety of registration 

techniques and much better overwatch on travel documentation, 

the issuance of passports and visas and certain knowledge provided 

by the travelers in many cases about who they are and what they 

intend to do in their travel is a big change. That does allow us to 

begin to have knowledge of them earlier in the process than we 

used to. I think the Department of State may have had that information, but it wasn’t integrated into the intelligence and law enforcement and security communities in a way that it is now. 

When they reach our borders, of course, as Stewart was discussing here, the U.S. visa—excuse me—the US-VISIT program, 

the enhanced Customs and Border Protection mechanisms at the 

border when they seek passage into our country, and the knowledge that we have about them combined is a very powerful tool, 

and indeed we are—as opposed to tracking them, in many cases we 

are interdicting them earlier. We are interdicting them in some 
19

cases before they get on an airplane. Occasionally that system fails. 

When they reach our border, generally we know who they are, and 

we are finding them. 

I will say that we have some additional capability from the past 

in the illegal border-crossing context. We know quite a lot about activities to our Southwest border and Mexico, and some information 

concerning along the Canadian border, perhaps a little bit less in 

the case of Canada because of the construct between our two countries. But that is a very powerful tool. We can in many cases anticipate movement, and we often do interdict persons on those two borders because we knew something about them. We knew they were 

staging or a group was planning to travel or something like that. 

It is not perfect, and I don’t wish to communicate to you it is by 

any means, but it is better than it used to be. 

And the last thing I would like to mention to you is the term ′′tracking′′ is very interesting. We have not only this foreknowledge 

or preknowledge of their activities in many cases, but we are then 

able to amass this knowledge in a cumulative way in databases 

that did not exist before. This is an invaluable tool and critical to 

our future success in this regard. The identification and registration in these databases of these people is vital, and we weren’t 

doing that in the robust way that we are now doing it. 

Mr. CAMP. I appreciate that, and I think we all agree that we 

have been working toward putting together a really strong system 

in place to apprehend terrorists trying to enter the United States. 

But it seems to me the more we strengthen our policy at ports of 

entry, it is also more likely that terrorists may try to infiltrate the 

country simply by walking across our border. You know, Time Magazine recently had a fairly chilling article on this issue and the 

human smuggling operations and the efforts like that. 

What is the Department doing—and this may be something the 

Assistant Secretary would like to comment on as well. What is the 

Department doing to strengthen our capabilities to prevent illegal 

crossings, and how can we use intelligence information to target 

and detect potential terrorists who may be trying to enter our 

country in that fashion? 

Mr. VERDERY. Well, the short answer is a lot. And at some point 

I would like to follow on to what General Hughes talked about in 

terms of our overseas efforts, and especially on the visa side and 

US-VISIT. 

In terms of the southern border, the enforcement capabilities are 

growing by leaps and bounds, but it is obviously a very difficult 

problem. In recent years, we have increased the number of Border 

Patrol agents. We have increased the use of advanced technology, 

UAVs, sensors, lighting, motion detection and the like. We have 

put the necessary number of prosecutors and asylum adjudicators 

and the like on the ground, as well as advanced aircraft deployment. All this, though, does demonstrate this is a difficult issue 

with the amount of traffic across the border. 

Under Secretary Hutchinson has launched the Arizona Border 

Control Initiative, ABC, which is really trying to bring operational 

control to certain sectors in Arizona and has resulted in huge increases in the number of apprehensions in that sector. But that, of 

course, has then put pressure on other sectors who have had to re-
20

spond with efforts such as the Los Angeles Airport Initiative to try 

to keep migrants from being moved into LAX and then flown into 

other parts of the country. 

We also have to look at our legal authorities, and that is why we 

put into place the expedited removal program to turn around thirdcountry nationals quickly who don’t have asylum claims; and the 

interior repatriation program, to fly Mexicans back into the interior 

of the country to try to break the cycle of people being just returned across the border. But over the long haul, we, of course, 

need to improve the entire spectrum of apprehension capability, detention capability, removal capability. It is a long-term project that 

we all have to concentrate on. 

General HUGHES. May I just comment on the intelligence piece 

of this answer? In this open environment, it is important for me 

to tell you that especially with Canada and Mexico, but also with 

some other countries that are involved, not in crossing the border 

illegally as in walking across, but the illegal border crossing activity can be facilitated from afar through the use of illegal documentation and false identity. And we do have better and growing 

cooperation with both Canada and Mexico and with other countries 

in that regard. Once again, in an open environment I probably 

wouldn’t like to get into the details, but I can look you directly in 

the eye and tell you that it is better than it was. It needs to get 

better than it is, and we are working on that part of this activity. 

Mr. CAMP. All right. Thank you. Thank you both very much. 

And at this time the Chair would recognize the Ranking Member 

of the Border and Infrastructure Subcommittee Ms. Sanchez to inquire. 

Ms. SANCHEZ. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thank you gentlemen for being before us. 

I think the last few weeks in particular, the Department of 

Homeland Security has had some pretty negative press with respect to borders and air; borders, I think, because Time Magazine, 

I believe, was one that has that little picture of something being 

pulled apart and talked about, how much we really do need to do 

with respect to our borders. And it really did highlight the northern border, which, of course, we all know is much more open than 

even the southern border. But I think the other incident that happened was the incident of Yusuf Islam, who everybody in this room 

probably knows as Cat Stevens. He had—you guys returned him to 

England after he arrived in the United States because his name 

was on the watch-list. 

I think this episode highlights several problems with our current 

policy, and I sort of want to go through them so I understand what 

happened. I think America wants to know what happened and 

what we are going to do to fix this. 

First of all, he was allowed to board the plane, and I guess while 

he was en route, you guys found his name on a watch-list. I guess 

the question is why would you—why wouldn’t we be checking it before we got a supposed dangerous person on the plane, because 

maybe he could have blown it up as we were trying to figure out 

who he was? So the question is why do we have such a huge security gap in the Visa Waiver Program that allows travelers participating in the Visa Waiver Program to get on a plane without first 
21

being run through the watch-list check? And why doesn’t DHS 

check the names of passengers on international flight against the 

terrorist watch-lists before the flights take off? And if you can’t do 

it to all passengers, can you at least do it for the vast majority of 

passengers who buy international tickets at least an hour in advance? 

Mr. VERDERY. I think I will take that one, Congresswoman. The 

Cat Stevens episode does exemplify a current weakness in the way 

international travelers come to this country. As you know, we do 

not have people stationed overseas except for a couple of selected 

airports, as I mentioned, and or the Immigration Security Initiative. And essentially the airlines are currently our response overseas to enforce the watch-lists. And so when a person such as this 

individual is on a watch-list, it is the airlines’ responsibility to compare the manifest against the watch-list and make those no board 

determinations. 

In this case there was an error made. We recognize this weakness and have announced as part of the Secure Flight Initiative 

For Domestic Travel that the international realm will be enhanced 

by a proposed rule to be announced later this year to require that 

manifest information be supplied to us in advance of wheels up, so 

before the plane takes off. Now, this would be a very complicated 

endeavor. It will not only change the way booking patterns are 

made, especially connecting flights from overseas travel, but it 

would provide much greater security for us to be able to run those 

watches ourselves through the National Targeting Center before 

the plane takes off, and hopefully these types of situations will be 

much less likely to occur. 

You asked about the Visa Waiver Program. Again, the watch-list 

check that is done now is no different whether you are from a visa 

waiver or non-visa waiver country. This same error could occur 

with the airlines enforcing the system. So that is not the issue in 

this case. There is a visa waiver issue we can discuss at another 

time. 

We do have the ability, and this happened during the heightened 

threat period in the winter, if there is a plane under a certain 

threat, we can essentially hold the plane on the tarmac and run 

the checks, and that is what was going on. But that is not a tenable solution for all international travel, and that is why we were 

going to move with this proposed rule to try to get this information 

ahead of time. It is also why we went to such great lengths to get 

the PNR, kind of back-up information about your travel agent, the 

people you are flying with, your bags, and your frequent flyer number from the Europeans under this agreement, so we could use that 

investigative tool both to find people and also to clear people if 

there is a potential hit. 

Ms. SANCHEZ. You held him for 33 hours. You held his daughter 

for 33 hours also, because they ended up going off together. After 

33 hours you sent him back to England. In 33 hours you couldn’t 

figure out who this guy was? I mean, such a famous person? I am 

trying to figure out what kind of a system are we using to figure 

out what is going on here. And did you tell the British authorities? 

Why would you put him on a plane if he was such a dangerous per-
22

son? Did you put him on chained; you know, shackled? I mean, 

what is the process? 

Mr. VERDERY. Well, there is a lot of different issues involved in 

the situation. I mean, there is the ‘should he have been allowed on 

the plane’ issue. There, is the ‘what should the plane have done 

while it was in midair’; and then there is ‘how was the individual 

who actually makes it to our country who is on a no-fly list or a 

watch-list treated’? They are all separate issues, and all need separate analysis. 

But in this case, we feel that he was treated appropriately. He 

should not have been allowed on the plane, and we had to return 

him when he arrived in our country after the appropriate booking. 

So we need to continue to work on these processes, but we feel 

that proper procedures were followed once we recognized that he 

had been allowed to board. And again, that demonstrates all the 

more why we need to make these decisions ahead of time before 

the person boards the plane. 

Mr. CAMP. All right. Thank you very much. 

Ms. SANCHEZ. Thank you Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. CAMP. Thank you. 

At this time the Chairman of the Intelligence and 

Counterterrorism Subcommittee Mr. Gibbons may inquire. 

Mr. GIBBONS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

And, General Hughes, again, welcome. And I have read your testimony and wanted to ask a series of questions, if I may, because 

I think it will sort of hone itself down to or distill itself down to 

a point where I think we are going to get to the heart of the issue 

here, which is information analysis. 

As you stated in your testimony, information analysis is really at 

the heart, I think, of good intelligence efforts, and absolutely, if you 

don’t have good analysis, no matter how good the collection is, the 

result is going to be flawed. So my question is, is when you have 

several other Department—or components within the Department 

of human—or homeland defense that maintain distinct intelligence 

units, what kinds of control do you have as the head of the information analysis over these other intelligence offices? Is there a 

need for a structured relationship between IA and these offices? If 

there isn’t one, should there be one? And tasking; describe for me 

the tasking ability of IA to these other offices in order that you get 

the right information to make a decision, from your standpoint. 

General HUGHES. Well, the answer, sir, I think, is—I will start 

from the back and go forward here. The capabilities resident in all 

of organizations that I enumerate in my oral statement are impressive. They all produce what I would call organizational intelligence. 

They are focused on their organizations. The Secret Service, as an 

example, is exclusively focused on the missions and matters at 

hand for the Secret Service, and they are very closely held and are 

not broadly applied for very good reasons. Conversely, perhaps the 

United States Coast Guard, a member of the U.S. Intelligence 

Community in its own right, it is a bona fide member and has its 

own budgetary line and its own identity, has a very broad set of 

capabilities akin to any other armed force. And I will just describe 

one more example, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which 

is—in large measure operates in a clandestine manner and is a 
23

very capable organization in the human intelligence context, all of 

those and others that I won’t take the time to enumerate, together, 

taken together, find their way into the national Intelligence Community through their own conduits and through the Department of 

Homeland Security. Depends on the circumstances, the nature of 

the reporting, but virtually everything of departmental and national interest comes to us at some point. 

I believe we have a value added in regard to the analysis of all 

of that information. We are able to put it together, assemble it in 

one place, cause it to become synergistic in nature. 

The answer to the last part of your question, sir, we can task 

anyone inside the Department of Homeland Security in the name 

of the Secretary, and we do. 

Mr. GIBBONS. Is there a structured relationship between you and 

these other intelligence agencies? 

General HUGHES. Yes, there is. We have an agreement among us 

which has been verified by the Secretary and by their individual 

organizational leaders that IA is the departmental organization 

that gives some form to the structure. We meet every 2 weeks formally in the Homeland Security Intelligence Group context, and we 

exchange information among us and between us. We also have coparticipation in many meetings, and interaction every day exists 

between us in automated form, like telephone and, in many cases, 

face-to-face meetings that occur because we interact. 

Mr. VERDERY. Congressman, if I could just add on this from the 

BTS perspective. And that is one of the points of having the Border 

and Transportation Security Directorate as an umbrella over these 

large operational components, CBP, ICE, TSA, which have their 

own headquarters. They are operating around the country, around 

the world. BTS is at headquarters with IA, so there is constant 

interaction between General Hughes’ operation and the BTS headquarters operation; and also to coordinate, because we recognize 

that the activities, intelligence or otherwise, between the BTS components are so linked, especially between ICE and CBP, because 

essentially Congress broke INS and Customs in half and stuck the 

investigators with the investigators and the inspectors with the inspectors. But those links between the two to bring front-line activity back to the investigative realm has to be maintained. And that 

is one of the large purposes of the BTS Directorate is to make sure 

that link continues, along with getting the intelligence from headquarters out to the field. 

Mr. GIBBONS. Well, Secretary Verdery, let me ask you this: You 

just talked about having 838 apparent hits on your watch-list, with 

one-third receiving some sort of adverse action, either arrested or 

rejected for entry due to the biometrics program that you have got. 

What are you doing today to enhance the current capability of biometrics? In other words, are you looking at new technologies that 

are out there so that we don’t get, as Ms. Sanchez said, an inadvertent hit because of the inability either to not have the information that was properly there, or to have a poor biometric system 

that doesn’t do what we expect it to do? What programs, what pilot 

efforts have you got going? What research and development—are 

you reaching out to the private sector to do this? 
24

Mr. VERDERY. Well, sir, the VISIT system which you referenced 

is obviously a fingerprint-, finger-scan-based system. Secretary 

Ridge, the Attorney General, and the Secretary of State made the 

decision to base it on fingerprints largely because that is how we 

have people listed in criminal databases, and also in terrorist 

watch-lists in many cases. That is what makes us able to find people, and it has worked extremely well. I think the turnaround time 

is running about 6 seconds from a systems perspective. 

Mr. GIBBONS. There are also other systems out there that could 

be supplemental to the fingerprint systems that could be very helpful. 

Mr. VERDERY. There are. VISIT is always looking at trying to 

find repetitive or back-up systems that would enhance the biometrics, such as the facial recognition. Part of the biometric passport which will be coming on line throughout next year will be part 

of the VISIT system. We have to deploy readers to read those biometric facial recognition parts of the passport and build that into 

the database. We are looking at other biometrics, whether it is iris 

or the like, and that can be built in on top of that. 

Now, a very important thing, the President issued HSPD 11, 

Homeland Security President’s Directive 11, last month, which requires our Department to go through a screening review of all 

things across the government, including biometric screening processes, to harmonize them to come up with the best biometrics, the 

best screening procedures to make them consistent. That review is 

ongoing right now with a biometric subgroup. 

Again, the other thing I should mention, our Science and Technology Directorate, not represented here, is putting in an incredible 

amount of effort on next-generation biometrics, working with our 

operational entities like US-VISIT. 

Mr. GIBBONS. Well, at some point I would like to talk to you personally about these systems and look forward to that. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. CAMP. Thank you. 

And at this time the Chair recognizes the Ranking Member of 

the Intelligence and Counterterrorism Subcommittee Ms. McCarthy 

to inquire. 

Ms. MCCARTHY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I have a question for each one of you. I will take Mr. Verdery 

first. I appreciate that you said that we are not under the practice 

of holding planes when we are checking watch-lists. I happen to 

agree with you on that. But in a journey I made during the recess 

period, I learned that Australia has a system now where they do 

that investigation when the individual buys the ticket. And I wonder if we are moving in that direction on this legislation in the 

House, sponsored by our Ranking Member, to encourage that. 

Would you give us your thoughts? 

Mr. VERDERY. Yes, ma’am. As I mentioned, we have announced 

that we are planning to promulgate a draft rule that would require 

that advance manifest information be supplied before the plane 

takes off so that we can do the vetting at the National Targeting 

Center before the plane gets into the air. And so that is something 

that will be coming down the pike. 
25

And I will say, to be candid, it is not an easy solution, because 

if you talk to airports, airlines, the way that the changes have had 

to be made to how people book flights, the way people connect on 

flights will be immense. There will be costs here both in terms of 

inconvenience to passengers, the way airports are structured and 

the like. We support it, we think it is the right way to go, but it 

is something that has to be managed very carefully to make sure 

we don’t kill off the travel industry in the process. 

Ms. MCCARTHY. Well, it hasn’t killed off the travel industry in 

Australia, so I think there is probably a good model for you out 

there. And people who are bargain shopping are generally buying 

their tickets ahead of time, and that should be of assistance in your 

efforts as well. I think it is only Members of Congress that don’t 

know when they are getting on a plane. 

Mr. VERDERY. It is of assistance, but, of course, when you are 

talking about millions of incoming travelers, even if you have a 1 

percent error rate where you know you are talking to the travel 

agent on the phone and you say your name or an address or a 

phone number, and they mistype a key or a number, that then 

ends up with the kind of false hits that you try to avoid. So that 

is why the system right now is based on the information on your 

passport that is swiped electronically at the desk at the check-in 

counter so there aren’t errors, or very rarely, in that kind of information taking. You take it off the phone, off the Internet, you end 

up with more errors. 

Ms. MCCARTHY. Well, I have every faith that you will figure this 

out and will do an even better job than Australia. 

General, does DHS or TTIC or any of the other intelligence agencies have an office devoted specifically to terrorist travel? The information sharing that is going on in other countries, I was on a trip 

with Member Dunn, who chaired the trip to Ireland, to Northern 

Ireland, the Republic of Ireland and England, and one of the examples we learned there was that a—of a police officer in Northern 

Ireland investigating an incident uncovered information that, when 

shared with others in the Republic of Ireland, in the South, and 

with Great Britain led to the discovery of the cell that funded the 

Bali tragedy and others. So they, albeit they are all in one compact 

series of islands, are doing that information sharing. 

How are we doing on information sharing not just within our 

own country, but within those other strategic countries that are so 

important to our mutual success? 

General HUGHES. That is a good question, but it is broader than 

the Department of Homeland Security. I will go ahead and answer 

it on behalf of the many other colleagues. 

The U.S. Intelligence Community, at a variety of levels, especially the Central Intelligence Agency, the Department of State’s 

intelligence organs, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the 

Defense Intelligence Agency, and the Department of Homeland Security, we all exchange information with other countries. It is not 

perfect in some cases. And the reasons are we have to go forward 

with information that can be released and placed at risk in the 

other countries’ realm. We do have mechanisms to do that, such as 

tear lines and sanitization, where you take out the source’s meth-
26

ods that we use to get the information. But it is a very robust activity and ongoing. 

I think there was kind of an interior question there that you 

asked, and that is how are we doing with regard to the travel, terrorist travel focus? The Transportation Security Administrations 

intelligence organisms, there are two or three different pieces to 

that, do overwatch terrorist travel in a professional sense. And in 

my organization, as part of our Strategic Intelligence Division, we 

have a culmination of liaison officers and devoted analysts who 

work part time or whole time on the issue of terrorist travel. Indeed, I would probably say each and every day, my time is devoted 

in some measure to the issue of persons who we have encountered 

in the travel process who are connected in some way with terrorism. It is of vital importance to us. 

Ms. MCCARTHY. Mr. Chairman, if I might pursue very, very 

briefly. 

Mr. CAMP. Very briefly. The gentlewoman’s time has expired. 

Ms. MCCARTHY. Yes, sir. 

Are you sharing this—is there a clear sharing with other countries? 

General HUGHES. Yes. 

Ms. MCCARTHY. Thank you. 

Mr. CAMP. The gentleman from New Jersey, Mr. Andrews may 

inquire. 

Mr. ANDREWS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the testimony of the witnesses. 

Our goal, our policy, is to reach a day when every person attempting to gain entry in the country can be affirmatively identified so we know who they say they are. When will we reach the 

day where every port of entry into the country has biometric reading capability? 

Mr. VERDERY. Well, if you are talking about the US-VISIT biometric reading capability, that has been deployed to the major seaports. There are some smaller ones that have not been brought on 

line. That will be coming down the pike throughout the coming 

months and years. In addition to that gap, we are deploying at the 

land borders, at the 50 largest land borders, at the end of this year 

and the smaller ports of entry throughout next year. So US-VISIT 

is not a complete system by any means, but the Secretary, I think, 

took the bold step of deploying it in stages, because no one had 

been able to do this because no one—

Mr. ANDREWS. I understand. You want to do it right rather than 

fast. But we want to do it right and fast. So what percentage of 

people coming into the country today do not have their IDs biometrically read? 

Mr. VERDERY. Well, I am trying to remember. The overwhelming 

number people who come in this country are coming via the land 

border, and the larger percent of that from Mexico. Now, most people coming from Mexico are Border Crossing Card holders. I would 

have to get the numbers for you, but my sense of it is at least probably a third of the individuals coming in are coming in as Border 

Crossing Cardholders, coming back and forth all the time. Those 

people have gone through a background check similar to a visa, so 
27

they have been checked. Anybody who has gone through a visa has 

been checked. And now starting today—

Mr. ANDREWS. When you say checked, you mean read through a 

biometric reading? 

Mr. VERDERY. If you apply for a visa now, you will go through 

a biometric check at the time of the visa interview and then again 

with US-VISIT at the port of entry to see if derogatory information 

has been received in the meantime or if you forged your document. 

And again, as of today, literally today, Visa Waiver travelers who 

don’t have a visa are now being checked biometrically at the port 

of entry, at the airports and seaports. 

Mr. ANDREWS. I know that it is not a totally knowable fact to 

know when the day will come when every port of entry has biometric reading capability, but when do you think the day will come? 

Mr. VERDERY. Well, again, the most difficult one will be the 

smaller land ports of entry, which is by statute required by the end 

of 2005. These are the outposts in the middle of nowhere, so to 

speak. So that is the backdrop of the last date where things would 

be fully employed. 

Mr. ANDREWS. And is that going to happen? 

Mr. VERDERY. I believe it will, yes. We are committed to have the 

big ports of entry with that capability in secondary at the end of 

this year, building out in the primary lanes of entry throughout 

next year. 

Mr. ANDREWS. So this will include by sea, by air, by land? 

Mr. VERDERY. Air is complete right now for entry, and the seaports largely complete. There are a few gaps. Land this year and 

next. 

Mr. ANDREWS. Now, let’s talk a bit about biometric quality. Dr. 

Wein, or Wein—I am sorry if I mispronounce his name—is going 

to testify later this afternoon that he has concluded that a very, 

very small number of the readings are reliable, and he has made 

a suggestion that if we shift the technology for the fingerprint reading to read 10 fingers instead of what we read now, we can dramatically increase reliability, I believe, to over 90 percent from in 

the forties or fifties where it is now. 

A, do you agree with his assessment? And B, if you do—if you 

don’t, what is wrong with his assessment? And if you do agree with 

his assessment, do you think that we should make the rather modest technological change that is proposed to try to plug the hole? 

Mr. VERDERY. All I have seen is his testimony for this hearing, 

which doesn’t have the technical back-up that you might expect. I 

understand he has a study that will be released in the coming 

days, which I would expect that our team, especially the US-VISIT 

Office, would want to look at very carefully. 

As I understand it, it is not that the majority are unreliable. It 

is that a small minority are unreliable if they have certain characteristics of their fingerprint. I honestly feel a little uncomfortable 

talking about in open session as to how to defeat the system, to be 

honest. But—

Mr. ANDREWS. But certainly we could generically say that there 

are people trying to beat the system, and there are ways to do it, 

right? So do you agree with his conclusion that those of—a signifi-
28

cant plurality, I guess, of those who try to beat the system can do 

so now. 

Mr. VERDERY. I don’t agree with that, and I don’t believe our USVISIT biometric experts do either. I don’t pretend to be a biometric 

expert, but I don’t believe they would agree with that in the way 

it has been presented. 

Now, to go to your question you asked earlier about the 10-print. 

I think we do agree that in a perfect world, a 10-print solution, if 

it didn’t take any more time and any more costs, would be preferable. But at a port of entry, at a visa issuance window, there is 

a big difference between putting a 10-print reader and a 2-print 

reader out in a primary lane or at a very crowded consular office. 

And so the marginal gain between 10-print and 2-print we have decided to date is not worth it because it would have held up deployment of a system that is working every day, as we speak, to find 

people you would not want coming into this country. 

Mr. ANDREWS. I have to say I am concerned about that answer 

because it is my understanding that NIST looked at this study and 

believes that his—the professor’s conclusions were conservative; 

that, in fact, the error rate may be higher. And remember that although the vast majority of people trying to get entrance do not in 

any way try to alter their fingerprint, I would assume that it is a 

pretty fair conclusion that a significant number of people that we 

are actively trying to keep out might want to alter their fingerprint. So it is a small part of the universe, but a very crucial part 

of the universe. 

Let me also ask you this. It follows up with Mr. Gibbon’s question. What mechanism is in place to move forward in biometric 

technology for things other than fingerprint, like eye scan? Do we 

have the flexibility to test those technologies, and, if so, what are 

we doing? 

Mr. VERDERY. Well, we are actually testing the iris scan, if that 

is what you mean, right now in a different program, the Registered 

Traveler Program that TSA is operating at five airports around the 

country, including Reagan National, both fingerprints and iris 

scans, as a way to verify people who have been preenrolled in a 

Registered Traveler Program. And so we are working on the iris 

scan from that end. 

As I mentioned, the facial recognition technology that will be 

built into international passports, will be required of Visa Waiver 

travelers next year. We are building in the capability to read that 

into our document readers at ports of entry. And so we are looking 

at the systems to provide redundancy and the like. 

But again, the backbone of the system, from our point of view, 

has to be the fingerprint because that is the way our criminal 

records are characterized; that is how we are able to find people 

very quickly with very low error rates, people who should not be 

admitted to this country. 

Mr. ANDREWS. Thank you very much. 

Mr. CAMP. Thank you. 

Mr. Pascrell may inquire. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Chairman, 98 percent of over 281 million visitors annually 

enter our country and are inspected. That means that millions of 
29

travelers entering the country are entering without being checked 

against any intelligence database that could help identify a potential terrorist or even a convicted criminal. 

I am interested—when we talk about terror, General, and I want 

to know if you agree with me, I am talking not only about those 

people who wish to bring explosives into this country or to come 

into this country to wreak havoc on our citizens and our property, 

and I am talking about those people who are transporting drugs 

across our border. I see that terror every day in my district, 

throughout this Nation. And I know that drug trafficking in the 

United States has a lot to do with the funding and the assisting 

of terrorist groups and organizations. What do you see and what 

do you do about drug interdiction? And how do you see they are 

both connected? 

General HUGHES. Well, thank you very much for the question. 

Perhaps Assistant Secretary Verdery would like to comment after 

I do. 

Personally, I am not positive about the figures you quoted, but 

I grant you that there are people who successfully get into the 

country with drugs and who are terrorists who may come in with 

some capability. That certainly is true. I think it is a very small 

percentage compared to what it was. 

We have actually been extremely successful in interdicting drug 

shipments, and indeed in the past 2 weeks, we have interdicted 

huge multiton, ship-borne movements of cocaine in the Pacific, 

which you may have read about in the newspapers. 

Aside from that, on our land borders and in air crossings, it is 

pretty common for us to now interdict any kind of carrying of such 

material, either terrorist-related material or drug materials, 

through the air bridge. 

The land bridge, as we mentioned, poses a significant problem for 

us. We are trying to do our best to control that, and there are a 

lot of issues there I can talk to you about, but I think we are making progress. We are on the right track. 

But I don’t know whether that is a good answer for you, but I 

will summarize it. Maritime is a huge problem, but we are being 

successful at interdicting, and that is often based on good intelligence. The air bridge is pretty secure comparatively for both terrorist activity involving material and narcotics trafficking. Small 

amounts probably arrive here and there. The land borders are an 

issue, and we are working hard to secure them. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Mr. Verdery, would you respond to that question, 

please? 

Mr. VERDERY. Sure. I think, as General Hughes mentioned, the 

numbers on drug seizures are up quite dramatically, whether it is 

by sea with the Coast Guard or over land at our ports of entry or 

the Border Patrol. We have seen no degradation of the drug mission in this Department. In fact, it has been enhanced by the additional capabilities being brought to bear. I would be happy to get 

you those figures on that. 

We do recognize, of course, that the means by which people are 

able to enter the country on the land border could facilitate a terrorist looking for the same type of entry. That makes it all the 

more important—
30

Mr. PASCRELL. Well, my point—excuse me for interrupting. My 

point is that there is no difference in the terrorists. What is the difference? If you are bringing drugs into this country to kill our children and our citizens who are stupid enough to use it, you are—

what is the difference between that kind of terrorism and the terrorism that the President has been talking about over the last 3 

years? What is the difference? 

Mr. VERDERY. I take the point. We want to do both. We want to 

fight the counternarcotics mission and also what I was referring to 

as more of international terrorism, which I think is a term of art. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Well, would you agree with my statement that the 

terror of drugs in this country is just as horrible, just as terrible 

as the terror which is brought into this country of those who wish 

to bring explosives or to kill our citizens or to damage our property? 

Mr. VERDERY. I wouldn’t want to rank two horrible outcomes. 

They are both horrific. 

Mr. PASCRELL. We both agree then. 

Mr. VERDERY. Yes. But I think the capabilities that are being 

brought to bear against the terrorism threat as I define it, kind of 

international terrorism, Al-Qa’ida and the like, is having significant impact on the drug enforcement mission also, whether it is the 

One Face at the Border Initiative, getting our Customs inspectors 

and immigration inspectors cross-trained, enhanced Border Patrol 

missions, advanced technology on the border. We are seeing increases in picking up people, picking up drugs, all those kinds of 

things on the border. 

The last point I have to make is that this demonstrates all the 

more reason for the President’s Guest Worker Initiative, because 

we have got to figure out a way to get the overwhelming majority 

of people who are crossing the border legally, who are not criminals, who are not trafficking drugs, who are not terrorists, who 

want to work, we have to be able to have a way for them to walk, 

to come back and forth to those jobs through the ports of entry 

where they can be vetted for security reasons and essentially pull 

the wheat and the chaff, separate them. Terrorists are not going 

to be able to walk into a port of entry. And so if we can get the 

guest workers who are here to work coming back and forth through 

ports of entry, regularize that, it would make our border enforcement mission much better. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Let me make myself clear. I didn’t make myself 

clear then. There are 22,000 Americans that are killed every year 

in the United States due to illicit drugs. It would seem to me, just 

an observation, a perception, that we do not have the commitment 

to interdicting those drugs and ending this horror on the streets of 

our communities. And we know the tragedy of 9/11. The Commission spelled it out, made some recommendations. Some we have included in legislation conveniently, and some we have left out. 

You don’t have enough people to do your job. I don’t care what 

you tell us today. You don’t have enough people to do your job. So 

you are the messenger. I understand that. It is not you personally 

that I am—

Mr. VERDERY. If I could just—I mean, there is a commitment 

from the Department, from the Secretary, from Asa Hutchinson, 
31

the Under Secretary, former head of the DEA, our Deputy Secretary, our operational heads such as Commissioner Bonner and 

our Counternarcotics Office to see this mission forward. And as 

General Hughes mentions, the numbers bear out that we are doing 

it. Are drugs getting in? Of course. This is never a 100 percent solution. But we have seen a robust increase in the amount of drugs 

that are interdicted in the source zone, at the ports of entry and 

the like, and we need to ramp it up. But we are doing the job. 

Mr. PASCRELL. I just wanted to bring something to your attention, that is, on the Border Patrol. We are talking about, in 2011, 

there were 9,700, almost 9,800 Border Patrol. There are 10,839 

today. How can you sit there and tell this committee—being the 

messengers, how can you sit there and tell this committee that by 

adding the small amount of Border Patrol, that you are even touching the surface of this serious problem. 

You know that there are more drugs coming into this country 

than ever in the history of the Nation. You don’t have enough people to do the job. We are doing this on the cheap, and we are doing 

this for what the reason? 

I don’t know why we are holding this hearing today, I really 

don’t. We need to act and we need to act yesterday. And that was 

the whole message of the 9/11 Commission, we need to act yesterday. And we need to do it in a very tangible way, rather than simply having committee upon committee, everybody gets a piece of 

this, and nothing is being done. 

There is terror in our streets, and there is terror from drugs in 

this country that are moving freely. You know it and I know it. 

Just as serious as the lunatics that are out to try to kill us—just 

as serious. 

Mr. CAMP. Thank you. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

And before I recognize Mrs. Lowey, the purpose of this hearing 

is to look at terrorist travel. We have separate committees in this 

House that deal with narcotics, and there are some Members that 

are on both committees, like Chairman Souder who has done a 

great deal of work in this area. 

So I appreciate the gentleman’s line of questioning, but this hearing, in fairness to our witnesses, is about terrorist travel. And I realize—

Mr. PASCRELL. I am talking about terrorist travel, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. CAMP. I realize, by your definition, but we have separate 

committees—

Mr. PASCRELL. That is why I asked the question. 

Mr. CAMP. But we have separate areas that are also working on 

this. 

So, with that, I would recognize the gentlewoman from New 

York, Mrs. Lowey, to inquire. 

Mrs. LOWEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Gentlemen, good to see you again. Tuesday’s New York Times reported, based on the findings of an FBI inspector general report, 

that 3 years after the September 11th attacks, more than 120,000 

hours of potentially valuable terrorism-related recordings have not 

yet been translated by linguists at the FBI. 

My judgment, this is absolutely outrageous, not to mention dangerous, particularly for the residents of my home State of New 
32

York which is referenced in intelligence reports time and time 

again. 

In my judgment, we can collect all of the intelligence we want, 

but if we let it sit on a shelf and collect dust for 3 years, it won’t 

do us any good. We are here today, in part, to review the progress 

being made by the Department in the area of information sharing. 

And perhaps, Secretary Hughes, could you just tell me what this 

report indicates to you, and what you are doing about it? 

General HUGHES. It indicates to me that we—and actually I 

guess I will use a little bit of history here—we haven’t solved the 

problem we have had for many years, where similar kind of records 

have been found throughout the intelligence community, not just at 

the FBI, but at the National Security Agency, the Central Intelligence Agency and the former office that I held, the Defense Intelligence Agency. We are overwhelmed, in fact, many times by the 

volume of material. 

We do have some screening mechanisms to go through this material and highlight to us the issues of interest that are in them, rapidly, key word search, as an example of anything that can be 

digitized. That is not the only—

Mrs. LOWEY. Secretary Hughes, if I may, but I know that my 

time is fast disappearing. You are the Assistant Secretary, Information and Analysis. I may not get to my next question about border security. But it is 3 years after 9/11. 

I have three children, I have seven grandchildren; I want to 

know what you or others who have similar responsibilities are 

doing about this now? This is an embarrassment. It should be an 

embarrassment to you, to Secretary Ridge, to the FBI. What are we 

doing about it now? 

General HUGHES. I don’t think I can answer your question. I 

don’t know what we are doing about it now, outside of being equally outraged, as you are, about the report. I don’t actually know if 

the report is completely accurate. 

But let’s assume that it is for a minute. What I intend to do is 

to ask questions about it in the appropriate forum and to seek full 

detail, and then search for ways to solve this problem. I am sorry 

if it seems like I was talking on anything something that wasn’t 

related. But, indeed, it is related, ma’am. 

We have had these problems for 20 years or more. And we are 

likely to have them in the future. The volume of information and 

the number of people to deal with it is in great imbalance. 

I apologize for giving you that answer. 

Mrs. LOWEY. No, I appreciate your honesty, sir. But I just want 

to say, as someone who sits on Appropriations, I know the—in addition to this committee, I know the billions that we are spending. 

We spent billions organizing this Department of Homeland Security. 

I had real concerns that instead of dealing with issues like this 

and replacing incompetent people with competent people, we have 

been moving chairs around. Some people aren’t even in their offices 

yet. So I just wanted to send a very strong message that if my first 

responders—my police, my fire fighters—are going to be getting 

plans in place to deal with emergencies and the FBI doesn’t even 

have all of these urgent messages interpreted—as you know, before 
33

9/11, part of the problem was they couldn’t get the messages to the 

right people; and I am not even talking about other issues that our 

first responders have. But if we can’t get these messages interpreted in a timely way, we might as well just all say, Give up, save 

the money, put it into our schools, put it into our health care, the 

Department of Homeland Security is just not doing what it should. 

And I hate to be so strong, because I know you are working so 

hard. But I just hope that if I am sending my strong message to 

you, it is gotten, and you can report back to me and to the committee as soon as possible with a plan that is going to address this. 

Mrs. LOWEY. I don’t know if we are going to have a chance to 

ask other questions, but Solomon Ortiz, my colleague, has been 

asking a lot of question about the gangs, the illegal immigrants 

that have been coming over the border. Unfortunately, the head of 

counterintelligence at the CIA, never heard about that. 

So I hope, Mr. Chairman, you all have heard about it. He didn’t 

know about it, and so there seems to be a real problem of people 

in one office not communicating with people in other offices. And 

I hope, Mr. Chairman, if we have another round, we can deal with 

that, because that is truly a major issue in border security. Thank 

you. 

General HUGHES. May I give one brief answer? 

One of our—

Mrs. LOWEY. I am talking about the catch-and-release issue. 

General HUGHES. I understand—and the gangs. My point that I 

was going to make is, one of our primary databases is called 

VGTOF it is the Violent Gangs and Terrorist Activities or Terrorist 

Organizations Database. 

We combine the two in at least one database and look at them 

with equal vigor for lots of reasons. And part of the reason is, we 

believe, I strongly believe, there is a connection. So MS13 from El 

Salvador or Honduras here in the United States and Al-Qa’ida 

somewhere else, I believe does have a relationship that is important for us to understand. 

May I just close by saying, I share your passion, and I will do 

my best, ma’am. 

Mrs. LOWEY. Mr. Chairman, I think it is just important to remember, and I know if we get to another round, that the problem 

here is that these illegal immigrants are released under their own 

recognizance. 

And I have a feeling that they might not all be home just knitting with their families or cooking dinner. And I think it is an 

amazing issue that many of my colleagues have spent a lot more 

time focusing on, and I was just going to bring it up today. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. CAMP. Thank you. 

Mr. Langevin. 

Mr. VERDERY. If I can have a brief minute to respond. But you 

mentioned that there were catch and release. That is obviously a 

concern of ours, because there is an imbalance between the number 

of people who are picked up, who are scheduled for deportation, 

and the amount of beds we have. 

Now, within that imbalance, ICE has gone to great lengths to 

prioritize people who have been found to be involved with criminal 
34

activity, violent criminal activity, or are non-Mexican. So we are 

trying to prioritize amongst our bed space to keep the violent felons 

in custody until they are deported, as well as trying to improve the 

deportation system itself to get more people through the system, 

whether it is through repatriation, getting people back to countries 

that won’t take them. 

We are trying to move more people through so we have less catch 

and release. 

Mrs. LOWEY. Maybe you should have more bed space. 

But, Mr. Chairman, I won’t take any more time. 

Mr. CAMP. Thank you. 

Mr. Langevin may inquire. 

Mr. LANGEVIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Gentlemen, thank you for being here today. Andrews, who is 

clearly on the same wavelength addressed my question in large 

part, but I do want to follow on, if I could, and just explore a little 

further where we are, how close we are in terms of having a robust 

system that is as close as possible to 100 percent effective when it 

comes to biometric scanning of fingerprints. 

What are you doing to get us to that 100 percent level, and in 

terms of a time frame, at what point can you give assurance to the 

public that we are as close as we are going to get, that it is a 100 

percent accurate scanning system? 

Mr. VERDERY. Well, if you think of—

Mr. LANGEVIN. If I could, in addition to that, are we giving equal 

attention in terms of the technology that is deployed to airports, 

ports of entry and land border crossings, particularly in light of the 

fact that there are some that suggest that Al-Qa’ida would prefer 

a port of entry as opposed to some of the other methods coming in? 

Mr. VERDERY. Well, thank you for that question, sir. 

Again, VISIT is being deployed in fairly well-identified, discrete 

increments: Increment 1, January 5 of this year, airports and seaports. It is now 100 percent at airports, so every international traveler, with the exception of diplomats and a couple of other minor 

categories, basically 100 percent are vetted biometrically at the 

port of entry, at airports. 

Seaports are close to 100 percent for entry. Land borders, we will 

put US-VISIT capabilities in secondary processing by the end of 

this year at the 50 biggest ports, the very heavily trafficked ones, 

and at the smaller ports of entry by the end of next year, by 12/

31/05. 

The VISIT capability on primary, because essentially when your 

cars are driving through you are talking about primary, will be deployed throughout 2005 at the big ports of entry and 2006 for the 

smaller ports of entry. 

In terms of how are we deploying it, we recognize there is no way 

to make everyone get out of a car at primary, with literally millions 

of people coming through. So we are going to be going with a radio 

frequency technology solution, so that the biometric information is 

pulled off your travel document as you are going through the port 

of entry ahead of time, so that the inspector can see the information, see if there is a potential problem while there is still time for 

a law enforcement response or other necessary action. And that 
35

same solution will be deployed on exit, so there is an exit at the 

port of entry, as well as for land. 

I think I mentioned the airport exit solutions will be deployed 

this year, and throughout next year there will be a universal airport and seaport exit. 

So I think the bottom line for airports and seaports, you are looking at near 100 percent coverage by the end of next year; land 

ports, 2006. 

Mr. LANGEVIN. What about the accuracy of the technology itself? 

As Mr. Andrews was—brought up, Dr. Professor Wein’s findings indicate that the technology itself in some cases may be as low as 52 

or –3 percent in terms of its accuracy. You feel it is higher. 

But, clearly, it is not at 100 percent. So what steps are you taking to get us as close to 100 percent accuracy as possible? And how 

long before you have confidence that it is 100 percent accurate 

when the technology is used? 

Mr. VERDERY. Well, what we found in the 9 million or so people 

who have been enrolled in US-VISIT this year is that the accuracy 

is quite high. The false positive rate is less than 1 percent. And 

those people are resolved usually very quickly, in a couple of minutes in secondary, where a fingerprint appears to be a match 

against a watch-list, but is not. There also are small numbers of 

individuals whose fingerprints cannot be taken for medical reasons 

or other reasons. 

The issue that was raised by the witness in the second panel is, 

I think, a little bit different than that. It is a question of, if you 

are trying to defeat it, how easy is it to essentially try to rig the 

system. And again I don’t feel real comfortable talking about that 

in open session. I would be happy to come in and talk to you privately about that. 

But in terms of the overwhelming majority of individuals, it is 

working extremely well, in the 99 percent range. 

Mr. LANGEVIN. My time is almost up, so quickly I would like to 

ask this. 

I still am constantly baffled by the sheer number of different 

databases and lists available for determining who requires extra 

screening and who should or should not be flying. And I can’t believe that we still don’t have one complete and integrated list that 

can be effectively used for our Border and Transportation Security 

infrastructure to thwart terrorist travel. 

So can you provide some more detail as to what your goal is in 

terms of streamlining those lists and ensuring that they are used 

effectively? And can you tell me exactly when that goal will be 

met? 

Mr. VERDERY. Well, the watch-listing effort is being led by the 

Terrorist Screening Center established by the President last year. 

The terror screening database is what is accessed by our frontline 

people, whether it is the TSA screener or an airline in terms of enforcing the ′′no-fly′′ list. So essentially we do have a common set of 

watch-lists that are now used, depending on the program. 

So the problem we have, and the reason you see these stories in 

the paper of people being flagged inappropriately, and the like, is 

not so much a problem with the list, it is a problem with the implementation of the list. Right now, it is being run by each of 77 dif-
36

ferent airlines differently. Essentially, your person that is checking 

you in is essentially acting as the watch-list enforcement person. 

We recognize that is not a tenable solution. That is why we have 

proposed a Secure Flight program to bring that responsibility within the government’s sphere, within the TSA. But to do that, we 

have to get information from the passenger, via the airlines, in 

time to make that determination. 

So we have issued an order to compel data for testing of the system. That will be followed on by an order compelling data to make 

the system go live, so that we can handle this and leave airlines 

with the responsibility of trying to enforce these lists. It will be 

based on the Terrorist Screening Center’s coordinated watch-list. 

Mr. LANGEVIN. Can you give a time frame? Can you assure the 

public out there that we are not going to see these kinds of stories 

in the paper where we have got different lists that don’t pick up 

accurately the people that should not be flying? 

Mr. VERDERY. Secure Flight, I believe, is due to become operational in the spring, post-testing; that is when you will see the 

transition from the airline-based system to the government-based 

system. 

Will it be 100 percent? No. Because there are so many air travelers, there will be false hits. If we have somebody on our watchlist whose name is Bill Jones, there will be other people named Bill 

Jones who are flying, and we have to resolve those types of potential hits. 

I am always amazed at how many similar names there are, when 

they sound like a common name; but you put the entire American 

people and our international travelers out there flying, you are 

going to have those types of hits that have to be resolved. That is 

why we are working on Secure Flight. 

Mr. CAMP. Thank you. 

The ranking member of the full committee, Mr. Turner, is recognized, if he would like to inquire. 

Mr. TURNER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I think the first thing I would like to talk about is this problem 

we have on the border with the catch-and-release practice that is 

ongoing. Do we have a figure available, Secretary Verdery, that 

would tell us what it would cost us to end that practice? 

Mr. VERDERY. A figure on how much it would cost to detain every 

person who is apprehended until they are deported? 

Mr. TURNER. Yes. 

Mr. VERDERY. I do not have that in front of me. It would be quite 

large. 

Mr. TURNER. Has there been any consideration of some temporary detention facilities that would enable us to halt that practice? 

Mr. VERDERY. Well, there are temporary facilities used on occasion. That is what we have done in Arizona where we have gone 

in and enhanced the resources. 

We recognize there has to always be a balance of the prosecutorial resources, the detention resources, the removal resources. 

And if you end up with an imbalance, you essentially haven’t done 

any good, because you can’t get people through the system appropriately. 
37

So there has to be essentially a continuum. So, in that case, we 

have put more temporary space in Arizona. 

Mr. TURNER. I am told by some of the Border Patrol people that 

I visit with that the catch-and-release practice fairly quickly has 

become well known among those who are engaged in human smuggling. And so we are likely to have seen an increase in efforts to 

come across our unprotected borders as a result of the fact that it 

has become known that if you are from a place other than Mexico, 

you have about a 50 percent chance of being released on your own 

personal bond if you come into our country. 

And I would suspect that we could at least make some impact 

upon the movement of illegal immigrants from places other than 

Mexico if we had some effort—made some effort to try to stop that 

practice. 

Mr. VERDERY. Well, regarding the announcement that we had recently of the new use of expedited removal, it points out the need 

for that. It essentially is going to say, if you are from a country 

other than Mexico and picked up between a port of entry and you 

do not have an asylum claim, you are going to be held, whether it 

is a couple of days, a short period of time. You are going to be 

flown back, you are not going to be put into the system taking up 

a bed for months, even years. We can move people through more 

quickly. 

Again, I have our detention numbers: 108,000 in 2001, 113,000 

in 2002, 145,000 in 2003. We had 130,000 in 2004 through June, 

so I think we are on track to have quite a bit of increase from last 

year. But, again, there is no shortage of people in this regard. 

Mr. TURNER. The Border Patrol people that I visit with say that 

they have received no instruction from the Department regarding 

how this new expedited deportation process is going to work, no indication of what kind of training the Border Patrol agents will be 

receiving, no indication of when this is going to be implemented. 

We have a program here that you have announced, but there 

doesn’t seem to be much understanding among the rank and file 

about how it is going to work or where you are getting the money 

to pay for it. Could you help enlighten us on that? 

Mr. VERDERY. Well, it is operational in two sectors, in Tucson in 

Arizona and Laredo in Texas. So if you are not a Border Patrol 

agent in those two sectors, then you probably wouldn’t have been 

trained, because it is not being applied. In these sectors, training 

has been completed. I have to get back to you on exactly how many 

people, but the training has been provided. 

There was a month lag time between the announcement and 

when it became operational, so they can get their proper training, 

to make sure we are abiding by our asylum requirements under 

international law. 

In terms of the funding, this is a money saver in the long haul. 

It is going to move more people through, and will be a deterrent 

effect against the migrant flow that you mentioned. 

And if I might just mention one other thing while I have the 

floor, a very important announcement from last week is that we 

have now integrated at the Border Patrol stations the IDENT and 

IAFIS fingerprint systems, which were formerly separate systems 

developed by the Justice Department. We have integrated work 
38

stations available at all Border Patrol stations so that if Border Patrol picks somebody up, they can not only check it in IDENT, which 

has information about prior illegal crossings and immigration information, but also against IAFIS, which has all of the criminal database from FBI and other sources. 

So we will have an end to that situation where people were 

picked up for a crime in one State, and then Border Patrol didn’t 

know about it. We have already had a number of successes of violent criminals being found. Of course, that means those are the 

types of people we are going to detain. They are not going to be 

part of a catch-and-release policy, so to speak, but will be the priority people that will take up those beds. 

Mr. TURNER. Do you have the capability to access the FBI database to know who they may have on their database when people 

come to Border Patrol stations? 

Mr. VERDERY. That is exactly what I was just talking about; the 

IAFIS system is what FBI operates. So, yes, if Border Patrol picks 

somebody up, they are now run against IAFIS to see if there is a 

prior criminal record. we had promised that was going to be deployed in 70 percent of the Border Patrol stations by the end of this 

year, and we will have beaten that by going to 100 percent as of 

last week. 

Mr. TURNER. Do you feed information back to the FBI regarding 

people that you picked up? do you feed records into the same database that you receive information from? 

Mr. VERDERY. They have access to IDENT through the US-VISIT 

program. And we have actually just announced an enhanced access 

by FBI to do searching through IDENT, whether it is the Border 

Patrol information you mentioned, or the entry-exit information 

through US-VISIT. They do have access to that. We are enhancing 

that. 

Mr. CAMP. Thank you. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

We have another panelist that we would like to hear from. 

I want to thank both General Hughes and Assistant Secretary 

Verdery for being here this afternoon. And this would conclude 

your testimony before this subcommittee today. Thanks again for 

being here. 

Mr. CAMP. The next panel will include Professor Wein. I want to 

thank Professor Wein for coming all of the way from California to 

testify at this hearing. Professor Wein can come and take a seat 

at the table. Thank you. 

We have your written testimony. If you could briefly summarize 

your statement in 5 minutes. 

STATEMENT OF PROFESSOR LAWRENCE M. WEIN, GRADUATE 

SCHOOL OF BUSINESS, STANFORD UNIVERSITY 

Mr. WEIN. Good afternoon, Chairmen Camp and Gibbons, Ranking Member Turner and members of the House Select Committee 

on Homeland Security. I am honored to appear before you today to 

discuss a serious but repairable vulnerability in the biometric identification performance of the US-VISIT program. 

The implications of our findings are disturbing enough that last 

week I briefed members of the Homeland Security Committee, staff 

from the Office of the Vice President, and analysts at the General 
39

Accounting Office, and program managers at the US-VISIT program. 

On the surface, the biometric identification of the US-VISIT program appears to be highly effective. A NIST May 2004 report estimates that the chances that a terrorist who is on the watch-list—

when entering a port of entry, the chances that we catch them and 

have a watch-list hit is 96 percent, while maintaining a false positive rate, that is the probability that someone like you or me would 

nonetheless set off a watch-list hit, maintaining that probability at 

a mere 3 in 1,000. 

So what is the problem? Well, the devil is in the details. It turns 

out that the software systems also report and determine the quality of each image. And the software has a very difficult time in accurately matching images that have poor quality. 

And the premise of our study is that terrorist organizations, such 

as Al-Qa’ida, will exploit this vulnerability by choosing U.S.-bound 

terrorists who have inherently poor image quality, such as wornout fingers or deliberately reduced image quality. Why is this? 

First, all of the information is public; it is on the NIST database; 

two, Al-Qa’ida has a large pool of terrorists from which to choose; 

and three, we know they are sophisticated enough. Indeed, given 

the intricacies of the planning of the 9/11 attacks, I think our assumption is not only prudent but realistic. 

So using publicly available information from the NIST Web site, 

we developed and analyzed a new mathematical model that includes red-teaming. First, the U.S. Government chooses a biometric 

strategy, essentially the rules that decide how you determine if a 

watch-list hit happens. So they choose a strategy to maximize the 

chances of catching a terrorist, subject to maintaining moderate 

congestion at the ports of entry under current staffing levels. 

Then the terrorist tries to defeat this system by choosing his or 

her own image quality to minimize his or her chances of getting 

caught. And the results are sobering. The currently implemented 

strategy has only a 53 percent chance of detecting a terrorist at 

U.S. points of entry, compared to the overall level reported in the 

NIST report of 96 percent. 

Again, the deterioration, down to a coin flip here, is due to the 

fact that the terrorist is allowed to exploit the vulnerability in the 

biometric system. 

We have two main results. The first result is that instead of 

using a one-size-fits-all decision rule for who gets a watch-list hit, 

we derived different rules for different image qualities. And by 

doing so, we were able to increase the detection probability from 

53 percent to 73 percent. So from essentially a coin flip, up to almost three-quarters. This is a minor software fix. 

Over the next few days, I will give a detailed mathematical paper 

to people at NIST, to people at the US-VISIT office, and this should 

be implemented as soon as possible. 

Now, even if we increased inspector staffing levels significantly, 

we can’t really get over the three-quarters level, over the 75 percent chance. But now here is our second result. If we take 10 fingers at visa enrollment, and then have the opportunity at ports of 

entry to use more than two fingers for the people with the poor 
40

image quality, then we can increase our detection probability all of 

the way up to 95 percent without increasing the false positive rate. 

Although switching from a two-fingerprint to a 10-fingerprint 

system may be costly and certainly would be disruptive, there is 

simply no excuse for a $10 billion program to not achieve a 95 percent performance level, particularly given the potentially grave consequences of allowing a detection—allowing someone, a terrorist, to 

cross the border. 

If slower two-finger matching algorithms cannot in the immediate future approach this 95 percent detection probability for poor 

quality images, then the US-VISIT program should be reconfigured 

with 10-fingerprint scanners as soon as possible. 

Thank you. And I look forward to taking your questions. 

[The statement of Mr. Wein follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF LAWRENCE M. WEIN

Good afternoon, Chairman Cox, Ranking Member Turner, and the Members of the 

House Select Committee on Homeland Security. I am honored to appear before you 

today. 

I am the Paul E. Holden Professor of Management Science at the Graduate School 

of Business, Stanford University. I teach operations management to MBA students, 

and perform research in the areas of operations management, medicine and biology. 

At their essence, many homeland security problems are service operations problems: 

Just as McDonalds needs to deliver hamburgers in a rapid and defect-free manner, 

the US Government needs to quickly deliver vaccines and antibiotics after an attack 

and to safely prevent nuclear weapons and terrorists crossing our borders. 

Since September 11, 2001, I have used mathematics to analyze a variety of homeland security problems in bioterrorism (effective responses to terrorist attacks using 

smallpox, anthrax or botulinum toxin) and in border security (evaluating ways to 

detect nuclear weapons coming through ports). These analyses have led to policy 

recommendations, several of which the U.S. Government has adopted. 

Today, I am here to discuss the results of a study I conducted at Stanford University with Ph.D. student Manas Baveja that examined the ability of the US-VISIT 

program to accurately match the fingerprints of visitors at ports of entry against 

a watchlist that contains the stored fingerprint images of suspected terrorists. The 

implications of our findings are disturbing, so much so that last week I briefed 

members of the Homeland Security Council, staff members from the Office of the 

Vice President, analysts from the Government Accounting Office (GAO) and officials 

from the Department of Homeland Security. 

On the surface, biometric identification of the US-VISIT Program appears to be 

highly effective. A May 2004 NIST study, entitled ‘‘Matching Performance for the 

US-VISIT IDENT System Using Flat Fingerprints,’’ predicted that the likelihood 

that US-VISIT would flag a terrorist whose fingerprints are stored on the biometric 

watchlist is 96%, while simultaneously limiting the false positive probability, i.e., 

the likelihood that a visitor not on the watchlist would nonetheless generate a 

watchlist hit, to 3 in 1,000. 

So what’s the problem? It turns out that the devil is in the details: The biometric 

software also computes the quality of each fingerprint image, and it is very difficult 

to accurately match poor-quality images. Our study stems from the belief that terrorist organizations can exploit this observation by choosing US-bound terrorists 

that have either poor image quality (e.g., worn out fingers) or deliberately reduced 

image quality (e.g., surgery, chemicals, sandpaper). The relevant data is publicly 

available on the NIST web site, and we know Al-Qa’ida has the sophistication to 

understand this and has a large pool of potential terrorists to draw from. 

Using publicly available biometric data from NIST, we developed and analyzed a 

novel mathematical model that allows red-teaming: First, the government develops 

a biometric strategy to maximize terrorist detection for a given inspector staffing 

level, and then the visiting terrorist attempts to defeat the biometric system by 

choosing the image quality to minimize his chances of getting caught. 

The results are sobering: the currently implemented strategy has only a 53% 

chance of detecting a terrorist during US entry, compared to the overall value of 

96% mentioned earlier. The detection probability is reduced to essentially a coin-flip 

because the terrorist is allowed to exploit the vulnerability in the biometric system. 
41

The good news is that our study pointed to possible solutions that our nation can 

implement. Rather than using the current one-size-fits-all rule for generating 

watchlist hits, we derived different rules for different levels of image quality and 

improved the likelihood of detecting a terrorist from 53% to 73% without increasing 

the false positive rate. 

Unfortunately, our study predicts that increasing staffing levels of US Custom 

and Border Protection inspectors would offer only modest benefits, and could increase the 73% detection by only an additional 5%. Given that US-VISIT runs millions of watchlist checks each year, this is an unacceptable security risk. 

Fortunately, our nation has a second solution it can rely upon. Instead of using 

a software system that scans two index fingers, we found that that allowing additional fingers to be tested from people with worse image qualities achieves a 95% 

detection probability, without increasing the primary plus secondary inspection 

workload associated with legal visitors. 

Finally, the government’s investment in biometrics at ports of entry for detecting 

terrorists should be assessed in light of the detection probability required to deter 

terrorists from crossing at an official port of entry. The deterrence value of a fingerprint system depends on the terrorists’ perceived likelihood of successfully entering 

the US between the ports of entry, e.g., along the US-Mexico border. While this detection rate has been estimated to be approximately 25% in a recent Time Magazine 

article, it appears that Al-Qa’ida prefers to enter the US at ports of entry. 

To summarize, there is a serious but reparable vulnerability in the biometric identification system of the US-VISIT Program, which is our last line of defense for 

keeping terrorists off U.S. soil. A minor software modification that allows the 

watchlist rule to vary with image quality can increase detection from 53% to 73%. 

I have provided details to officials who oversee the US-VISIT operations, and this 

should be implemented as soon as possible. The use of more than 2 fingers for lowquality images can achieve a detection probability of 95%. Although switching from 

a 2-fingerprint to a 10-fingerprint system may be costly and disruptive, there is no 

excuse for a 10-billion dollar program to settle for performance below this level. Indeed, our results are not inconsistent with the warning in the November, 2002 NIST 

report that a 2-finger search was not sufficient for identification from a large 

watchlist. If slower 2-finger matching algorithms cannot approach 95% detection for 

poor-quality images, then the US-VISIT Program should be reconfigured with 10-

fingerprint scanners as soon as possible. 

Our recommendations hinge on the assumption that terrorist organizations as sophisticated as Al-Qa’ida will eventually attempt to defeat the US-VISIT system by 

employing terrorists with poor-quality fingerprints. In light of the meticulous planning that went into the 9/11 attacks, I believe this assumption is not only prudent, 

but realistic. 

Thank you, and I look forward to responding to your questions.

Mr. CAMP. Thank you very much. We just had, last week, a demonstration of some of the technology available in biometrics, and 

they didn’t have exactly the same rates. 

I think the way you look at your data is a little different than 

theirs. But I understand your concern is that people intentionally 

deface their fingerprints and then—on a two-finger scan system, 

that is not that hard to do, and they will circumvent. 

Now, in theory, if there is a bad read or an inability to read a 

fingerprint, there should be diversion to secondary screening at 

that point under the system. But my question is more about alternative biometrics. 

I have seen some demonstrations on facial scans. I am not sure 

that 10 fingers is really the best direction that we should go. It is 

almost landline versus wireless in terms of telecommunications. 

But it seems to me that this facial reading has a much higher rate 

of accuracy, which is in sort of the development stage. 

As you referred to, there are other biometrics, such as eye scans. 

Can you comment on those and give us some information on what 

you—

Mr. WEIN. Yes. The operative word you bring up is ‘‘development.’’ These are in the development phases. I have worked on port 
42

security also with Stephen Flynn on some of these issues. It is a 

hard problem, because you have all of this technology that may 

provide a silver bullet, but it may take 5 or 6 years. But the terrorists aren’t going to wait 5 or 6 years to sneak a nuclear weapon 

into the country. 

NIST has done quite a bit of analysis on face biometrics, and 

they claim for large-scale identification of the size we are talking 

about here, it simply is not a feasible option. The iris and eyes—

I have read up on all of these, and some of them sound promising; 

they may be ready in several years, they are not ready for prime 

time. Either they have too many false positives, people don’t like 

to have various parts of their eye scanned and so forth. So, whereas, it may not be viewed as wireless technology, taking 10 fingers 

clearly will help a lot. 

Indeed, my recommendations are not inconsistent with what is 

reported from the NIST way back to November of 2002, that twofinger methodology is simply not adequate to do large-scale identification. 

Mr. CAMP. Well, it seems if you could deface—

Mr. DICKS. Would you yield just for a second? 

I think you were here. We had a meeting here, and they came 

up and told us that two fingers gave us 95 percent reliability. 

And you are saying that is not true, because there are quality 

problems associated with two fingers or any fingers, and that is 

why you should do 10, in order to get the higher reliability; is that 

not correct? 

Mr. WEIN. The 95 percent is averaged over the entire population. 

The overwhelming amount of the average population, like you and 

me, we are not attempting to defeat the system. 

Part of the reason we are putting this program in place is to stop 

terrorists from coming into the country. It would be naive to think 

that these people are not trying to defeat the system. 

An insignificant fraction of people have naturally worn-out fingers, have naturally poor image quality. It is on the order of 5 to 

10 percent. 

Mr. CAMP. If I could reclaim my time, my point was, we did have 

a higher number. I think he is looking at it a little differently. 

But, second, if you can deface two fingers, you can deface 10, and 

we ought to be looking at other means—my point is that. 

US-VISIT is just one of the items that we have to try to disrupt 

terrorist travel. We also have, you know, this other biometric capability. We have the watch-lists that we just had an extensive discussion on. There are inspectorinterviews. There is secondary 

screening. There is actual real intelligence that has helped disrupt 

this. 

So this is just one of the many items that we are looking at in 

terms of how we disrupt terrorist travel. 

Mr. WEIN. I think it is important on many of these homeland security problems to move forward in two ways. One is, operationally 

we need to get things in place that are effective, and get them in 

there quickly, because Al-Qa’ida and other terrorist organizations 

are not going to wait. 
43

And second, we need to keep an eye towards the future of trying 

to find better technologies, be they biosensors, be they radiation detectors, be they biometrics, to help us on the 5-to–10-year time line. 

Mr. CAMP. The last point is that the additional fingerprints, from 

what we understand now, would take a great deal of additional 

time. To get in this 45-second or 50-second window at the booth is 

very important in terms of not disrupting travel for those citizens 

who are not trying to do us harm. So it is a balance there. 

Mr. WEIN. My analysis is conservative. I am assuming each finger takes 5 seconds. So if you did 10 fingers, it is going to take you 

50 seconds rather than 10 seconds that it currently does. 

Mr. CAMP. Well, it takes longer than 10 seconds with two fingers, 

because of the entire process. But I understand your point. 

Mr. WEIN. Right. 

Mr. CAMP. We are not there yet in terms of speed. 

Mr. WEIN. Right. But, MITRETEK and NIST and have proposed 

the four-finger slap. And, indeed, they think they can do this quite 

quickly, more like doing it in 10 seconds rather than in 50 seconds. 

And, indeed, I have been told ergonomically that you can actually 

get better prints from the slap, because your fingers are more stable. 

Mr. CAMP. Thank you. My time has expired. 

And I would at this time recognize the ranking member of the 

Border and Infrastructure Subcommittee, Ms. Sanchez, to inquire. 

Ms. SANCHEZ. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And thank you, Professor. I am trying to understand what you 

were telling us. 

Are you saying that over a large range of people, an end sample 

being almost infinite, or 200 million, or whatever we have in the 

United States, that if we look at all of our fingerprints, we have 

a 95 percent good match, but if we are taking a look at a much 

smaller number, these people who we think are terrorists or would 

happen to be on a list, that because we think that they might deform their fingers in some way or something, that the percentage 

would therefore be lower? 

I am trying to understand how you get down to the 50 percent. 

Mr. WEIN. Right. The 95 percent that they give us is over everyone. But it turns out, on the order of 5 percent, let’s just say, people have poor image quality. 

For the most part, this is naturally poor image quality, people 

who have worn-out fingers either genetically, or they have 

scrubbed floors all of their life or whatever. Al-Qa’ida has a large 

pool of terrorists to choose from to come into this country. There 

are pictures on the NIST Web site of what a low-image-quality finger looked like. 

Ms. SANCHEZ. So they can select those people who they think are 

low-image people to put into the pool of people we would be concerned about? 

Mr. WEIN. Right. So they don’t even have to deliberately deface 

their fingers with sandpaper or chemicals or surgery or whatnot. 

They can simply choose people for their U.S.-bound missions who 

have poor image quality. 
44

Ms. SANCHEZ. You said, if we took these 10 fingers at the visa 

processing—when we were processing the visa, that it would take 

about a minute a person? 

Mr. WEIN. Well, we would take the 10 fingers at enrollment, so 

we have the 10 fingers. We wouldn’t need to use all 10 fingers, except for the people with bad image quality. We would have that information when they show up at port of entry, Oh, this is a person 

who has bad image quality. We are going to use 8 or 10 fingers 

here at the port of entry. 

What you can do at port of entry is take 10 fingers from everyone, so that everything else can be blind to both the operator and 

to the visitor of how many fingers you use to actually try to figure 

out if they are on the watch-list. 

Ms. SANCHEZ. OK. I just wanted that clear for my own information. Thank you, Professor. 

I will yield back my time. 

Mr. CAMP. Thank you. 

Mr. Gibbons may inquire. 

Mr. GIBBONS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Wein, thank you for being here. Appreciate your testimony. 

As you know, the State of Nevada for many years has had biometrics within their gaming industry that uses massive, large-scale 

recognition of large crowds to be able to single out a selected individual based on facial recognition features. And I am sure that 

their system, while not perfect, could be an ancillary or additional 

check for a person coming through either the screening at a port 

or, at the same time—

But let me ask a completely different question that goes to this 

quality image that we talked about. How much of the quality is 

outside of the control of the Department of Homeland Security? I 

mean, you talked about the characteristics of the fingerprint,but is 

there a quality issue with the machine, a quality issue with the 

training, a quality issue with the software? 

How much of it is outside of their control, and therefore, what 

portion could be corrected by going back and doing, like you said, 

software versus the quality image of having a bad series of fingerprints? 

Mr. WEIN. That is a very good question. We asked ourselves that 

in the process of this research. 

Unfortunately, the available data from NIST doesn’t exactly answer that question. But we do have an analysis that is quite technical—I won’t go into it now—but it suggests that the great majority of this is inherent in the fingers and is not operational noise 

due to sweat and dirt and finger pressure and things like that. 

I do think it is important to train the operators to keep the operational noise or environmental noise as small as possible by, you 

know, cleaning the fingers and cleaning the surfaces where they 

are putting the fingers and making sure they are holding their fingers steady and things like that. 

In talking with the US-VISIT people last week, it sounds as if 

good operations processes are in place. So I think US-VISIT is 

doing all they can on the image quality problem—I mean on—in reducing, on getting rid of the operational noise. And most of it is 
45

simply inherent in the people; that is why we really need to make 

these fixes I recommended. 

Mr. GIBBONS. OK. Let me go back to the issue of other biometrics, particularly facial recognition. Is facial recognition 

enhanceable by increasing the number of points on a face from today’s standard—I guess what is it, 14 or something like that? 

What if the facial recognition capability were 200 points on a 

given picture of a given face? Is the likelihood or accuracy of that 

biometric far greater? 

Mr. WEIN. I can just tell you that my analysis, and what I will 

distribute in the next few days to the government, cites a paper 

from NIST that says for large-scale identifications, that is, one-tomany matching for a large watch-list, facial biometrics is inadequate to even help on the problem. It just isn’t feasible at this 

point in time. 

Mr. GIBBONS. Do you know why they say that? 

Mr. WEIN. The data is there. I would have to go back and look 

at the paper to give the reasons. They mostly do a statistical analysis, look at this, and conclude that the facial recognition cannot 

help. It certainly is great for verification one-on-one, are you who 

you say you are, but when you are comparing it to all of the millions of people on a watch-list, it is simply—

Mr. GIBBONS. Is it because of the computer technology where we 

have to sort through a large, massive database in order to have 

sufficient evidence, or time or recognition features that would allow 

for a more accurate determination of who the individual is with 

something like that? 

Mr. WEIN. As I understand it from reading, there is a lot more 

noise involved in taking someone’s picture, the lighting, the shadows, the angle, things like that, than there is on a finger. That is 

why there are many more false positives. 

And when you start thinking about a false positive, when you are 

comparing against hundreds of millions of people, you are getting 

back to the John Doe that the assistant secretary was talking 

about. There are just too many John Doe’s on the watch-list. 

Mr. GIBBONS. It just seems to me that if we can control the quality of the fingerprint, we can control the quality of the photograph. 

Mr. CAMP. Would the gentleman yield? 

With the new facial recognition, the lighting is not as important 

as in past times. So there is some new technology there that really 

gets around that problem. 

Mr. GIBBONS. Mr. Chairman, my time is up. 

Mr. WEIN. NIST has decided—has said that facial recognition 

has gotten much better in the last few years, but it still cannot 

help on the problem of large-scale identification. Maybe in 5 years, 

hopefully, but not now. 

Mr. CAMP. The gentleman from Texas, the ranking member of 

the full committee may inquire. 

Mr. TURNER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Professor, the NIST scientists that our staff has talked to say 

that, if anything, your numbers are very conservative, that the 

quality of the fingerprint images in the terrorist watch-list is even 

worse than what you are talking about. 
46

So it seems to me that you are telling us something that is very, 

very troublesome. And I don’t know how much worse they think it 

can be than your 50 or 52 percent number. 

Did they give you any indication? Have you talked to them about 

what they think about this? 

Mr. WEIN. I only talked to one person from NIST who was 

present when I briefed the program managers from US-VISIT last 

week. 

It is true that NIST has said over and over again in their papers, 

which are publicly available on the Web site, that the test databases they use, in some sense are much cleaner than the true operational databases that we are using to try to catch terrorists. And, 

indeed, there is going to be lower image quality in general on the 

real databases than there is on these test databases. 

Obviously, at this point in time, they are not sharing those numbers with me, so I can’t say what the magnitude of that is. But I 

would agree with their assessment that my numbers are conservative and are painting, if anything, an optimistic view of the current operation. 

Mr. TURNER. I mean, this is quite disturbing. We are talking 

about a program that was announced and estimated to potentially 

cost the taxpayers $10 billion to put in place. And you are saying, 

even by your numbers, the chances of catching a determined terrorist may be only 52 percent. 

Mr. WEIN. Yes. And, you know, one good thing is that a chunk 

of that, you can get maybe from 50 to, 70 or in real terms, maybe 

40 to 60 or whatever by just a few lines of software code. So that 

is part of the silver lining here. 

But, yes, I do want to just reiterate that a program this expensive and this important with the implications of allowing terrorists 

into this country, given that there is an existing fix that we can 

do that doesn’t involve—well, it does involve some retrofit—I realize there are space constraints at the ports of entry. But this seems 

like a no-brainer, that we have the 10 fingers available, we can get 

it, and let’s do it. 

Mr. TURNER. And so that fix, moving to 10 fingers and changing 

the software, would move it up to where we might have a 75 percent chance of catching a terrorist that was determined—

Mr. WEIN. Yeah. I think that is conservative. I would think it 

would be higher than that. 

But, again, one would really have to almost, you know, look at 

the true database, and probably people with security clearances—

and I don’t know if it is NIST or people at the US-VISIT—would 

have to run the final numbers. But I think we would get in the 

90’s. 

Mr. TURNER. You know, we have had a large number of Members 

of Congress raise this question about why US-VISIT is based on a 

two-fingerprint system, rather than a 10. Some have suggested 

that even going to four would be a substantial improvement. 

Do you understand and could you shed any light on why it is 

that the Department chose to stay with its two-fingerprint system, 

which apparently is much less effective in accomplishing our objective? 
47

Mr. WEIN. To be honest, the last few years I have focused on 

other catastrophic terrorist events, namely, smallpox, anthrax, botulinum toxin and port security. So I have only been working on 

this problem for the last few months. I was not engaged in this 

problem at the time these decisions were going on. So I would 

guess other people in this room would have better answers to that. 

I would—I think I will stop there. 

Mr. TURNER. All right. My time may be up. 

Mr. CAMP. Thank you. 

Mr. Dicks may inquire. 

Mr. DICKS. Thank you very much. 

We have pointed this out to them, going all the way back to the 

time when they were selecting contractors. And I don’t know why 

this—for some reason, they went for two, because it was easier and 

faster, I think. 

This is something we pointed out to them; and I think they misled the committee, Mr. Chairman. I think the witnesses that were 

here misled our committee by not pointing out this problem with 

the unrecognizable or poorly done fingerprints. 

I agree with you, I think terrorists are going to pick that up and 

understand that. So, I think we have to go to a 10-fingerprint system. 

I have checked with some of the best experts in the world on 

this, and they all agree. In fact, NIST recommends a 10-slap fingerprint image stored in type 14. 

You know, I think Congress—I think we have put in the reports 

recommending to them that they do this, that they compete it and 

have a competitive system. They didn’t do it. I think it has something to do with the contractor, frankly. 

But having said that, we have only got 3 minutes and 40 seconds. Tell us a little bit about these other issues. We know about 

this one. We know this is a mistake. 

Tell us—you mentioned port security. Give us a couple of seconds 

on that. 

Mr. WEIN. I have worked on the port security problem with Steve 

Flynn. I think, A, that is a much more important problem in the 

sense—it is one thing to let a terrorist into the country; it is another to let highly enriched uranium or a nuclear weapon into the 

country. 

B, to their credit, I think it is a lot more difficult problem, the 

technology isn’t all there. 

C, I think they have been dropping the ball on this problem, and 

Steve Flynn and I have briefed Commissioner Bonner’s entire staff. 

They have put all of their eggs in the ATS basket, and we are currently testing 5 percent of the containers; the other ones can waltz 

through the system. 

It is easy for a terrorist to bypass one layer of security, particularly given the manifest rules that are in place. And we really need 

to do-100 percent passive radiation testing, and we need to do a 

fair amount of active testing in the sense of an x-ray or gamma ray 

imaging to look for shielding. 

And we also need to spend money now to to find a way to detect 

highly enriched uranium, which is very difficult to catch with existing equipment. 
48

Mr. DICKS. You mentioned a few others, anthrax and some other 

ones. 

Mr. WEIN. For anthrax, I have an op-ed in the Washington Post, 

a paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. As 

a result of that, your area here, Washington, D.C., if a big attack 

occurs, the postal workers will help distribute antibiotics throughout the area. Hopefully, this program will go nationwide. 

That was a direct result of our op-ed. I am currently funded by 

HHS to help them decide how, if and when to deploy the next-generation anthrax vaccine. My work on smallpox was instrumental in 

affecting the Bush administration’s post-attack strategy for vaccination. 

Mr. DICKS. We still don’t have enough people vaccinated, though, 

do we? The caregivers, isn’t that still a problem? 

Mr. WEIN. Yes. The implementation of the front-line worker vaccination had a number of problems with it. And, you know—

Mr. DICKS. They still haven’t been corrected, have they? They 

still don’t have enough people vaccinated, do they? 

Mr. WEIN. I think this—I think it is dead in the water at this 

point, until we have another terrorist attack, to be honest. 

Mr. DICKS. In other words, to get more people vaccinated, the 

caregivers, we are going have to have a catastrophic event in order 

to convince everybody to do that? Is that what you are saying? 

Mr. WEIN. It may not have to be catastrophic, but I think we 

need another event. 

Mr. DICKS. Because nobody is paying attention? Is that what you 

are saying? 

Mr. WEIN. No, it is not because no one is paying attention. It is 

because—it is several reasons. It is the risk communication, about 

what is the risk of—if I give the vaccine to the frontline worker, 

what are the chances of them dying or having a serious incident? 

It is the perception of, is there really smallpox out there—the 

whole weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, issue. And it is a complicated problem. 

Mr. DICKS. Well, again, I am troubled by this, Mr. Chairman, 

that we have had a series of these hearings. I commend the majority for having these hearings, but I think it is pointed out again 

and again and again, the deficiencies in this homeland security 

program. 

And I don’t know how we can, in the Congress, get people’s attention in the executive branch that we have got to do more on 

these issues from port security, anthrax, the fingerprints for the 

US-VISIT program. I mean, there are all of these problem areas 

that haven’t been addressed. 

It is one of the things that has shocked me, frankly, in my service here in this Congress for 28 years. I have never seen something 

of this importance treated this way by the executive branch. 

I commend the committee for having the hearings, because at 

least we have a chance to present the information to the American 

people. But we can’t seem to get anybody to do anything about it. 

Mr. Wein, I appreciate your going around and meeting with all 

of the officials. I hope that they will respond to your very lucid 

presentation of this gap in the fingerprinting program. I commend 

you for your good efforts, and please keep them up. 
49

Mr. CAMP. Thank you. 

That concludes our questioning. There being no further business, 

again I want to thank the subcommittee members and our witnesses for being here today. 

The Chair notes that some members may have additional questions for this panel, which they may wish to submit in writing. 

Without objection, the hearing record will remain open for 10 

days—

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. CAMP. —for Members to submit written questions to these 

witnesses and to place their responses in the record. 

[The information follows:]

FOR THE RECORD

PLEASE NOTE: ASSISTANT SECRETARIES VERDERY AND HUGHES HAVE DEPARTED DHS. 

DEPUTY ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR POLICY AND PLANNING ELAINE DEZENSKI

SUBMITS ON BEHALF OF A/S VERDERY, MATTHEW BRODERICK, OF THE HOMELAND

SECURITY OPERATIONS CENTER, SUBMITS ON BEHALF OF A/S HUGHES. 

QUESTIONS FOR THE RECORD FROM CHAIRMAN CHRISTOPHER COX

1. Although the interagency charter for the Human Smuggling and Trafficking 

Center between the Departments of Homeland Security, State and Justice was just 

signed this past July, the 9/11 Commission’s report itself referred to this center as 

having produced, ‘‘disproportionately useful results.’’ The Commission staff believes 

that the collective interagency effort of the Center holds great promise to become 

one of the most important resources to combat terrorism and terrorist travel. 

Q02133: Please describe for the Committee how the Department is currently working with the Human Smuggling and Trafficking Center and 

more importantly, what formal plans does the Department have and what 

steps has it taken to ensure that DHS does its part in ensuring this center 

reaches its full potential? 

Answer: The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) supports the Human 

Smuggling and Trafficking Center (HSTC) in a variety of ways to enhance border 

security efforts: 

• DHS has signed an interconnectivity agreement that provides HSTC personnel with access to critical DHS data systems to facilitate efficient information sharing; 

• DHS procured necessary equipment to provide the HSTC with secure communications capabilities and provides the necessary systems support; 

• Immigration and Customs Enforcement has assigned full-time staff to the 

HSTC that serve as subject matter experts in the areas of human trafficking, 

terrorist mobility and human smuggling. DHS is also committed to providing 

full time participation in the HSTC from other DHS components such as the 

United States Coast Guard (USCG), Customs and Border Protection (CBP), and 

Information Analysis. 

• DHS utilizes the HSTC to convene important interagency coordination meetings, and to coordinate select initiatives. DHS also utilizes the products produced by the HSTC to inform the policymaking decision process. 

DHS’ commitment to the HSTC is long-term. DHS holds three seats on the HSTC 

Steering Group; Acting Under Secretary Randy Beardsworth is the DHS co-chair 

representative for the Steering Group, Elaine Dezenski, Acting Assistant Secretary 

BTS Policy and Planning, and Michael Garcia, Assistant Secretary of Immigration 

and Customs Enforcement, serve as members on the Steering Group for the HSTC. 

This group oversees and provides policy and administrative oversight of the HSTC, 

and to make sure that it is operating in a manner consistent with Constitutional 

liberties and national security requirements. Through this interagency Steering 

Group, DHS works with our partner agencies to ensure that the HSTC is fully supported by DHS, including personnel, fiscal resources, and information.

(B) Q02134: What specific budget authority and personnel resources does 

DHS plan to provide the HSTC? 

Answer: In effecting the HSTC, DHS is more fully utilizing existing governmental facilities that have been associated with monitoring the flow of illegal persons, cargo and conveyances into the country. DHS is currently reviewing the re-
50

1On December 6, 2004, the NCTC undertook all responsibilities assigned to the TTIC. 

source requirements for the HSTC and anticipates that it will finalize both the operations funding and personnel requirements in the very near future. Currently there 

are 6 ICE agents/analysts staffing the Center full time and the USCG has 3 individuals on a part-time basis. 

Additionally, the Director of the HSTC is a Department of Homeland Security 

(DHS) Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Supervisory Special Agent.

(C) Q02135: How is the DHS Office of Information Analysis sharing information with the HSTC? And how is DHS as a whole going to share information with the Center? 

Answer: Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Office of Information Analysis 

(IA) analysts have daily or near daily interaction with the management and staff 

members of the HSTC during which they discuss cables of mutual interest and collaborate on tasking and production. Cable traffic flagged by IA personnel is sent to 

the HSTC via SIPRNET (Secret Internet Protocol Router Network; the DoD-operated SECRET level network), as are all products classified SECRET and below that 

contain references to alien smuggling and terrorist mobility. If there are documents 

at a higher classification, IA will share hard copies with properly cleared HSTC 

members, and/or encourage HSTC to obtain the documents by other means. Once 

the HSTC is equipped with JWICS (Joint Worldwide Intelligence Communications 

System; the DoD-run TOP SECRET/Sensitive Compartmented Information system), 

all appropriate documents will be shared electronically. Information identified by 

HSTC staff is shared with IA in a similar fashion. Similar procedures are followed 

for information sharing between the HSTC and other enforcement and intelligence 

entities within DHS. HSTC personnel are able to access message traffic and finished 

production via connectivity to their parent organization systems and other online 

data repositories. 

2. My staff had several meetings with the 9/11 Commission staff responsible for 

writing the terrorist travel portion of its report. And although not specifically articulated in the 9/11 Commission Report, its staff has pointed out in discussions with 

this Committee’s staff combating terrorist travel will require ‘‘specialists’’ who are 

located at all ports-of-entry and that these specialists must have the ability to contact the intelligence community directly to obtain up-to-the minute classified information that could be used to combat terrorist travel.

Q02136: Please comment on this recommendation of Commission staff 

and indicate what concerns and roadblocks you see which might prevent 

this from occurring. 

Answer: CBP worked diligently after release of the 9/11 Report to examine their 

findings and recommendations and make use of the report within CBP. Some of 

those recommendations will be incorporated into CBP practices and enforcement 

posture. By example, CBP is devoting extensive resources to training to make frontline officers more cognizant of the threat posed by terrorists and their weapons. To 

further this field level training, CBP’s Office of Intelligence has placed an intelligence analyst at the Terrorist Mobility Group at the Terrorist Threat Integration 

Center (TTIC) to be aware of the trends and techniques and assist CBP with knowledge of these trends and methods to identify and defeat them. 1We are participating 

in Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) squads. We are nearly completing installation 

of a Special Compartmented Information Facility (SCIF) at the CBP National Targeting Center, with access to classified materials, to be able to support field enforcement—first and foremost, identification of terrorists and their weapons. Moreover, 

we work each day to apply whatever intelligence is derived from the Intelligence 

community into appropriate actions by field officers, in a manner consistent with 

the classification and sensitivity of the information. Our concerns would be more pedestrian—the length of time to obtain clearances for employees, which are needed 

to help work through the ever-growing volume of intelligence and classified material 

and the need for training employees to think and work as intelligence analysts do. 

When CBP officer encounters a possible terrorist, they are required to contact the 

CBP National Targeting Center (NTC) and relay all the specifics of the individual 

for further review. In all cases where the NTC cannot discount the individual is a 

match to the terrorist, the Terrorist Screening Center (TSC) is contacted. The TSC 

has complete and full access to all of the derogatory information associated to the 

record and passes it back to the NTC when appropriate. The passing of information 

is only limited to the clearance level of the NTC officer and the security level of the 

communications into the NTC. The NTC, in turn, will relay enough information 

back to the port of entry (POE) for the front line officer to make appropriate decisions. The TSC will also contact the FBI Counter Terrorism Watch (CTW) with in-
51

formation on the encounter. The CTW acts as the operational arm for the TSC and 

will relay operational instructions to CBP. They can also dispatch the local Joint 

Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) and have the ability to pass classified information to 

the cleared JTTF members. 

There are two limitations to getting classified information to the POE. The first 

issue is the clearance level of CBP personnel in the field is rarely above the SECRET level and most derogatory information today is at the Top Secret and Code 

Word levels. The other issue is the lack of a secure communications path to the 

ports and how to get classified information to a non-SCIF environment. Two possible 

solutions are to make the NTC SCIF operational and/or to rely on the clearance levels of the JTTF teams. The JTTF approach is already in place and appears to be 

working. 

3. As you are already aware, ICE’s Forensic Document Lab is the only Federal 

crime lab dedicated almost entirely to the forensic examination of documents and 

has been doing so since 1978-and specializes in the identification of fraudulent visas 

and passports. Besides the FDL’s role as the leading resource on fraudulent passports and visas to other Federal agencies, including the FBI and Department of 

State, the FDL’s Library houses the largest known repository of known genuine 

travel documents. I have two questions related to the FDL,

(A) Q02137: Since the FDL is the leader in such documents, what concerns do you have that both the Department of State and the Department 

of Justice, both consumers of the expertise and resources available 

through the efforts of the FDL, may be planning to set up their own capabilities in the identification of fraudulent documents? 

Answer: At present, we are not aware of any initiatives by either the Department 

of State (DOS) or Justice to develop their own capabilities in the identification of 

fraudulent documents. Several years ago, however, the DOS expressed an interest 

in establishing such a capability. When the Forensic Document Lab (FDL) learned 

of this, FDL representatives initiated a meeting with DOS officials to express their 

concern over the potential duplication of effort and unnecessary expenditure of resources. The FDL reiterated its willingness to provide forensic and operational support to all DOS entities. Subsequently, the DOS decided that its plan represented 

duplication of effort, and rather to continue to utilize the FDL’s unique resources 

and expertise. 

Central to the FDL’s forensic and field operations support functions is its exemplar library, which presently contains more than 120,000 known genuine travel and 

identity documents and other resource materials from every country of the world. 

The library, the largest known collection of its kind and continually growing, represents a 25-year effort by FDL staff which would take enormous time and resources for another agency to replicate. A far more feasible and cost effective approach would be to dedicate additional resources to expand the FDL library and extend its availability to more federal, state, and local user agencies.

Q02138: And do you think that instead of duplicating efforts in other Federal agencies that instead more resources should be dedicated to the FDL 

and it expanded in light of the new importance being placed upon the disrupting of terrorist travel? 

Answer: DHS agrees with the view of the 9/11 Commission Report that ‘‘targeting travel is at least as powerful a weapon against terrorists as targeting their 

money.’’ DHS has devoted additional attention and resources to the analysis and 

disruption of terrorist travel. CBP has created the Fraudulent Document Analytical 

Unit (FDAU) to analyze the travel of suspected terrorists and the documents they 

use. CBP coordinates closely with ICE and the FDL so that the unparalleled experts 

at the FDL can forensically examine suspect documents, issue any necessary alerts, 

and modify the training in fraudulent document recognition that FDL offers accordingly. DHS believes that the FDL is the leading government entity in the identification of fraudulent travel documents and it would not be a prudent use of resources 

for other government agencies to seek to replicate the expertise that FDL already 

provides so well.

(B) Even with the FDLs limited resources and current staff of only 51, it impressively provides training to not only the agencies within DHS, (ICE, CBP, CIS, and 

the USCG), but also to other Federal agencies (State, Justice, IRS, SS Administration) and to state and local law enforcement and they can barely keep up with the 

requests for training currently.

Q02139: Please describe for the Committee how the Department plans to 

build upon the expertise of this office and enhance its ability to provide 

necessary training-including ongoing training-to DHS and other Federal 

agency personnel? 
52

Answer: ICE is working to develop a strategy to establish an operational entity 

within the FDL to provide proactive, high quality training in fraudulent document 

recognition, specifically tailored to the needs of students from a wide variety of domestic and foreign law enforcement organizations, intelligence agencies, and private 

sector employers. In addition, the FDL would provide training courses and material 

to formally certify Document Instructors for DHS and other federal, state, and local 

agency personnel. The FDL would also develop training modules and presentations 

for use by ICE offices overseas in implementing outreach programs to educate and 

liaison with foreign enforcement agencies. The outreach materials would focus on 

document fraud and threat awareness training, and acquaint foreign officials with 

FDL capabilities and access protocols. 

QUESTIONS FROM CHAIRMAN DAVE CAMP AND CHAIRMAN JIM GIBBONS

1. Q02140 How is classified information disseminated to front line border 

and consular officials? 

Answer: In the U.S. Customs and Border Protection, classified information is reviewed by a team of intelligence analysts for information pertaining to terrorists attempting to enter the country or smuggle weapons of mass destruction into the 

United States. When appropriate, the analysts request a downgrade of information 

from the originating agency to put into the Sensitive but Unclassified (SBU) system 

that is available to the front line officers. This information could be as simple as 

the name of a person or as complex as performing analysis of various pieces of information to put into an intelligence alert or report, a trend analysis, or a threat assessment which again is entered into the SBU system. 

Currently if classified information needs to be sent to the field, it is secure faxed 

or, if possible, verbally conveyed by way of STU/STE. CBP completed installation 

of the Homeland Secure Data Network (HSDN) in 24 offices in Calendar Year (CY) 

04 for secure communications up to the Secret level. 

The National Targeting Center (NTC) and Terrorist Screening Center (TSC) work 

together to identify and vet potential terrorists intending to travel to, or ship cargo 

to the U.S. and prevent them from entering or endangering the U.S. The NTC is 

a resource to CBP field officers for coordination and communication. It is also one 

of the TSC’s largest customers for requesting additional identification of internationally traveling personnel or cargo that may have terrorist ties. 

The NTC has the unique mission to provide a centralized communication point 

for all CBP field officers and a coordination center for all CBP Office of Field Operations anti-terrorism activities. This presents other agencies with the benefit of having a single point of contact (the NTC) for communicating anti-terrorism information 

and it ensures a coordinated, managed approach toward focusing CBP resources 

that is accountable across all levels of CBP.

2. The National Targeting Center (NTC), located in U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), and the Terrorist Screening Center (TSC) both screen people and 

cargo using multiple databases. 

Q02141: How do these centers work together and how do they distinguish 

their unique missions? 

Answer: The NTC and TSC work together to identify and vet potential terrorists 

intending to travel to, or ship cargo to the U.S. and prevent them from entering or 

endangering the U.S. The NTC is a resource to CBP field officers for coordination 

and communication. It is also one of the TSC’s largest customers for requesting additional identification of internationally traveling personnel or cargo that may have 

terrorist ties. 

The NTC has the unique mission to provide a centralized communication point 

for all CBP field officers and a coordination center for all CBP Office of Field Operations anti-terrorism activities. This presents other agencies with the benefit of having a single point of contact (the NTC) for communicating anti-terrorism information 

and it ensures a coordinated, managed approach toward focusing CBP resources 

that is accountable across all levels of CBP. 

It also has the added benefit of having entities knowledgeable about CBP operations conveying specific information regarding anti-terrorism efforts that is specific 

and germane to the operating environment. 

The TSC is the clearinghouse for all encounters with known or suspected terrorists and as such is a significant resource for the National Targeting Center. Additionally, the NTC is the research center for CBP field officers for all potential terrorist or terrorism identifications. The NTC researches all terrorist field alerts and 

will contact the TSC for any additional classified derogatory information that may 

not be readily available to CBP field officers. By centralizing this capacity, clean, 
53

secure lines of communication and roles can be established between the TSC and 

NTC. Through this process the TSC can contact the FBI Counter Terrorism Watch 

(CTW). The CTW, in turn, can dispatch the local Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) 

and ensure an FBI case exists on the individual. In cases where an FBI case does 

not already exist, the National Joint Terrorism Task Force is contacted and they 

initiate a threat assessment on the subject. All information collected from the encounter is pushed back to DHS, FBI, NCTC and member of Intelligence Community 

(IC) for further analysis. The CTW coordinates the appropriate response through the 

NTC and they serve as the conduit for getting the appropriate information directly 

to the CBP field officers.

a. Q02142: Do these centers work with the Human Smuggling and Trafficking Center (HSTC)? 

Answer: DHS can not speak for the TSC; however, the National Targeting Center 

is CBP’s centralized anti-terrorism communication and coordination center for 

CBP’s Office of Field Operations. As such, they routinely exchange available information with other agencies and their operations centers.

b. Q02143: How does the Department of Homeland Security envision 

these centers roles and responsibilities changing once the National 

Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) is created? 

Answer: CBP sees the role of the NTC becoming even more significant once the 

NCTC is created. There will continue to be a need for CBP to centralize its antiterrorism communication and coordination with its field assets. The need for the 

NTC will continue to be vital for managing effective and efficient communications 

from external sources and passing it down to CBP field officers, as well as, collecting 

information internally from CBP field officers and passing it up to external sources. 

A side benefit from this accountability process is that the NCTC or other centers 

are not responsible for knowing how to best communicate information to CBP field 

officers in and between over 300 ports, or have telephone lists. 

3. Homeland Security requires a strong international security policy. The Department of State is the face of the U.S. Government overseas and is our first line of 

defense, through the visa review process, against potential terrorists entering the 

United States.

Q02144: How does DHS share information with State Department? 

Answer: State’s Consular Lookout and Support System (CLASS) receives over 3 

million watch-listings from DHS systems, including the Treasury Enforcement Communications System (TECS). 

In the context of visa security specifically, State Department shares visa applicant 

and adjudication data with the Visa Security Program, and the Visa Security Program shares the results of its reviews with State. State also provides watch-listings 

and lost and stolen passport information to TECS (over 850,000 records). 

USCIS’ Office of Fraud Detection and National Security (FDNS) meets on a 

monthly basis with DOS’ Office of Fraud Prevention Programs to discuss cross cutting issues. In addition, FDNS is drafting a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) 

with DOS’s Visa Office (VO) on data sharing. Pursuant to the MOU, USCIS will 

obtain access to DOS’ Consolidated Consular Database (CCD) and certain reports 

and systems accessible through the CCD and DOS will be granted access to certain 

USCIS databases. 

During the visa application process, biometric and biographic information collected by consular offices is queried against selected databases via an electronic 

interface with US-VISIT. At the POE, the inspecting office can verify biometric and 

biographic information provided by the travel against the DOS visa information 

through US-VISIT.

Q02145: Are there common training programs regarding terrorist indicators and fraudulent documents? 

Answer: In the context of visa security specifically, the Visa Security Program 

is developing a training program for consular officers that will address numerous 

issues relevant to effective consular adjudication of visa applications, including terrorist indicators and fraudulent documents. These trainings will leverage training 

material that is included in the Program’s training curriculum for Visa Security Officers. The FDL does provide fraudulent document training to State and other agencies and will continue to do so.

4. Is the following available to DHS personnel including front line 

agents? If it is, what agency provides this information? 

(A) Q02146: The number and type of fraudulent documents used broken 

down by country over the past month, quarter, or year? 

Answer: CBP collects information on fraudulent documents in several ways. One 

source is through its statistical collection Form G–22 Inspections Workload Report 
54

provided by the ports of entry. The Form G–22 data provides only the number of 

various types of fraudulent documents intercepted, but does not provide the country 

of origin. In January 2005, CBP established the Fraudulent Document Analysis 

Unit (FDAU), now the collection point for fraudulent documents confiscated at the 

ports. The FDAU collects additional categories of statistics, to include the number 

of passports, country of origin, and the nationality of the person who presented the 

document, and conducts regular analysis of fraud trends and significant interceptions which will be disseminated to DHS front line agents. The FDAU expects to 

have data ready in these categories by July for the first six months of this calendar 

year. The United States also intercepts other fraudulent travel documents in addition to passports, including Mexican border crossing cards and U.S. permanent resident cards. The FDAU expects to disseminate statistical information on fraudulent 

travel documents to the ports and others every six months. 

(B) Q02147: Information regarding stolen and fraudulent passports and 

documents acquired from collection activities abroad? 

Answer: It is crucial that component frontline CBP officials receive information 

regarding lost, stolen and fraudulent passports (or other travel documents). CBP 

systematically receives reporting from the Department of State and other federal 

agencies regarding lost and stolen passports and fraudulent documents. This information migrates to CBP Inspectors via electronic interface through the Treasury 

Enforcement Communications System (TECS) and the Consular Lookout and Support System (CLASS). Additionally, the DHS Office of Information Analysis (IA) and 

other Intelligence Community (IC) members periodically produce and disseminate 

lengthier pieces of unclassified finished intelligence for line agents. Such products 

may address trends, such those pertaining to lost and stolen passports, or may be 

crafted as specific hands-on guides. There are ongoing initiatives to improve the 

speed at which classified data is made available to line agents at the UNCLASSIFIED level. For example, IA is working with the IC to establish a standard whereby 

the pertinent portions of classified information concerning lost and stolen passport 

information will be automatically downgraded so that the information can immediately be sent to CBP’s National Targeting Center. This would allow the frontline 

officers to more quickly query the Interagency Border Inspection System (IBIS) 

database to ascertain if the passport is from a lost/stolen batch or known fraudulent 

document. The FDL’s Operational staff provides seven day a week (and Holidays) 

assistance to CBP field personnel regarding fraudulent documents. The Operations 

staff has access to the largest collection of foreign and domestic travel and identity 

documents in the world. They also have access to the Image Storage and Retrieval 

System (ISRS—photos, fingerprints and signatures from tens of millions of ‘‘green 

cards’’ and Employment Authorization cards), DOS’s DataShare (database of photos 

and biographical data from millions of U.S. non-immigrant visas and U.S. passports), EDISON (image database of passports of every country in the world and 

other DHS databases. The FDL officers themselves have many years experience in 

examining travel and identity documents. The operations staff develops and disseminates Document Intelligence Alerts, Document Reference Guides and Fraudulent Document Briefs. They also develop and conduct fraudulent document training 

for CBP officers. As part of the Department’s work in this area, the DHS Privacy 

Office is working collaboratively with other program offices to research the pragmatic, policy and privacy protection issues related to a distributed model for the exchange of passport-related data (lost, stolen, identity verification) where participating governments would control access to the personal information of their travelers and be able to verify travelers and travel documents of others in real time.

(C) Q02148: On site resources at high traffic ports of entries to assist 

agents in identifying fraudulent documents or terrorist indicators on documents? 

Answer: Most high traffic ports of entry have the EDISON system on site. This 

is a computerized database containing images of travel documents and their security 

features from all countries. The system is used for comparative purposes when examining questioned documents. Altered and counterfeit documents are also contained in the database for reference. 

Ports have on site training staff and reference documents to assist Officers in 

identifying fraudulent documents or terrorist indicators. Immigration and Customs 

Enforcement (ICE) Forensic Document Laboratory (FDL) provides all ports with immediate assistance in document verification through their Intelligence Officers. The 

FDL produces and distributes Document Alerts to the ports illustrating recent 

fraudulent document interceptions. 

The Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Fraudulent Document Analysis Unit 

(FDAU), as it comes on line, will provide both strategic and tactical information to 
55

ports of entry regarding recent trends of document abuse identified through an analysis of document interceptions at ports of entry. This information will enable CBP 

officers to be on the alert for new patterns of fraud.

5. Q02149: What is the Department doing to deal with the problem of altered and counterfeit passports and visas? 

Answer: The FDL’s Operational staff provides seven day a week (and Holidays) 

assistance to all DHS personnel, other federal agencies, foreign immigration/border 

control authorities, State and local police and DMV and Social Security personnel 

in all matters relating to fraudulent documents. The Operations staff has access to 

the largest collection of foreign and domestic travel and identity documents in the 

world. They also have access to the Image Storage and Retrieval System (ISRS—

photos, fingerprints and signatures from tens of millions of ‘‘green cards’’ and Employment Authorization cards), DOS’s DataShare (database of photos and biographical data from millions of U.S. non-immigrant visas and U.S. passports), EDISON 

(image database of passports of every country in the world and other DHS databases. The FDL officers themselves have many years experience in examining travel 

and identity documents. The operations staff develops and disseminates Document 

Intelligence Alerts, Document Reference Guides and Fraudulent Document Briefs. 

They also develop and conduct fraudulent document training for all DHS personnel, 

other federal agencies, foreign immigration/border control authorities, State and 

local police and DMV and Social Security personnel (FDL’s longstanding relationships) The FDL has continually participated in international working groups 

and conferences for over 20 years. The FDL was instrumental in the creation of the 

International Immigration Fraud Conference (IFC) which is comprised of 20 Western European and North American countries) that meet annually to exchange information on document fraud, fraudulent document training and document examination equipment. The FDL has also participated in Interpol’s Fraudulent Document 

Working Group that develop minimum standards for passports. The FDL chaired 

the Security Working Group to develop minimum standards for U.S. driver’s licenses and identification cards mandated by the Intelligence Reform Act of 2004. 

We are working well with our international and interagency partners on improving standards for travel documents, aviation safety, port security and the exchange 

of watchlist information. The appropriate and secure use of biometric identifiers will 

assist in all these efforts. We use biometric identifiers as tools to help prevent the 

use of fraudulent travel documents and identities so that we can be more confident 

and secure about our admissions and screening decisions. DHS has conducted a review of the use of biometrics to ensure that we are coordinating the implementation 

of biometric technology across the Department. In the international arena, we are 

working closely with our European counterparts in the G–8, the International Civil 

Aviation Organization (ICAO) and other international fora to discuss how to advance biometric methodologies, both in chip technology and electronic readers, by establishing standards to ensure global interoperability. 

The most notable success in our efforts is the creation of US-VISIT, a biometric 

entry-exit system. This system not only allows the Department to know who has entered the United States, but also captures a photograph and scans of index fingers 

to prevent the use of fraudulent identities to circumvent detection and employs biometric visa data shared by the US Department of State. In addition, the US-VISIT 

data is shared with law enforcement and intelligence agencies as appropriate. Other 

initiatives undertaken by the Department include the promulgation of regulations 

to ensure that passenger data is collected and provided to law enforcement agencies 

for screening purposes, including efforts to target terrorists through the National 

Targeting Center; participation in the G8 Lyon Roma group focusing on terrorism; 

setting passport issuance standards and fraud prevention.

Q02150: How is the Department working with other federal agencies to 

deal with this problem? 

Answer: The Department utilizes the resources of the Forensic Document Laboratory to ensure that information about fraudulent documents is disseminated to 

appropriate agencies within and outside the Department. Distribution of ‘‘Document 

Alerts’’ based on information obtained from intercepted fraudulent documents will 

be the major ports of entry throughout the United States, ICE, CBP, and CIS offices, Federal law enforcement training centers, various law enforcement intelligence services, the US Department of State, the US Secret Service, and the US 

Federal Protective Service. When appropriate, alerts will also be sent to the Social 

Security Administration, relevant Department of Motor Vehicles, and several transportation trade organizations such as the International Civil Aviation Organization, 

National Maritime Organization and International Council of Cruise Lines. The 
56

widest distribution of information on altered/fraudulent travel document is essential 

to addressing the problem.

6. Q02151: Describe in detail the technologies and training methods the 

Department is using to detect terrorist indicators on travel documents. 

Answer: In the context of visa security specifically, the Visa Security Program 

is training its officers in terrorist indicators and document evaluation. The Program 

is leveraging the resources of ICE Forensic Document Laboratory (FDL). CBP and 

the FDL have created a train the trainer session that has brought in more than 300 

CBP Officers into the FDL for a 3-day intensive training session. They stay another 

day and are given the material they will take back to the port in order to teach 

an 8-hour course. This course is currently a prerequisite to some of our cross training efforts, such as our Anti-Terrorism Passenger course and Unified Primary. As 

of November 5, 2004, more than 4566 Officers have participated in this 8-hour 

course. In addition, using advance passenger information, the National Targeting 

Center accesses a variety of databases to identify travel and document patterns 

which might indicate terrorist connections.

Q02152: Again, how is the Department coordinating its efforts with other 

federal agencies? 

Answer: In the context of visa security specifically, the Visa Security Program 

coordinates closely with State. At posts where Visa Security Officers are deployed, 

the VSOs work closely with consular officers; share information about fraud documents, fraud schemes, and terrorist activity and indicators; and provide training to 

enhance consular officers? ability to recognize those during the consular adjudication process. The VSOs also work with the law enforcement and intelligence communities at post and share information to support their efforts. 

The HSTC is utilized by DHS to convene important interagency coordination 

meetings, and to coordinate select initiatives and has signed an interconnectivity 

agreement with the HSTC that allows HSTC personnel, including non-DHS personnel, to access DHS information systems. DHS has also provided information 

technology resources to provide secure communications capabilities to HSTC personnel. Equally important, however, numerous agencies are able to communicate directly with the HSTC’s staff on a daily basis on a wide range of policy, intelligence, 

and operational issues that impact our efforts to secure the homeland.

7. Q02153: Is the training provided to our front line border personnel sufficient? 

Answer: Together with the FDL, we have created a train the trainer session that 

has brought in more than 300 CBP Officers into the FDL for a 3-day intensive training session. They stay another day and are given the material they will take back 

to the port in order to teach an 8-hour course. This course is currently a prerequisite 

to some of our cross training efforts, such as our Anti-Terrorism Passenger course 

and Unified Primary. As of November 5, 2004, more than 4566 Officers have participated in this 8-hour course. 

Q02154: Or do we need a terrorist travel specialist at our ports-of-entry 

who can provide this information but also protect classified information? 

Answer: The trainers described above, however, are not only equipped to teach 

this single course, but now have the materials and technical experience to teach additional port specific material. These are the technical experts and this pool of personnel will continue to expand, with the continued help of the FDL. 

As noted, CBP will establish a complementary function at selected field locations 

to ensure that there will be a specialist available to ports of entry at all times. This 

unit, and the field specialist, will work closely with the CBP Office of Intelligence 

and the intelligence community as a whole to ensure our front line border officers 

have the best and most up-to-date information available to safeguard the United 

States.

Q02155: Do all the front-line personnel who need clearances to utilize 

current threat information in their activities have the appropriate clearances? 

Answer: All appropriate front-line personnel who need clearances have them or 

are in the process of obtaining the required clearances.

8. Q02156: What is the Department doing to uncover clandestine travel 

among terrorists? 

Answer: The Department has instituted a number of initiatives designed to target clandestine travel by terrorists. As noted in the 9/11 Commission Report, targeting terrorist travel is a powerful weapon, and constraining terrorist travel is part 

of the Department’s overall strategy. As part of this effort, we are working well with 

our international and interagency partners on improving standards for travel docu-
57

ments, aviation safety, port security and the exchange of watchlist information. The 

appropriate and secure use of biometric identifiers will assist in all these efforts. 

We use biometric identifiers as tools to help prevent the use of fraudulent travel 

documents and identities so that we can be more confident and secure about our 

admissions and screening decisions. DHS has conducted a review of the use of biometrics to ensure that we are coordinating the implementation of biometric technology across the Department. In the international arena, we are working closely 

with our European counterparts in the G–8, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) and other international fora to discuss how to advance biometric 

methodologies, both in chip technology and electronic readers, by establishing standards to ensure global interoperability. 

The 9/11 Commission Report also advised that the Department needed to look 

even more closely at our aviation security initiatives and give special attention to 

improving each of the layers of the security system. The improvements in the layered approach include using biometric identifiers as well as using airline passenger 

data appropriately—both passenger name record (PNR) data and advanced passenger information system (APIS) data, which are screened against law enforcement 

databases by the National Targeting Center. 

The most notable success in our efforts is the creation of US-VISIT, a biometric 

entry-exit system. This system not only allows the Department to know who has entered the United States, but also captures a photograph and scans of index fingers 

to prevent the use of fraudulent identities to circumvent detection employs biometric 

visa data from US Department of State. In addition, the data is shared with law 

enforcement and intelligence agencies as appropriate. Other initiatives undertaken 

by the Department include the promulgation of regulations to ensure that passenger 

data is collected and provided to law enforcement agencies for screening purposes, 

including efforts to target terrorists through the National Targeting Center; participation in the G8 Lyon Roma group focusing on terrorism; setting passport issuance 

standards and fraud prevention; continuation of the National Security Entry Exit 

Registration System (NSEERS) for special interest travelers; and the use of the Student and Exchange Visitor Information System or SEVIS to monitor the activities 

of foreign students. Additionally, the Department is actively working with the FBI 

and the Department of Justice, which already provides terrorist and criminal fingerprint data to US-VISIT to allow FBI access to data collected by US-VISIT at the 

ports of entry. Through these and other efforts, and the sharing of data with the 

appropriate agencies, the Department is working diligently to uncover clandestine 

travel by terrorists. 

DHS has coordinated improvements to security in the maritime arena by its implementation of a layered system of screening vessel arrivals to the U.S. Since 9/

11, the USCG has been added as formal member of the Intelligence Community, 

created Maritime Intelligence Fusion Centers on the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, 

begun fielding Field Intelligence Support Teams in major U. S. ports, created the 

National Vessel Movement Center, and created the Coastwatch Program at the Intelligence Coordination Center in Suitland, MD. All of the programs are interagency 

coordinated efforts to bring together federal, state, and local agencies with a role 

on the protection of maritime assets an infrastructure. They all play significant 

roles in screening and collecting intelligence information on arriving ships, crew, 

and passengers that enter the U.S. 

In addition, the services and unique expertise of HSTC personnel directly supports the Commission’s call for enhanced connectivity amongst law enforcement and 

intelligence entities. This enhanced connectivity will improve the U.S. Government’s 

effectiveness in combating terrorism, as well as supporting an enhanced worldwide 

focus on travel and identity document fraud. Furthermore, the HSTC’s interagency 

environment provides the opportunity to apply this approach to the serious problems of human trafficking and human smuggling. 

For the first time, the HSTC brings together federal agency representatives from 

the policy, law enforcement, intelligence, and diplomatic arenas to work together on 

a full-time basis to achieve increased progress in addressing the problems of human 

smuggling, human trafficking and clandestine terrorist mobility. Additionally, the 

HSTC has access to several interagency, national, and international databases that 

contain information relative to human smuggling and human trafficking that may 

not be readily available through other sources. This combination of on-site expertise 

and accessibility to sensitive information provides the U.S. Government and foreign 

allies with a unique opportunity to more effectively identify and dismantle smuggling and trafficking organizations, and terrorist travel facilitators by working together to attack these threats on multiple fronts.

9. Q02157: How is the Department developing techniques to counter the 

evasive methods terrorists use to travel? 
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Answer: The Department is actively involved in developing techniques to counter 

evasive methods used by terrorists to travel. Through the use of biometrics and the 

US-VISIT program, the use of fraudulent identities to enter the United States can 

be effectively countered. Through US-VISIT, and in conjunction with the Department of State’s Biometric Visa Program, the Department has created a ‘‘virtual border’’ as a line of defense against entry by terrorists. Travelers seeking visas are 

screened against biometric and biographic watchlist to identify criminals, terrorists, 

and immigration violators. DHS is also working internationally to counter terrorist 

travel by participation in the G8 Lyon Roma group targeting terrorism and the use 

of fraudulent identification documents. In addition, the Department is in the process 

of implementing the legislative mandate of Section 428 of the Homeland Security 

Act. The Department will deploy experienced DHS law enforcement officers to U.S. 

embassies and consulates. These officers will perform in-depth investigative reviews 

of high risk visa applicants, conduct training programs for Department of State consular officers, initiate investigations, conduct homeland security law enforcement liaison, and research and disseminate intelligence. 

The Department is also home to the Forensic Document Laboratory, the premiere 

fraudulent document laboratory in the world. It maintains an extensive library of 

travel documents, as well as trained forensic experts and intelligence officers who 

provide expertise throughout the Department. 

For aviation travelers, the department collects advance passenger information 

system data (APIS) otherwise known as manifest data, which is screened against 

law enforcement data bases and watch-lists. For specific flights, the Department 

also collects and vets passenger name record (PNR) data which may contain more 

detailed information about the passenger’s itinerary. In addition to using passenger 

date, DHS has also piloted the Immigration Advisory Program (IAP) through which 

small teams of CBP Immigration Advisory Officers with strong immigration backgrounds are assigned to foreign airports to work with host country officials to identify potentially high-risk or inadmissible passengers before they board planes bound 

for the United States. 

DHS recognizes that there is no single solution to prevent airplanes from being 

used as weapons of terrorism. The improvements in the layered approach include 

using biometric identifiers to deter visa fraud, sharing lost and stolen passport information through Interpol, promoting a global standard for machine readable passports, using airline passenger data appropriately, expanding no-fly lists, screening 

domestic and international passengers against no-fly lists, including more travelers 

in US-VISIT, boosting airline security utilizing Federal Air Marshals on international flights of concern, hardening cockpit doors, and offering voluntary programs for arming pilots on passenger and cargo planes for domestic flights. 

Through the collection and dissemination of information, through the use of biometrics, and new approaches and technology such as US-VISIT, the Department is 

constantly seeking out ways to detect and counter the evasive methods used by terrorists to travel. 

In addition, the HSTC staff is collecting, correlating, analyzing and disseminating 

domestic and international information on clandestine terrorist travel on a continual 

basis. These activities include: • Daily SECRET cables from select U.S. government sources via DOS Cable 

Xpress. 

• Daily notices of activities, items of interest, and intelligence from domestic, 

overseas and foreign sources. 

• National and foreign fraudulent document alerts. • Consular fraud notices and intelligence alert bulletins. • Foreign law enforcement reports, notices and alerts. • Foreign government periodic reports on: 

• Immigration • Identity and travel document fraud • Terrorism • National Security 

The HSTC will support and exchange information with the NCTC and other U.S. 

agencies and organizations active in the war on terrorism, trafficking in persons and 

human smuggling. It will also coordinate feedback amongst the various diplomatic, 

law enforcement, and intelligence agencies.

10. International coordination is essential to prevent terrorists from traveling into 

our country. 

Q02158: What is the Department doing to coordinate with the international community to prevent terrorist travel? 

Answer: The 9–11 Commission Report stated: ‘‘The U.S. government cannot 

meet its own obligations to the American people to prevent the entry of ter-
59

rorists without a major effort to collaborate with other governments. We 

should do more to exchange terrorist information with trusted allies, and 

raise U.S. and global border security standards for travel and border crossing over the medium and long term through extensive international cooperation.’’ The bombings in Madrid, the more recent hostage crisis in Beslan, 

Russia and the Australian Embassy bombing in Jakarta also serve as vivid reminders to us that terrorism is an international threat that cannot be conquered alone. 

DHS understands that we must engage in a global effort each day, through collaboration, information sharing and ongoing dialogue to ensure that our efforts are informed, coordinated, and effective. 

As part of this effort, we are working well with our partners bilaterally and within multilateral organizations to improve standards for travel documents, aviation 

safety, port security and the exchange of watchlist information. 

The Department is working closely with our the international partners in the EU 

as well as with Canada, Mexico and other foreign governments to ensure that developments and initiatives in border and transport security are discussed, coordinated, 

and clarified before they are implemented. 

We are taking such steps every day. For example, together with our colleagues 

in the Department of State, DHS is addressing security challenges posed by lost and 

stolen passports. Through the efforts of the Departments of State and Justice, the 

U.S. has provided over 300,000 records of Lost and Stolen passports to the Interpol’s 

lost and stolen document database, which is available to border authorities worldwide. We continue to encourage our international partners to join us in this effort. 

Additionally, the US is initiating a scoping study to assess a technology concept that 

helps address this concern. The Enhanced International Travel Security (EITS) concept, which has been addressed in the G–8 context, uses distributed databases as 

a mechanism to allow real-time exchange of to the basic information needed- i.e., 

a ‘‘yes’’ or ‘‘no’’ response—concerning the validity of a document without requiring 

visibility into the data that allows that determination. The approach would be very 

similar to that already used worldwide by the banking industry to support ATMs. 

Developing better systems for international sharing of information, and expanding 

participation to more countries will improve our ability to identify and screen travelers before they enter our country. 

Another area on which we are working to make significant enhancements involves 

the Visa Waiver Program and US-VISIT. DHS, with the assistance of Department 

of State, is in the process of completing the country evaluations required under the 

Visa Waiver Program statute. These reviews involve site visits to each of the participant countries. Overall, the cooperation of the VWP countries’ governments has 

been exceptional. Additionally, on September 30, 2004, we began processing nationals from VWP countries through in US-VISIT. The Department engaged in multiple 

forms of outreach to ensure the countries and their citizens were prepared for the 

expansion of the program. 

To address possible risks, prior to flight departure, the Department has piloted 

the Immigration Advisory Program (IAP) in Poland and the Netherlands and is exploring other locations to expand this program. Host countries have shown support 

for this reciprocal program that has CBP officers assisting in examining travel documents and screening the flight manifests to make determination of whether passengers are adequately documented or likely to be found inadmissible upon arrival 

in the United States. Such efforts save the air carriers from penalties and providing 

an extra layer of security prior to departure. 

Since the establishment of the Department, the leadership of DHS has worked to 

establish and enhance the critical international relationships and partnerships with 

foreign counterparts. Coordinated efforts and continuous dialogue have proven vital 

to pursuing the DHS mission, whether it be through well-established legacy agency 

dialogues with Mexican and Canadian neighbors, the new Joint Contact Group 

meetings with United Kingdom officials that examine issues relating to all aspects 

of Homeland Security, the continuous discussions with European Union (EU) and 

the EU Member States. In addition, Department officials engage with foreign partners within the various international fora such as ICAO, World Customs Organization (WCO), International Maritime Organization (IMO), the G–8, Organization for 

Security and Cooperation in Europe and many others. 

DHS has also connected the Canadian Government Operations Center, the United 

Kingdom’s Civil Continingincies Secretariat, National Security Advice Center, to the 

Homeland Security Information Network. This network provides 24/7 connectivity, 

at the SBU level, from each of these locations to the Homeland Security Operations 

Center.
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Q02159: How is the Department working with our neighbors, in Canada 

and Mexico in particular, to devise a coordinated anti-terrorist travel strategy? 

ANSWER: The Department values the strong partnership of the Governments of 

Canada and Mexico in securing international travel. While the work plans with our 

neighbors are similar in many respects, they are also tailored to the specific capacities and realities of each government. We are proceeding on two bilateral tracks 

rather than a trilateral track at this time although there is strong potential for 

convergence the future. 

On December 11, 2001, the U.S. and Canada signed a Smart Border Plan originally containing 30 concrete initiatives to secure the infrastructure, flow of people, 

and flow of goods and to share information. A few short months later in March 

2002, the U.S. and Mexico signed a 22-point Border Partnership Action Plan organized under the pillars of secure movement of goods, secure movement of people, 

and secure infrastructure. Together with our neighbors we recognized that our current and future prosperity—and security—depend on borders that operate efficiently 

and effectively under any circumstance.

General 

Progress is steady and many of the initiatives have already been implemented or 

are near completion. In other cases, on-going processes are required. Others, like 

our cooperation on human smuggling and trafficking, are ongoing activities that 

continue to be strengthened as we deepen our relationships. Some goals will require 

many years and extensive investment before they are in place. In some cases, such 

as the electronic sharing of information, the process is itself the goal. Still in other 

cases, long-term investment, political will and effort will be necessary to achieve the 

goal.

APIS 

Of particular note is the progress in sharing advanced passenger information. 

Currently, Canada and Mexico require international air carriers to send electronically manifest information for commercial flights destined to their countries. We are 

vetting the APIS data against relevant databases and have already developed with 

Canada a means to exchange bulk and individual records. Additionally, Customs 

and Border Protection (CBP) has developed common risk-scoring algorithms with its 

Canadian colleagues as well as a mechanism to resolve hits. Under the U.S.—Mexico Smart Border Action Plan, the GOM transmits APIS data to CBP. Commercial 

air carriers transmit API data to the GOM as required by law. The Mexican API 

data is retransmitted by the GOM to CBP via the existing CBP APIS infrastructure. 

In May 2004, the GOM designated Centro de Investigacio ́n y Seguridad Nacional 

(CISEN) as the lead point of contact for the Mexican APIS program.

Integrated Border Enforcement Teams (IBET) 

In support of the Canada-United States Smart Border Declaration and Action 

Plan for creating a secure and smart border, Integrated Border Enforcement Teams 

(IBETs) seek to identify mutual national security threats and combat illicit cross 

border activity. IBETs are multi-agency field level groups of law enforcement officials dedicated to securing the integrity of the Canada/United States border while 

respecting the laws and jurisdictions of each nation. The IBET mission is to enhance 

border integrity and security at our shared border by identifying, investigating and 

interdicting persons and organizations that pose a threat to national security or are 

engaged in other organized criminal activity. 

Across the northern border, 15 regional IBET locations have been established and 

are currently active. Each IBET has a local Joint Management Team (JMT) to incorporate national policies and formulate local investigative priorities of the regional 

team. The JMT is predicated on the needs and involvement of its participating agencies. 

IBETs are not ‘‘firehouses’’ waiting for something to occur but rather operate as 

intelligence driven enforcement teams comprised of federal, state/provincial and 

local law enforcement personnel to address terrorism and other forms of criminality 

in the context of the border. The teams are multidisciplinary in nature and work 

in an integrated land, air, and marine environment along or near the Canadian/

United States border while respecting the jurisdiction of each nation. 

The IBETs were developed to be ‘‘intelligence driven’’ units. The concept of the 

Joint Intelligence Teams is to develop an inter-connectivity of intelligence by co-locating ICE Intelligence Analysts/Intelligence Research Specialists and Special 

Agents with Intelligence Analysts/Officers representing the other participating core 

member agencies. The intelligence officers will be responsible for the collection and 
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2On December 6, 2004, the NCTC undertook all responsibilities assigned to the TTIC. 

collation of information and its dissemination to the field, other IBETs, as well as 

to their respective Headquarters entities.

Cargo Screening 

Tremendous progress has been made in securing commercial traffic—both rail and 

truck. By 2005, it is expected that 100% of rail cargo entering the U.S. from Canada 

and Mexico will be screened using Vehicle and Cargo Inspection Systems (VACIS) 

and other appropriate technologies. The benefits derived from our northern and 

southern border FAST programs speak for themselves. For example, 92% of commercial traffic on the US-Mexico border is via the FAST lanes at the seven largest 

ports. We have aggressive expansion plans for FAST along the southern border and 

are studying additional dedicated FAST lanes at some of the busiest crossings between the U.S. and Canada. 

The Department, through CBP, has developed with Canada a Joint Targeting Initiative to review and research bills of lading and manifests necessary to target highrisk containers destined for North America. Additionally, CBP and Canada will embark on a common Container Security Initiative, leveraging resources at select locations abroad. 

Passenger Enrollment Systems 

Low-risk, pre-enrolled travel programs for visitors and other non-commercial travelers are another example of ways to leverage technology and bilateral cooperation 

to achieve the mutual goals of enhanced security and facilitated through-flow of 

known border crossers. We continue to expand and upgrade the NEXUS and 

SENTRI programs at our land borders while ensuring continuous compliance monitoring. Further, we will test a NEXUS Air program with Canada at the Vancouver 

International Airport.

Visa Policy 

Visa policy plays an essential role in our layered defense strategy that prevents 

known high-risk travelers from entering North America. To this end, we are working with Canada and Mexico to identify commonalities, gaps and areas. For example, since September 11, Canada has imposed a visa requirement on nationals of 

12 countries, including Saudi Arabia and Malaysia. We are studying ways to converge visa-screening procedures and to exchange visa information.

Information Sharing 

Both before and since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, the State Department, with DHS and other interagency partners, has spearheaded efforts to coordinate the exchange of biographic terrorist screening information. With the specific authority granted to the Secretary of State by the USA PATRIOT Act of 2001 

to establish agreements with foreign governments on exchange of visa screening information, we are seeking to negotiate more robust information exchange agreements. 

On June 12, 2003, the Secretary of State authorized negotiations on an agreement 

for the systematic exchange of broader visa screening database information with 

Canada and approved a draft executive-level agreement to do so. At the same time, 

he gave blanket authorization to pursue such an agreement with any other willing 

country, using the effort with Canada as a model. In accordance with the new guidelines of the Homeland Security Act, the State Department sought the cooperation 

of DHS and subsequently the newly formed TSC. In January 2004, the State Department opened negotiations with Canada aimed at reaching such an agreement. 

The negotiating team, which includes representatives of State, DHS and the TSC, 

is addressing the policy, legal and technical issues involved. 

The HSPD–6 Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) on the Integration and Use 

of Screening Information to Protect Against Terrorism of September 16, 2003 was 

signed by the Departments of State, Justice, and Homeland Security and the DCI. 

The MOU requires the obtaining of terrorist screening information from our foreign 

partners ‘‘in a manner consistent with each government’s laws,’’ and, as necessary, 

‘‘to provide operational support to the participating governments.’’ It also established the guidelines for operation of the TSC and the transfer of State’s TIPOFF 

database to the TTIC. The TIPOFF Program, founded in 1987, was the first federal 

program focused on the identification of known and suspected terrorists to prevent 

their entry into the United States. On November 17, 2003 the TTIC,2 under the authority of the DCI, assumed responsibility for TIPOFF and for collecting all information the U.S. Government possesses related to known or suspected terrorists, with 

the exception of information on purely domestic terrorists. TIPOFF contains more 

than 175,000 records on terrorist identities as of mid-August 2004 and serves as a 
62

screening and analytic resource to the U.S. Government. On December 1, 2003 the 

Terrorist Screening Center (TSC) was established, under the administration of the 

FBI, to consolidate the U.S. government’s approach to screening for terrorism. 

The TSC facilitates terrorist screening exchange arrangements with two trusted 

partners—Canada and Australia. An agreement with Canada was established and 

implemented on May 23, 1997, and with Australia on April 12, 2000, through which 

sensitive but unclassified biographic screening data elements derived from the Terrorist Screening Data Base (TSDB), were made available to both countries. Terrorist 

screening data provided to TIPOFF by Canada and Australia is included in the Consular Lookout and Support System (CLASS) used by the State Department to screen 

visa applicants in the Integrated Border Inspection System (IBIS) used by DHS to 

screen travelers seeking admission into the United States, and by other federal, 

state, and local law enforcement through the National Crime Information Center 

(NCIC). HSPD–6 also tasked the Department of State, in conjunction with the TSC, 

to expand the sharing of terrorist identifying information with other countries and 

to begin with our partners in the Visa Waiver Program. This effort has been initiated and significant progress is being accomplished. 

Similarly, we are working within the Administration to determine the appropriate 

bilateral exchange of the No Fly and Selectee Lists currently used by domestic and 

international airlines transporting passengers in, to, or from the United States to 

conduct passenger prescreening. We continue to monitor the status of domestic legislation in Canada that would further enhance aviation security including the exchange of passenger information on domestic flights that may fly over U.S. airspace.

Transportation Security 

Member States in the International Civil Aeronautics Organization must meet the 

100% hold-baggage screening standard by January 2006. This standard will make 

the global aviation system even more secure and will help reduce the possibility of 

acts of terrorism on our air carriers. The Department is pleased that our neighboring governments are sharing information to help meet this goal.

US-VISIT 

DHS implemented US VISIT at 115 airports and 14 seaports starting on January 

5, 2004. The land border solution is being designed to be fast and easy, but also 

secure. The Department is committed to the dual goals of enhanced security and facilitated legitimate travel. Through US-VISIT, and in conjunction with the Department of State’s Biometric Visa Program, the Department has created a ‘‘virtual border’’ as a line of defense against entry by terrorists. Travelers seeking visas have 

their fingerprints vetted against a biometric watchlist to identify criminals, terrorists, and immigration violators We have worked closely with officials from Canada 

and Mexico to develop an effective and open communication mechanism to exchange 

ideas and address concerns about how US-VISIT utilizes technology, how it may affect border communities, and how to manage public relations. Shared infrastructure, 

biometrics, data privacy and protection are all issues of common interest. The Department looks forward to continued bilateral dialogue as US-VISIT expands to the 

50 largest land border ports by December 2004 and all land ports by December 31, 

2005, and as we assess and build upon technologies and management concepts being 

tested or already deployed from the various departure pilots.

11. Constraining terrorist mobility should be a broad, long-term DHS goal. 

Q02160: What initiatives does DHS have underway and what have you 

identified as future goals or developing capabilities? 

Answer: CBP has a number of initiatives underway in support of DHS’s longterm goal of constraining terrorist mobility. To highlight a few:

Deploying Immigration Advisory Officers 

The Immigration Advisory Program (IAP) is a CBP effort to prevent terrorists 

from entering the United States. Under IAP, small teams of CBP Immigration Advisory Officers with strong immigration backgrounds would be assigned to the major 

‘‘hub’’ airports around the world to identify potentially high-risk or inadmissible passengers before they board aircraft bound for the United States. Through these efforts, CBP is better positioned to address the worldwide threat of terrorism. 

CBP initiated an IAP pilot at Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport on June 26, 2004 and 

a second effort began at Warsaw’s Chopin Airport on September 15, 2004. The IAP 

teams in both foreign locations have established similar passenger processing methods. Typically, airline security officers or government border guards review passenger documents and if there are any anomalies with the document or the passenger, they request assistance from the IAP Officer. IAP officers, based on targeting information or observation, may ask to see a particular passenger. Based on 

the review of the passenger’s documents and responses to questions, the IAP officer 
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may recommend to carriers not to board individuals who have documentary deficiencies or who may be otherwise inadmissible. 

Additional sites will be identified based on intelligence information, funding, and 

approval by the Department of Homeland Security and host countries.

Deploying Integrated IDENT/IAFIS 

The Automated Biometric Identification System and the Integrated Automated 

Fingerprint Identification System (IDENT/IAFIS) program was established to integrate the IDENT database with the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System (IAFIS). The Integrated 

IDENT/IAFIS terminal provides simultaneous access to biometric-based criminal 

and immigration violator information for DHS agents in the field. In FY2004, DHS 

assumed the responsibility for funding and completion of phase 1 of the project—

the nationwide deployment of IDENT–IAFIS workstations was transferred from the 

Department of Justice to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). DHS immediately began accelerating the deployment of the integrated capability and has now 

completed deployment of the integrated system to all 140 operational Border Patrol 

stations, and 216 Port of Entry and ICE locations. DHS will complete deployment 

to all remaining Ports of Entry and ICE locations by December, 2005. 

Numerous other initiatives being pursued by CBP include continuing to enhance 

the automated targeting system, continuing to aggressively pursue smart box container technology, increasing Container Security Initiative (CSI) participation, Free 

And Secure Trade (FAST), internal law enforcement partnerships, deploying radiation portal monitors, and deploying additional imaging technologies to the ports. 

Future goals and developing capabilities include our Automated Commercial Environment system (ACE) which is currently restructuring what information is required for international transactions, how that information is processed, and employing technology and business partnerships with other agencies to identify their 

international data requirements, and how to best integrate these requirements 

through an international trade data system (ITDS). 

QUESTIONS FOR THE RECORD FROM CHAIRMAN DAVE CAMP AND CHAIRMAN JIM

GIBBONS

(1) Q02161: What is the current process for DHS agencies to share information and intelligence they gather in their day-to-day activities with the 

DHS Office of Information Analysis? 

Answer: Each Department of Homeland Security (DHS) component employs several methods to share information with the DHS Office of Information Analysis (IA). 

Standardized, daily reporting is the principal method for sharing information. This 

regular reporting is supplemented by spot reports, alerts, and informal notifications 

via email, phone or fax to provide timely notice to IA, and to DHS in general, of 

emergent threats and other events of interest. The Homeland Security Operations 

Center (HSOC) is the focal point for this information exchange. IA personnel staff 

the HSOC on a 24X7X365 basis. This team, under the leadership of the Senior Intelligence Analyst, reviews all component reporting and works directly with both the 

Senior HSOC Watch Officer and all parts of the IA organization to ensure timely 

distribution of information throughout IA and to provide front line, first phase intelligence analysis to the HSOC. 

Most DHS components provide their reports to the HSOC via email at all classification levels (Sensitive but Unclassified (SBU), Secret (S), and Top Secret/Special 

Compartmented Information (TS/SCI)). These reports are automatically filed in designated folders accessible across DHS Headquarters for easy access and archival 

management. The U.S. Coast Guard submits reports in the form of Information Intelligence Report messages to the DoD’s Automated Message Handling System 

(AMHS) and Web Intelligence Search Engine which are both guarded at DHS. In 

addition, the Coast Guard develops and displays a wealth of information on its Common Operational Picture (COP), and which provides real-time information to the 

HSOC. That information available through HSOC and through the COP is provided 

to DHS Office of Internal Affairs (OIA). The following is a listing of reports by agency:

BTS 

Daily Operations Report 

* BTS components ICE, CBP, and TSA also provide their own reports:

ICE 

Homeland Security Intelligence Report 

Significant Activity Reports 

ICE daily operational summary 
64

ICE Spot Reports 

Daily Intelligence Summary

CBP 

Homeland Security Intelligence Report 

CBP Spot Reports 

CBP daily operational summary 

Intelligence Assessment 

Intelligence Alert 

Weekly Matrix

TSA 

Daily intelligence Summary 

Homeland Security Intelligence Report 

Transportation Security Operations Center Spot Reports 

Suspicious Incident Report

FAMS 

Daily Intelligence Brief 

Weekly Assessment

USCG 

Coast Guard Incident Reports 

Spot Reports 

Field Intelligence Reports (via AMHS) 

Intelligence Information Reports (via AMHS) 

Common Operational Picture 

Daily Intelligence Summaries 

Routine and ad hoc Intelligence Production

USSS 

USSS Intelligence Division/Operations Branch-Daily Operations Report

Federal Protective Service 

Daily Operations Log 

Spot Reports 

Information Bulletins 

Incident Reporting via the FPS Portal 

This system also supports reporting from DHS affiliates in the National Infrastructure Coordinating Center (NICC). NICC participants are given reporting criteria and email addresses to provide information to the HSOC for further distribution to IA analysts. 

The IA staff in the HSOC distributes information through several methods. The 

report is captured in a running log with the source of the report, the facts as reported, derivation of information gaps, and actions taken to exploit the information 

against all available databases and subject matter experts to determine terrorism 

nexus / emergence of threat. External watch officers are often contacted as the information is received, and queried for support in evaluating the threat against their 

resources. The text of the report is also sent to the HSOC Senior Watch Officer and 

IA analytic staff via email. If the nature of the information suggests an imminent 

threat, key IA leaders are notified by phone / pager. 

While this process is the primary path of information from components to IA analysts, the same email storage and DoD message systems are available directly to 

analysts and desk officers with appropriate security clearance. The SIA serves as 

the primary conduit of information into IA, providing global coverage of all of the 

over 1500 messages received by DHS daily and ensuring broad distribution of that 

information on a 24X7 basis, but IA analysts have identical access to the source information for their topic areas to support easy access and rapid analytical response. 

This process is depicted in the example diagram below:
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Additionally, the DHS Request for Information (RFI) and Tearline process facilitates the sharing of information not only within DHS, but also with members of the 

Intelligence Community (IC). DHS’s Web-based Pantheon system will help expedite 

and streamline the information sharing process. DHS IA also manages the DHS 

tearline program that currently helps facilitate information sharing within the IC, 

DHS, State & Local Government, and the private sector. In response to DCID 8/

1, DHS IA has developed a four phased tearline reporting implementation plan 

which will greatly enhance the ability to share information.

(2) Q02162: Does IA currently have specific personnel devoted to developing a complete threat picture based on information it receives from BTS 

agencies and the Intelligence Community? 

Answer: The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Office of Information 

Analysis (IA) currently has two analytical units. One focuses on current intelligence 

and the other on broader trends and developments. Within the analytic unit focused 

on current intelligence, there is a branch focused on fusing current intelligence and 

homeland security reporting, to include DHS Border and Transportation Security 

(BTS) reporting, with the contextual picture provided by the unit analyzing broader 

trends and developments. The product of this fusion, along with the near real time 

input from the Senior Intelligence Analyst in the Homeland Security Operations 

Center, is a complete threat picture. Additionally, BTS component intelligence activities, as well as representatives from the U.S. Intelligence Community (IC) maintain a presence in IA to facilitate sharing their respective understanding of the current threat picture. 

It is the responsibility of IA analysts to be cognizant of and apply knowledge of 

the broader threat context as derived from all sources of Homeland-related threat 

information to analyses of their specific accounts or programs. Specific divisions 

within IA that are focused on information derived from or pertaining to BTS naturally possess a greater macro and micro understanding of this information. It is also 

the responsibility of senior analysts and managers within IA to ensure all-source fusion is taking place.

Q02163: Is this information integrated with intelligence and reporting 

from other agencies? 

Answer: Yes. Please refer to the above (Q02162) and Q02166.

(3) In addition to the Office of Information Analysis (IA) within the Department 

of Homeland Security (DHS), several other components within the Department 

maintain distinct intelligence units. These units located within the Border and 

Transportation Security Directorate (BTS) and the U.S. Coast Guard serve the demands of their respective offices.

Q02164: How does IA work with their respective DHS intelligence components to share border reports? 

Answer: Please refer to Q02161.

Q02165: How is this information shared across the Department, with IA, 

and with the larger Intelligence Community? 

Answer: The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Office of Information 

Analysis (IA) utilizes both formal and informal processes to share information across 

the Department, within IA, and with the larger Intelligence Community. IA conducts and or participates in several daily and weekly meetings/teleconferences. The 

primary purpose of these events is to discuss and disseminate information/intelligence and assign taskings for further analysis. 

The following meetings are of significant importance in the IA information sharing process: 

• Information Analysis Morning Executive Brief (IAMEB)—daily Monday 

through Friday brief that is attended by numerous agencies from DHS to include IA, IP, HSOC, USSS, BTS,CBP,ICE, TSA, State & Local as well as the 

FBI, State Department and the Intelligence Community. 

• Daily Secure Video Teleconference—IA participates in the daily secure meeting hosted by the National Counter Terrorism Threat Center. 

• Homeland Security Terrorist Threat Intel Group (HSTTIG)—Bi-monthly 

meeting of the DHS Intelligence component leaders. 

Formal products are produced in a variety of formats to accommodate the different security handling and information requirements of our diverse audience, 

which ranges from private sector firms and institutions to members of the Intelligence Community. 

The department produces a wide variety of formal products including: 

• Homeland Security Information Advisories; 

• Homeland Security Information Bulletins; 
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• Homeland Security Assessments and Studies; • Homeland Security Intelligence Articles (HSIA); • Homeland Security IAIP Red Cell Session Reports; • Homeland Security Intelligence Reports; • Daily briefings such as the Information Analysis Morning Executive Brief; • Intelligence Information Reports (via DoD message handling system). 

Information Advisories (IAs) provide a means for DHS to communicate threat 

information to all DHS customers ranging from the intelligence community and law 

enforcement to the general public at large. Advisories incorporate intelligence or information identifying a threat targeting critical national networks or key infrastructure assets that contains actionable incident information. The Advisory may suggest 

a change in readiness posture, protective actions, or response, as well as, relaying 

newly developed procedures that, when implemented, would significantly improve 

security or protection. 

Information Bulletins (IBs) report information of interest to the nation’s critical 

infrastructures that does not meet the timeliness, specificity, or significance thresholds of Information Advisories. IBs are designed to provide updates on the training, 

tactics, or strategies of terrorists and may include: statistical reports, monthly, 

quarterly, or semi-annual summaries, incident responses or reporting guidelines, 

common vulnerabilities and patches, and configuration standards or tools. In addition, preliminary requests for information on symptoms, events, or social engineering being observed by constituents may also be communicated through a bulletin. 

Homeland Security Assessments and Studies provide an assessment or study 

for a specific event or location and are directed at a specific audience. Assessments 

are typically 2∼5 pages, while Studies offer a more in-depth coverage of the subject 

and are typically 10∼20 pages in length. These come in various forms including: 

Threat—particular event related; Special—study of threats to infrastructure / security; Executive—summary assessments; and Joint—author sponsorship by DHS and 

another concerned organization. 

Homeland Security Information Articles (HSIAs) are classified, timely, allsource intelligence products that assess, clarify or consolidate new intelligence with 

previously reported information. HSIAs are an analytic production process that begins with new intelligence or threat information often expanding upon previously reported intelligence and threat assessments. The information is not limited to raw 

reporting and may contain finished analysis. The HSIA is authored by IA–C and/

or IA–D analysts on an as-needed basis and is intended for various internal DHS 

audiences and the Intelligence Community. 

IAIP Red Cell Reports provide alternative assessments intended to provoke 

thought and stimulate discussion. Red Cell products enhance DHS analysis by engaging a community of outside experts from government, industry, and academia to 

provide an alternative perspective on threats/vulnerabilities facing the homeland. 

Emphasis will be is on examining issues from a terrorist mindset, focusing on innovative and unconventional targets and tactics. The analytic Red Cell program brings 

together DHS and outside experts on a regularly scheduled basis, and can also 

stand up ad-hoc red cells in response to immediate needs. Distribution is generally 

limited based on topic. 

Homeland Security Intelligence Reports (HSIRs) allow DHS operational components a vehicle to report case and potential terrorist information to DHS Headquarters. The final report contains a compilation of information with preliminary 

processing or analysis by the reporting agency supported by research using locally 

available databases and domain expertise of the component analysts. 

Information Analysis Morning Executive Brief (IAMEB) provides daily situational awareness on homeland security issues. The brief is a daily compilation of 

preliminary/ in-depth analytical perspectives on significant recent and developing 

issues affecting homeland security and DHS. The IA–C briefing team develops the 

IAMEB with input from IA–D as warranted, and briefs it to key IAIP personnel 

each weekday morning. The IAMEB is then modified as appropriate and disseminated. Appropriate versions of the IAMEB are sent internally throughout DHS and 

the Intelligence Community. 

DHS Intelligence Information Reports (IIRs) are produced by IA to publish 

information gathered by DHS components in the format most familiar to IC and 

DoD consumers. IA has partnered with DIA to allow direct publication of DHS IIRs 

into the standard DoD message handling system. Currently, DHS authors’ component reporting in this format, however, components will begin production on their 

own to directly inject the information into the IC in the near future. 

Homeland Security Information Message (HSIM): Designed to communicate 

uncorroborated threat information to U.S. Government agencies, State and Local 

Homeland Security Advisors, and/or the private/public sector, in an expeditious 
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manner. Information has not been fully evaluated. No specific actions are recommended. Should further information become available, it will be disseminated as 

a more comprehensive Information Bulletin, Advisory or Memorandum. 

This information is provided as directed in Section 201, Homeland Security Act 

of 2002. Additionally, IA is in constant informal communication with other Intelligence agencies and other non-intelligence organizations, directly communicating 

information via liaison, phone, fax or e-mail. We rely heavily on representatives of 

the various agencies, both inside and outside DHS, to facilitate communication with 

their parent organizations. These experts provide not only a conduit for information, 

but also are valuable resources during the development and vetting of products.

(4) Q02166: Does IA have the ability to analyze imagery and other forms 

of telligence that is gathered on our borders? 

Answer: Analyzing and consuming all-source intelligence analysis is at the core 

of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Office of Information Analysis (IA) 

mission. However, IA does not literally analyze imagery, with the exception of a 

small contingent of imagery analysts working within the Coast Guard who provide 

analysis of maritime events that impact a wide variety of USCG missions. However, 

for the most part, IA relies on the analysis of the National Geospatial Intelligence 

Agency (NGA) and other organizations that possess literal imagery analysts. This 

analysis is incorporated into IA evaluations and assessments pertaining to border 

issues. As a member of the U.S. Intelligence Community, NGA maintains multiple 

representatives within IA who very ably assist with various imagery requirements. 

Most notably, NGA has played a key role supporting DHS Information Analysis and 

Infrastructure Protection (IAIP) Directorate efforts relating to critical infrastructure 

protection, and has supported IAIP’s mission to National Security Special Events 

and other significant functions. Other border-related information derived from the 

IC or BTS is funneled to DHS via established electronic systems and incorporated 

into IA’s assessments. 

(5) Terrorist travel intelligence runs across broad federal, state, and local agency 

lines.

Q02167: How is the Department leveraging its assets to best utilize current terrorist travel information from within DHS and other partners in 

the Intelligence Community? 

Q02168: What is it doing to improve the exchange of information? 

Answer: One of IA’s OMB Milestones is to ‘‘Establish and resource a DHS reports 

officer capability to report information from field and component organizations on 

potential threats to the Homeland.’’ IA is staffing positions, developing procedures 

and training, and implementing a plan to deploy reports officers to the field. These 

reports officers’ primary responsibility is to write and disseminate reports of intelligence value based on DHS component operational information. IA’s intent is to 

model this effort on successful reports officer programs of long standing in the Intelligence Community and to review the newly developed program at the FBI for lessons learned in a start-up enterprise.

LAWRENCE M. WEIN RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS FROM CHAIRMAN DAVE CAMP AND

CHAIRMAN JIM GIBBONS

Thank you for the opportunity to testify before the Select Committee on Homeland Security Subcommittees on Infrastructure and Border Security and Intelligence 

and Counterterrorism hearing on September 30, 2004, entitled ‘‘Disrupting Terrorist 

Travel: Safeguarding America’s Borders through Information Sharing.’’ I am pleased 

to answer your questions.

Question 1: You make the point in your testimony that the more fingerprints captured, the less important image quality is. However, if I’m a terrorist I can just as easily ruin or impair all 10 of my fingerprints as I can 

just two. How do you make the assumption that 10 prints are essential? 

Answer 1: First, approximately 5–10% of terrorists have poor image quality in 

the absence of any deliberate impairment. Given Al-Qa’ida’s large pool of terrorists, 

it can simply choose US-bound terrorists that have inherently poor image quality. 

Second, approximately five times as much work, pain, etc. is required to impair 10 

fingers rather than two fingers, although your point is well taken that terrorists 

who are capable of deliberately impairing two fingers can certainly deliberately impair 10 fingers. Regarding your main question, the bottom line here is that you get 

a limited amount of information out of a fingerprint with poor image quality, and 

you get approximately five times as much information from 10 poor-quality fingerprints as you do from two poor-quality fingerprints. We do not assume that 10 fingerprints are essential. Rather, we solve an optimization problem that allows for the 
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possible use of up to 10 fingerprints, and find that it is optimal to employ 10 fingerprints from visitors with poor-quality fingerprint images. That is, the use of 10 fingerprints for visitors with poor image quality is not an assumption of our analysis, 

but rather a product of our analysis. Returning to the earlier issue, using 10 fingerprints allows five times as much information to be captured from visitors with inherently, or deliberately, poor image quality, which leads to a much higher detection 

probability.

Question 2: What factors are involved in order to capture a quality 

image? (i.e., capabilities of the machine, software, screener training, and 

physical characteristics of the fingers). 

Question 3: It seems that if US VISIT is capturing quality images, the 

matching problems you outline in your testimony will largely be addressed. 

In your estimate, how much of the ability to capture a quality image is outside of DHS’s control? 

Answers 2 and 3: While all the factors you mention in Question 2—along with 

environmental factors such as humidity and dirt—impact image quality, our analysis of the data in Figure 11 of the NISTIR 7110 report (this analysis appears in 

Appendix I of a report we distributed to various parts of the US Government, including analysts at NIST and managers of the US-VISIT Program) suggests that 

most of the image quality is inherent in the physical characteristics of the person 

(i.e., some people have inherently worn-out fingers), and hence is outside of DHS’s 

control. However, a definitive answer to this question requires an analysis of NIST 

data that is more detailed than the summary statistics in Figure 11 of NISTIR 

7110; I requested this additional data from NIST analysts on June 2, 2004, but they 

never responded to my request.

Question 4: You concluded in your testimony that capturing additional fingerprints would not take additional time because you average the screening time between primary and secondary. Your findings combine the time in primary and secondary into a mean time. I am concerned that your findings don’t fully weigh the 

cost of delaying travelers at a port of entry. What are you recommending exactly—that 10 fingerprints are captured during primary inspection at the 

port of entry or at some other point in the screening process? 

Answer 4: We are also concerned with traveler delay at ports of entry. Unlike 

most previous biometric research, our analysis includes a constraint that the total 

mean (primary plus secondary) screening time per visitor be fixed at its current 

value. Queueing theory, which is the field of mathematics that analyzes waiting 

lines (see our report for a reference to a specific paper) implies that mean delay at 

ports of entry will not increase if the mean (primary plus secondary) screening time 

per visitor is not increased, under the assumption that there is some flexibility in 

the workforce (i.e., a small fraction of the inspectors are trained in both primary 

and secondary screening). Hence, we are taking traveler delay into full consideration. Regarding your final question, our recommendation is that 10 fingerprints be 

captured during visa enrollment from all during their next visit to a port of entry, 

and these 10 prints could replace the 2 fingerprints that were originally captured 

during enrollment. Our exact recommendation at the ports of entry is to take 10 

fingerprints from enrollees with poor image quality, but only two fingers from the 

enrollees with good image quality. Using this information to match against the 

watchlist, we predict a detection probability of 95% with no increase in mean traveler delay. Of course, if different numbers of fingerprints are captured from different 

people, there is the issue of managing the perception of differential treatment (i.e., 

different numbers of fingers for different people). However, image quality is an objective measure that does not explicitly take into account age, gender, race, country 

of origin, etc., which may mitigate this concern.

Question 5: I am concerned about the additional burden and time delay 

of taking 10 fingers from all travelers. Did you assess what the added value 

would be of taking 10 prints from all enrollees with poor image quality, as 

a subgroup of all visitors? 

Answer 5: This question was essentially answered in Answer 4, but I will repeat 

the answer here. We are also concerned with the time delay of taking 10 fingers 

from all travelers. In fact, in our analysis, 95% detection probability at the port of 

entry (with no increase in traveler delay) is achieved by taking 10 fingerprints from 

enrollees with poor image quality, but only two fingers from the enrollees with good 

image quality; note that we would know an enrollee’s image quality from their 

prints taken at the time of enrollment. Of course, if different numbers of fingerprints are captured from different people, there is the issue of managing the perception of differential treatment (i.e., different numbers of fingers for different people). 
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However, image quality is an objective measure that does not explicitly take into 

account age, gender, race, country of origin, etc., which may mitigate this concern. 

Thank you for your interest. Please let me know if I can be of any further help. 

Mr. CAMP. The gentleman from Texas. 

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Chairman, I just wanted to ask the chairman 

if he would allow me to place in the record a NIST 2002 report, 

which concluded that the addition of the additional fingerprint slap 

system that I believe you were referring to, Professor, the time required to capture those fingerprints would be insignificant. 

It goes to the heart of the issue that Mr. Dicks raised, because 

I think we all have the impression that we didn’t use the 10-print 

system because it takes too much time. And I would like for this 

report to be placed as part of the record of this hearing. 

Mr. CAMP. Without objection, the NIST report may be placed in 

the record. 

[Retained in the committee file.] 

Mr. CAMP. There being no further business, the hearing is now 

adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 3 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]

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