Senior Homeland Security officials have said that plans are underway to expand the agency's biometric data collection capabilities at borders.Speaking to Passcode, the officials said that more biometric scanners, which may include iris, face, and fingerprints, will be placed at border crossings beginning in 2018 in an effort to ensure visitors do not leave the US under another person's passport.The newspaper writes that Homeland Security plans to introduce fingerprint scanning at 20 of the busiest airports by 2018 in an effort to reduce the number of “impostors” coming into the country. The agency has already brought in the technology at JFK Airport in New York and at Dulles airport in Washington, D.C and is also deploying iris and facial recognition software at a land crossing in Mesa, Calif.”We truly believe that having biometrics on both exit and entry is going to be that next step in our transformative efforts to make the arrivals and departure processes the most efficient and secure it can be at the US border for both US citizens and our visitors,” said Kevin McAleenan, deputy commissioner of US Customs and Border Protection (CBP), the DHS agency leading the charge for more biometric information.The 2016 Omnibus Appropriations Act authorized up to $1 billion in fees over 10 years to fund the build-up of biometric exit-tracking for non-U.S. citizens and residents. Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson testified in June that he directed CBP to begin adding the technologies and processes, so that by 2018 the agency can collect biometric data, “starting at the highest volume airports.”

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