DHS Implementing Facial Recognition in Top 20 US Airports

At these 10 airports: Hartsfield-Jackson in Atlanta, Logan in Boston, O’Hare in Chicago, Hobby and George Bush in Houston, McCarran in Las Vegas, Miami International, John F. Kennedy in New York, and Dulles International Airport in Washington, D.C. the Department of Homeland Security (DHS)—specifically U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP)—has ramped up and expanded its Biometric Exit program, which gathers biometric data from international individuals exiting the United States to document and verify that they’ve left. But instead of the fingerprints or document review DHS had been using as biometrics verifiers since 2004, the focus now is on facial recognition.

John Wagner, deputy assistant commissioner at CBP, outlined the program vision in early May. It was initially trialed in June 2016 at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. Wagner is arguing for the expansion of facial recognition technology not just to the flight check-in process, but also to airport waiting areas, external cameras, and other aspects of airport travel.

Wagner went on to say that this could mean using facial recognition to identify travelers arriving in the United States, including passport-holding citizens, regardless of their citizenship status. It could also be applied to TSA checkpoints or airport lounge access, according to the Verge. “As soon as you check in for arrivals or departure, we’re going to stage your photo in that database,” Wagner said.

The agency hopes to implement this program in the 20 highest-traffic airports by the end of next year. But while DHS and CBP see this as a way to help address national security and immigration, others are concerned about the civil rights and surveillance implications of the continued rollout of such a system. “They’re using facial recognition on American citizens without any explicit authorization,” said Harrison Rudolph, an associate at the Georgetown Center for Privacy and Technology who has been studying the program. “That’s a big deal.”

Congress has been clear that the Biometric Exit program is about collecting biometrics from foreign nationals but never giving DHS permission collect biometrics from U.S. citizens—but that’s exactly what DHS is doing.  (Medium)
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There may be a legitimate value to a "Biometric Exit Program" that uses facial recognition technology (maybe?), but the problem is the expansion of this technology into a mass surveillance program that tracks and enters into a government database everyone that travels through a US airport.