ID cards prepare for takeoff

In November, police arrested 23 airport workerswho used fake identification cards to entersecure areas at Chicago's O'Hare Airport. Anairport contractor had routinely been issuing itsemployees old and deactivated ID badges toavoid security checks.The fraud was simple but effective.According to an affidavit, workers were told tosort through deactivated identification cards toselect those with photographs that most closelyresembled them.Security breaches such as this are spurringCongress, airports and the TransportationSecurity Administration to move more quicklytoward issuing biometric identification cards toan estimated 3 million airport employeesnationwide, officials and industry experts say."The O'Hare incident caught the attention ofTSA and of Congress," said Walter Hamilton,chairman of the International BiometricIndustry Association. "If they had biometrics,they would not have been able to do that atO'Hare."Airports have issued employee badges formany years. Now the focus is shifting toward useof biometrics ? primarily fingerprints and irisrecognition ? in such credentials. Even so, it isnot clear how quickly those technologies will bedeployed, how they will be paid for and whetherthe federal government will require them.Estimates for 3 million cards range into thehundreds of millions of dollars, sources say.Transportation worker identification hasbeen a cornerstone of homeland security forseveral years. The Homeland Security Departmentbegan implementing last yearthe Transportation Worker IdentificationCredential for 750,000 port workers. LockheedMartin Corp. won the $70 million contract toproduce a smart card with a chip containing afingerprint template and a digital photograph.It is modeled on Federal InformationProcessing Standard 201.Airport employees are likely to be one of thenext large groups to undergo biometric identificationchecks.Congress is pushing for 100 percent airportemployee screening, which typically includes anX-ray for weapons and might also incorporatebiometric identification and a check for suspiciousbehavior.In January, Congress included a provision inthe Omnibus Appropriations Act to authorize90-day tests of airport screening to be conductedby TSA starting in May. TSA will report onthe tests in September.Biometric identification cards will be part ofthe testing at Denver International and BostonLogan International airports, TSA spokesmanChris White said, but he added that TSA hasnot yet decided whether biometric identificationshould be deployed by airports nationwide."For employee screening, we are looking atthe entire universe," White said. "Part of that isbiometric, part of it is screening, part is at acheckpoint, part is remote. It is premature forus to say what the end state might be."Meanwhile, an airport consortium has begundeveloping a biometric solution on its own."This is an airport-driven initiative," saidCarter Morris, senior vice president of securitypolicy at the American Association of AirportExecutives. "We are looking to start moving itforward."Colleen Chamberlain, vice president of transportationsecurity policy at the association, saidthe goal is to stay a step or two in front ofCongress and TSA so the airports help shape abiometric ID card program on their own, withor without a mandate."We don't want a top-down solution from theTSA but rather something that allows for localcontrol," Chamberlain said. "We want to do thissooner rather than later."Eventually, the airports expect to adopt asolution compliant with FIPS-201, she said, butit might have to be adapted somewhat for useoutdoors under harsh winter conditions."Do you ask a worker to take off a winterglove to use the fingerprint scanner outdoors?"Chamberlain asked. The answer: probably not.The airport coalition also wants to develop aconcept of operations that builds on existingsolutions, develop a reasonable timeline forimplementation, and identify costs and sourcesof financing for the new ID cards, she said.Participating airports include Atlanta; Boston;Denver; Jacksonville, Fla.; Miami; Minneapolis;Port Authority of New York and New Jersey;Phoenix; Portland, Ore.; San Diego; SanFrancisco; and Washington Dulles.The airports also are working with TSA on itsinteroperability project so the identificationcards can be used at more than one airport.Presumably, they would follow TWIC andFIPS-201 interoperability models.Airports are already implementing biometricidentification cards on their own. In a recentsurvey of 56 airports, 40 percent said they were using biometrics for identification in somefashion, Chamberlain said. Most were usingfingerprints or iris recognition, and a few weretrying hand geometry or facial recognition.Meanwhile, airline pilots also are enteringthe fray. The Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA)held demonstrations in March to prod TSA intotesting a separate ID check procedure for pilots.The proposed procedure, called CrewPass, isdescribed in a white paper released last year.Pilots and flight crews go through physicalscreenings along with passengers. The pilots'group said it would prefer a separate screeningin which the pilot would display photo identificationto a TSA screener, who would then checkthe card against a database of photographs andcredentials."Pilots are tired of being 'strip searched,'" saidPeter Janhunen, an ALPA spokesman. "It isdegrading, demoralizing and disrespectful, andit treats them like a terrorist threat."TSA has approved CrewPass for testing.The airport ID cards will operate differentlyfrom TWIC, Hamilton said. For one thing, thecredentials will be issued by the airports ratherthan through a central authority. For another,they are likely to be swiped at thousands ofaccess doors and gates rather than a handful ofmanned gates as is the case at seaports.If TSA approves a general biometric credentialfor airport employees, it likely would applyto 2 million to 3 million employees, Hamiltonsaid. Cost estimates are expected to be in thehundreds of millions of dollars, and it is notimmediately clear who will pay."There is a lack of clarity on the funding," saidRaj Nanavati, a partner at the InternationalBiometrics Group consulting firm. "Fundingwill be the key."