African refugees and passengers arriving at Sydney's international airport will be the focus of a test of a high-tech identification system that collects data like fingerprints and iris scans, Australia's immigration minister said Thursday.
The completely voluntary trial, which started earlier this month, is testing Australia's ability to collect, store and match such data from passengers going through airport security, Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone said in a written statement.
If the trials succeed, Vanstone said, biometric details such as fingerprints, iris and facial scans could be collected from anyone passing through Australian airports, and the information could be added to security alert lists.
"About 9 million travelers come both into and out of Australia every year, and a significant number are referred to immigration officers for further checking," the minister said. "Biometrics can take much of the guesswork out of this further checking process."
Two main groups are being targeted for the voluntary trial, Vanstone said. It was not clear how long the trial would last.
The first group _ travelers arriving at Sydney's international airport _ may be asked to undergo the tests, the statement said.
The second _ refugees from Africa _ may be asked to provide biometric information before traveling to Australia, it said, adding that they will be scanned again upon arrival to "test our capacity to match the information."
Vanstone's statement did not say why those groups were selected for the trial, or what would happen if the data collected from the refugees in Africa failed to match biometric information collected upon their arrival.
Under another security system trial already underway, passengers using U.S. passports to check in for Australia-bound flights from anywhere in the world are subjected to an automatic search of more than 3 million lost, stolen or invalid U.S. travel documents, Vanstone said.
Reviewing these documents is important, Vanstone said, because "in the wrong hands, they could provide access to Australia to people who are not entitled to it, including terrorists and criminals."
An evaluation report of the trial will be presented at a Nov. 18-19 meeting of leaders from the member governments of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, or APEC, in Busan, South Korea.
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