Canada has been experiencing robust immigration for several years, now.
60% of adult Canadians have a valid passport.
So, I was surprised to learn that Canada is to be the last G8 member to adopt biometric passports.
Last G8 Nation with Improved Documents (Montreal Gazette via @m2sys)
Canada's long awaited ePassports will be ready by the end of 2012, making this country the last among G8 nations to have enhanced digital security measures on the documents.
UPDATE: The linked article seems to conflate "ePassport" with "Biometric Passport." For a variety of reasons this is confusing and, in my observations, I compounded the confusion instead of clearing things up.
An ePassport has a chip.
With or without a chip, facial recognition can be applied to the picture on a passport for comparison to the person presenting the passport.
The ePassport's chip adds another layer of security because the picture on the chip has to match the photo in the document has to match the person presenting the document. A fraudster would have to hack the document and the chip with their own photo to counterfeit the ePassport. The US ePassport chip does not store fingerprints. Canada's won't either. So, facial recognition is the only biometric in the discussion. An ePassport, therefore, is not definitionally the same as a biometric passport.
Biometrics can be applied to both an ePassport and a pre-ePassport.
There was also some question as to whether the US was ahead or behind Canada in the adoption of biometrics applied to passports or the issuance of ePassports.
The US State Department has issued only ePassports since 2007:
Can a request be made for a new passport to be issued without a chip?So that may be why the Montreal Gazette describes Canada as the last G8 country to issue "Biometric Passports." I suspect they mean ePassports.
No. Since August 2007, all domestic passport agencies and centers issue only e-passports.
This conflation of Biometric- and e- Passport, however, didn't originate with the Montreal Gazette as this Airport International article from 2006 describing facial recognition applied to ePassports in the UK indicates.
Over 13 million people in the UK hold biometric passports, which feature a microchip containing biographical information and images.It's looking likely to me that the application of facial recognition to passports arose at about the same time as storing photos on the chips of ePassports and that the digital image stored on the chip has been the primary input into facial recognition applications. So while ePassports and Biometric passports aren't literally or necessarily the same thing, practically (at least in the G8) they always have been.
Hopefully that clears things up a little. I welcome any feedback on Twitter (@SecurLinx) or at blog@securlinx.com.
