[Senate Hearing 109-304]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 109-304
VULNERABILITIES IN THE U.S. PASSPORT SYSTEM
CAN BE EXPLOITED BY CRIMINALS
AND TERRORISTS
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
COMMITTEE ON
HOMELAND SECURITY AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
JUNE 29, 2005
__________
Printed for the use of the
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COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS
SUSAN M. COLLINS, Maine, Chairman
TED STEVENS, Alaska JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, Connecticut
GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio CARL LEVIN, Michigan
NORM COLEMAN, Minnesota DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii
TOM COBURN, Oklahoma THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware
LINCOLN D. CHAFEE, Rhode Island MARK DAYTON, Minnesota
ROBERT F. BENNETT, Utah FRANK LAUTENBERG, New Jersey
PETE V. DOMENICI, New Mexico MARK PRYOR, Arkansas
JOHN W. WARNER, Virginia
Michael D. Bopp, Staff Director and Chief Counsel
Michael L. Stern, Deputy Staff Director Director for Investigations
Joyce A. Rechtschaffen, Minority Staff Director and Counsel
Kevin J. Landy, Minority Counsel
Trina D. Tyrer, Chief Clerk
C O N T E N T S
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Opening statements:
Page
Senator Collins.............................................. 1
Senator Lautenberg........................................... 4
WITNESSES
Wednesday, June 29, 2005
Jess T. Ford, Director, International Affairs and Trade, U.S.
Government Accountability Office............................... 5
Michael L. Johnson, Former Special Agent in Charge, Miami Field
Office, Diplomatic Security Service, U.S. Department of State.. 8
Frank E. Moss, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Passport Services,
Bureau of Consular Affairs, U.S. Department of State........... 19
Donna A. Bucella, Director, Terrorist Screening Center........... 21
Thomas E. Bush, III, Assistant Director, Criminal Justice
Information Services Division, Federal Bureau of Investigation. 22
Alphabetical List of Witnesses
Bucella, Donna A.:
Testimony.................................................... 21
Prepared statement........................................... 66
Bush, Thomas E., III:
Testimony.................................................... 22
Prepared statement........................................... 69
Ford, Jess T.:
Testimony.................................................... 5
Prepared statement........................................... 33
Johnson, Michael L.:
Testimony.................................................... 8
Prepared statement........................................... 49
Moss, Frank E.:
Testimony.................................................... 19
Prepared statement with attachments.......................... 54
Appendix
National Federation of Federal Employees, International
Association of Machinists & Aerospace Workers, AFL-CIO, Local
1998, prepared statement....................................... 75
Reponses to questions for the Record for Mr. Moss from:
Senator Collins.............................................. 90
Senator Lieberman............................................ 92
VULNERABILITIES IN THE U.S. PASSPORT SYSTEM CAN BE EXPLOITED BY
CRIMINALS AND TERRORISTS
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WEDNESDAY, JUNE 29, 2005
U.S. Senate,
Committee on Homeland Security
and Governmental Affairs
Washington, DC.
The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 9:31 a.m., in
room SD-562, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Susan M.
Collins, Chairman of the Committee, presiding.
Present: Senators Collins, Carper and Lautenberg.
Chairman Collins. The Committee will come to order. Good
morning.
Before I begin the hearing today, I would like to express
my deepest condolences to my friend and the Committee's Ranking
Member, Senator Joe Lieberman. Senator Lieberman's mother
passed away on Sunday, June 26, and he is unable to be with us
today because he is observing the traditional Jewish 7-day
period of mourning.
He is a co-requester with me of the GAO report on passport
integrity, and I know that he is very concerned and interested
in this subject. Senator Lieberman will be submitting questions
for the record, and the record will remain open for 15 days in
order to receive his materials as well as any others that the
Committee Members wish to express, but I did want to explain
the reason for Senator Lieberman's absence since he is such a
diligent Member of this Committee.
OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN COLLINS
Today the Committee will examine an issue that is central
to our homeland security and that is the process for issuing a
U.S. passport. As a new Government Accountability Office report
makes clear, this process suffers from several vulnerabilities
that could be exploited by terrorists and other criminals.
The U.S. passport is the gold card of travel documents.
Governments worldwide treat it as unassailable proof of
identity and of citizenship. It opens doors to international
travel and expedites re-entry to our country upon return. A
fraudulent passport, however, can be a ticket to criminal
activity and terrorism.
Technological improvements have made it extremely difficult
to counterfeit or alter a U.S. passport, but it is less
difficult to obtain an authentic passport by fraudulent means.
A common fraud scheme, accounting for 69 percent of cases
detected last year, according to the State Department, is the
use by an imposter of legitimate birth certificates and other
identification documents belonging to another, in other words,
identity theft. This scheme is often facilitated by organized
fraud rings that can provide the imposter with suitable
documents at a price. One such ring was recently uncovered
smuggling hundreds of undocumented aliens from Ecuador and
other South American countries into the United States for fees
ranging from $12,000 to $14,000 each.
And there can be no doubt that fraudulent travel documents
are essential to terrorists. As the 9/11 Commission found:
``For terrorists, travel documents are as important as weapons.
Terrorists must travel clandestinely to meet, train, plan, case
targets, and gain access to attack.'' The Commission reported
on many instances of al Qaeda's use of fraudulent foreign
passports. In fact, the Commission's report documents an al
Qaeda office of passports, which was charged with altering
passports and other documents. Further, Jihadists were required
to turn in their passports so that they could be recycled if
they were killed. The Commission's report also describes how
the operatives were trained to alter passports.
Around the world, in Australia, Indonesia, and South
Africa, among other places, governments are investigating
passport fraud with clear ties to terrorism. It is not
surprising, therefore, that former Secretary of State Colin
Powell described maintaining the integrity of the U.S. passport
as ``a critical component of our global effort to fight
terrorism.''
The GAO report that this Committee requested identifies a
number of weaknesses in the State Department's efforts to
detect and prevent passport fraud. These include insufficient
staffing, training and oversight, and a lack of investigative
resources dedicated to stopping passport fraud.
The GAO also raises troubling concerns about the State
Department's ability to provide adequate oversight of nearly
7,000 passport acceptance facilities throughout the Nation,
such as local post offices and courthouses which accept
millions of passport applications each year. Last year the
State Department had to stop accepting passport applications
from one of these facilities when it learned that a corrupt
county employee in New Jersey was aiding passport fraud by
selling fraudulent birth certificates to illegal aliens.
Another fundamental flaw uncovered by GAO relates to an
issue that Members of this Committee know all too well, and
that is a profound lack of consistent and effective information
sharing. It is inconceivable to me that in this post September
11 world we are still seeing examples of Federal agencies not
sharing information that is vital to our security. The
Terrorist Screening Center, which began operating in 2003, has
a consolidated watch list database of known or suspected
terrorists. The GAO reports that more than 20,000 names of
Americans on this watch list were not incorporated into the
State Department's database for passports. As the State
Department and the Terrorist Screening Center have
acknowledged, the failure to share this information means that
a suspected terrorist could obtain a passport without alerting
the appropriate authorities.
The fact that one of these individuals listed on the
terrorist watch list has applied for a passport would almost
certainly be significant for purposes of a counterterrorism
investigation. Moreover, in an appropriate case, the Secretary
of State could use her authority to deny a passport on the
grounds that U.S. national's activities abroad are likely to
cause serious damage to national security. But obviously, if an
investigation is never triggered because the information is not
shared, there is nothing that can be done.
The information-sharing problems go beyond the shadowy
world of terrorism. The GAO investigation also revealed that
the State Department name check system does not include the
names of many Federal and State fugitives, individuals wanted
for such crimes as murder, rape, robbery, and embezzlement. In
fact, the CLASS system, the database used by the State
Department, contains the names of only 50,000 of the more than
1.2 million Federal, State, and local fugitives in the United
States. That is less than 5 percent.
To illustrate the problem, the GAO tested the names of 67
fugitives wanted for a variety of serious crimes, including
murder, felonious assault, and child sex offenses. The GAO
found that fewer than half were included in the CLASS database.
These fugitives not in CLASS could apply for and receive a
U.S. passport in their own names and flee the country. In fact,
one of the Federal fugitives, whose name GAO found was not in
the CLASS system, did obtain a U.S. passport on May 12, 2004.
This was 17 months after the FBI had listed this person in its
database as wanted in connection with an $11 million
telemarketing fraud. The fugitive was able to obtain an updated
passport from an embassy abroad after his name was cleared in
the State Department's database. This occurred despite the fact
that there was an outstanding Federal warrant for his arrest.
Perhaps more alarming, one of the names tested by the GAO
and found not to be in the State Department's database was that
of Donald Eugene Webb. Mr. Webb, who is wanted in connection
with the brutal murder of a police chief in Pennsylvania,
appears on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted List. If someone like Mr.
Webb could potentially apply for and receive a passport, the
prospects of denying passports to possible terrorists are even
more worrisome.
I am pleased that the Committee's investigation has spurred
action on this subject. The State Department and the Terrorist
Screening Center are making arrangements to share information
on Americans on the terrorist watch list. The State Department
has informed the Committee that it is near an agreement with
the FBI's Violent Crimes Section to gain access to more
fugitive data. The State Department has also taken steps
recently to improve fraud detection training, enhance
oversight, and dedicate more resources to fraud investigations.
These developments are encouraging and welcome, but there is
much more that remains to be done, and it disturbs me that
these problems have continued for as long as they have.
Protecting the integrity of the U.S. passport is essential
to protecting our citizens from those who would do us harm,
whether they are terrorists or other criminals.
I look forward to hearing the testimony of our witnesses
today as we seek to fortify our defenses.
Senator Lautenberg.
OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR LAUTENBERG
Senator Lautenberg. Thank you very much, Madam Chairman.
Apparently you have set off an alarm through the bureaucracy
that this is going to be under review and they had better get
going. This morning I saw on television that there was talk
between the FBI and the State Department. So you have already
ruffled the feathers, and it is a good thing that you did.
You were kind enough, Madam Chairman, to mention Joe
Lieberman, my dear friend, colleague here, the loss of his
mother, and I join you in sending our condolences to him.
My guess is that the United States is the largest issuer of
passports in the world of any of the countries, but if not the
largest, certainly among the largest, and the fact that people
on the terror watch list can get by, the criminals that we have
identified here is outrageous. The funniest thing is that I
have seen an example of the failure to connect with the terror
watch list when it comes to issuing gun permits. We found out
that they would almost never hit the terror watch list to see
if someone was on that list, and how could we ignore that?
So it tells us something, I think, about the general policy
or the general attitude that permits these people to get by and
crack our security wall. It has always been important for us to
maintain our Nation's borders, but it became absolutely vital
in the wake of the terrorist attacks of September 11.
In order to keep track of who is crossing our borders,
coming in and out of our country, we obviously rely on
passports and visas. A valid U.S. passport is the ticket upon
return to the country of citizens or those who would purport to
be eligible passport recipients, that enables a person to enter
our country and cross our borders at will. So any problem in
the issuance of a passport is no mere bureaucratic hitch, it is
a potential threat to our national security.
Passport fraud often is committed in connection with other
crimes including those mentioned by the Chairman, including
drug trafficking, money laundering, and smuggling of illegal
aliens.
I know that various Federal agencies including DHS are
working with the State Department to ensure that people who are
not entitled to the U.S. passports do not get them. While that
is comforting, it was alarming to learn that the State
Department system for checking names on passports does not have
access to the terrorist watch list or databases of wanted
Federal and State fugitives.
Therefore a passport examiner would be unaware if a person
seeking a passport was suspected of links to terrorism, even
though our government has compiled a lengthy list of suspected
terrorists. This looks like the classic example of the left
hand not knowing what the right hand is doing, and I understand
the State Department is now negotiating an agreement to make
this information available, and we say here, the sooner the
better.
The passport system also does not contain the names, as the
Chairman said, of most Federal fugitives even though they are
legally prohibited from receiving passports. GAO tested the
names of a number of Federal fugitives and found that many were
not in the State Department name check system. So it simply
makes no sense. And as we approach the fourth anniversary of
September 11, there is no longer any excuse for the bureaucracy
standing in the way of national security.
Once again, thank you for calling this hearing, and I look
forward to the thoughts of our witnesses.
Chairman Collins. Thank you, Senator.
I am delighted to welcome our first panel of witnesses this
morning. Jess Ford is the Director of International Affairs and
Trade at the U.S. Government Accountability Office and is the
lead author of the report that we will discuss today. He has
extensive experience in the areas of national security and
international affairs, and I want to thank him for doing an
excellent, thorough investigation.
Michael Johnson is the Former Special Agent in Charge of
the Diplomatic Security Service's Miami Field Office, an office
that I would note is the busiest office in the Nation for visa
and passport fraud prosecutions. As Special Agent in Charge,
Mr. Johnson was responsible for all Diplomatic Security Service
operations in eight States. He, too, has extensive previous
experience in running security programs at embassies around the
world, and he currently serves in the Department of Commerce in
the area of export enforcement.
I want to welcome both of you, and I thank you for joining
us.
Mr. Ford, we will start with your testimony.
TESTIMONY OF JESS T. FORD,\1\ DIRECTOR, INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS
AND TRADE, U.S. GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY OFFICE
Mr. Ford. Thank you, Madam Chairman and Members of the
Committee. I would like my full statement to be submitted in
the record.
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\1\ The prepared statement of Mr. Ford appears in the Appendix on
page 33.
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Chairman Collins. Without objection, all statements will be
included in the record as well.
Mr. Ford. I am pleased to be here today to discuss our
report on the State Department's efforts to strengthen U.S.
passport fraud detection. Maintaining the integrity of the U.S.
passport is essential to the State Department's effort to
protect U.S. citizens from terrorists, criminals, and others.
The Department issued about 8.8 million passports in fiscal
year 2004. Each year the State Department passport examiners
refer tens of thousands of applicants they suspect may be
fraudulent to their local Fraud Prevention Offices. In fiscal
year 2004, the State Department's Diplomatic Security Service
arrested about 500 individuals for passport fraud and about 300
of them were convicted.
Passport fraud is often intended to facilitate such crimes
as illegal immigration, drug trafficking, and alien smuggling.
Our report addresses three key issues: How passport fraud is
committed, what key challenges the State Department faces in
fraud detection efforts, and what effect new passport examiner
performance standards could have on fraud detection. Today I am
going to focus my discussion on the first two issues, and I
will also discuss our recommendations to the State Department
to respond to them.
We found that identity theft is the primary tactic used by
individuals fraudulently applying for U.S. passports.
Specifically, impostors using other people's legitimate birth
and other identification documents accounted for about 69
percent of passport fraud detected in fiscal year 2004, while
false claims of lost, stolen, and damaged passports and other
methods accounted for the remaining 31 percent of cases.
According to the State Department's Bureau of Diplomatic
Security, passport fraud is often committed in connection with
other crimes, including narcotics trafficking, organized crime,
money laundering, and alien smuggling. Fraudulently obtained
passports can enable criminals to hide their movements and
activities, and concerns exist that fraudulently obtained
passports could be used to support terrorism. U.S. passports
allow their holders to enter the United States with much less
scrutiny than is given to foreign citizens and also allow visa-
free passage into many countries around the world, providing
obvious potential benefits to terrorists and criminals
operating on an international scale.
Our report details a number of challenges to the State
Department's passport fraud detection effort, including
information sharing deficiencies, insufficient fraud prevention
training, staffing and oversight, and investigative resources.
These challenges make it more difficult to protect U.S.
citizens from terrorists, criminals, and others who would harm
the United States.
Specifically, the State Department does not currently
receive information on U.S. citizens listed in the Terrorist
Screening Center database, which is the Federal Government's
consolidated terrorist watch list. Nor does the State
Department routinely obtain information from the FBI on the
names of individuals wanted on both Federal and State law
enforcement authority warrants. Therefore, many of these
individuals are not listed in the State Department's Consular
Lookout and Support System name check database for passports,
and they could obtain passports and travel internationally
without the knowledge of appropriate authorities.
We tested the names of 67 different Federal and State
fugitives, some wanted for serious crimes including murder and
rape, and found that fewer than half were in the State
Department system. To my left and right are some graphics that
illustrate the issue.
The first poster on my right-hand side is a table that
summarizes the listing of the 37 individuals that we found were
not in the Consular Lookout System. As you can see in the
chart, many of these individuals were wanted for serious
crimes.\1\
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\1\ The chart referred to appears in the Appendix on page 34.
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To my left is a graphic of the most wanted poster
individual in the FBI's Ten Most Wanted List, whom we found was
not in the State Department system. You will note that Donald
Eugene Webb is a dangerous individual. He is wanted for a
brutal beating and murder of a police chief in Pennsylvania,
and the FBI is offering a $100,000 reward for information
leading to his capture.
Also to my left is a wanted bulletin for James Stanley
Eberhart, wanted for involvement in a telemarketing scheme
which defrauded website investors out of $11 million.
As the Chairman noted in her opening statement, Mr.
Eberhart obtained an updated U.S. passport 17 months after he
had been listed in the FBI's Most Wanted List as an individual
that they were interested in arresting.
Finally, the photograph to my right is a bulletin for
William P. Fischer, wanted by the New York State Police for
murdering his son and daughter's girlfriend.
These examples are merely illustrative of the many
thousands of other wanted fugitives who are currently not
listed in the State Department's name check system. Although
the State Department, the Terrorist Screening Center, and the
FBI have been made aware of this situation, they are now in the
process of reaching an agreement to try to foreclose this
vulnerability.
The State Department does not maintain a centralized
electronic fraud prevention library that enables information
sharing on fraud alerts, lost and stolen birth and
naturalization certificates, counterfeit documents, and other
fraud prevention resources.
We found that fraud prevention training is provided
unevenly at the various passport issuing offices. Some
examiners have not had formal fraud prevention training in
years, and training and oversight of a passport acceptance
agent operations are even more sporadic.
The State Department does not have any way of tracking
whether many of the acceptance agent employees are receiving
required training. It makes oversight visits in only a limited
number of cases and it does not maintain records of all of the
individuals in the acceptance facilities, posing significant
fraud vulnerability.
Any effect that new passport fraud examiner performance
standards may have had on the State Department's fraud
detection efforts is unclear because the State Department has
continued to adjust the standards. The State Department began
implementing a new standard in January 2004 to make work
processes and performance expectations more uniform nationwide.
Passport examiner union representatives expressed concern that
the new production quotas may require examiners to shortcut
fraud detection efforts. However, in response to union and
examiner concerns, the State Department eased the production
standards during the rest of 2004 and made other modifications
to the standards.
We made six recommendations to the State Department
designed to improve the coordination and execution of passport
fraud detection efforts. These included actions to improve and
expedite information sharing specifically by ensuring that the
State Department's Consular Lookout System for passports
contains more comprehensive lists of individuals identified in
the Terrorist Screening Center, as well as State and Federal
fugitives.
We also recommended that they establish and maintain a
central electronic fraud prevention library.
We are also recommending that the State Department consider
designating additional positions for fraud prevention
coordination and training in some domestic passport issuing
offices.
We also recommended that they examine the impact of other
workload-related issues related to fraud prevention and
strengthen its fraud prevention training and acceptance agent
oversight programs.
The State Department indicated in a response to our report
that they were taking actions on most of the areas that we
recommended.
This concludes my opening statement. I would be happy to
answer any of your questions.
Chairman Collins. Thank you, Mr. Ford. Mr. Johnson.
TESTIMONY OF MICHAEL L. JOHNSON,\1\ FORMER SPECIAL AGENT IN
CHARGE, MIAMI FIELD OFFICE, DIPLOMATIC SECURITY SERVICE, U.S.
DEPARTMENT OF STATE
Mr. Johnson. Good morning. I would like to thank Chairman
Collins and all the other Members of the Committee for the
opportunity to appear before you today. Passport fraud is a
much misunderstood problem, and I am very pleased that the
Committee is holding a hearing to discuss how it affects our
country's homeland security, including the possibility that
weaknesses in the passport issuance regime could be exploited
by terrorists.
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\1\ The prepared statement of Mr. Johnson appears in the Appendix
on page 49.
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For the record, my name is Michael Johnson. I served in the
State Department's Bureau of Diplomatic Security for 18 years.
In 1999, I began serving in Diplomatic Security's Miami Field
Office, rising to be a Special Agent in Charge in 2002 until I
left at the end of 2004. I would like to add that while I am
currently the Special Agent in Charge of the Miami Field Office
of the Office of Export Enforcement for the Department of
Commerce, I am not here today testifying on their behalf.
As you know, the State Department is the sole Executive
Branch Department with the authority to issue passports to
citizens of the United States. With this authority comes the
responsibility to maintain the integrity of the U.S. passport.
The Department's Bureau of Consular Affairs handles much of
this responsibility, with the task of supporting its mission
falling to the Bureau of Diplomatic Security's criminal
investigative programs. Investigating passport fraud is just
one of Diplomatic Security's responsibilities, which also
include protecting the Secretary of State and high-ranking
foreign dignitaries and officials visiting the United States,
protecting U.S. embassies and consulates abroad, conducting
personnel security investigations, and training foreign
civilian law enforcement officers to protect their countries
from terrorism.
As Special Agent in Charge of Diplomatic Security's Miami
Field Office, I was charged with overseeing what has
historically been Diplomatic Security's busiest field office. I
believe this places me in a unique position to discuss efforts
to combat passport fraud.
Possession of a U.S. passport is important because it
allows an individual to prove two things: United States
citizenship and identity. In fact, it is the only official
government document that establishes both, making the U.S.
passport the most widely accepted and versatile government-
issued document in the United States. Most consider it the
``gold standard'' of all passports, and, as a result, it can be
used throughout the world to establish bank and credit
accounts, to cash checks, apply for driver's licenses, welfare
or unemployment, and any other activity requiring an individual
to prove citizenship or identity.
There is a common misperception about passport fraud that I
would like to clear up. First, passport fraud is not primarily
committed to facilitate illegal immigration. In fact, the
overwhelming majority of passport fraud cases involve
applicants who are already in the United States. By
fraudulently obtaining a U.S. passport, an unscrupulous
individual will have the document that allows its holder to
travel into and out of the United States freely, bypassing the
border requirements for non-U.S. citizens.
It also provides ironclad proof of an individual's
identity. The value of this document to an individual trying to
conceal his identity or blend into American society is obvious,
given the post September 11 scrutiny placed on non-U.S.
citizens inside the United States. Stopping passport fraud
should be at the core of strong border and homeland security
procedures.
When discussing the problems posed by passport fraud, we
should remember that the U.S. passport is an extraordinarily
difficult document to counterfeit or to fraudulently modify.
Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for a document used to
establish eligibility for a passport. The threat to the
passport comes when bogus versions of these documents, called
breeder documents, are used in the passport application process
to falsely establish an applicant's citizenship or nationality
and proof of identity. Key among these breeder documents are
bogus birth certificates. Weaknesses in these documents can
provide unscrupulous individuals a back door method of
acquiring a U.S. passport.
Despite the challenge posed to the integrity of the U.S.
passport, I do not believe that enough is being done within the
Department of State to protect this vitally important document.
For example, in my experience, Diplomatic Security Service
thinks of itself primarily as a security service and tends to
view passport fraud as a less important part of its mission.
Because it is not its main priority, sufficient resources are
not dedicated to fighting passport fraud.
One way to solve this problem would be to assign additional
civil service Diplomatic Security special agents to field
offices for whom they would investigate passport fraud on a
permanent basis. This would give them the time needed to
develop sufficient expertise to effectively combat passport
fraud and would develop a cadre of agents with the expertise to
take down the fraud rings that are attacking the integrity of
the U.S. passport.
Another significant obstacle in combatting passport fraud
is that Diplomatic Security lacks an analytic capacity. During
my service in the DSS, I found that there was simply no
institutional capacity to spot and understand trends, analyze
information gained from operations, and share intelligence
across the DSS and other law enforcement organizations. The
lack of such an intelligence capacity cripples DSS's ability to
identify and dismantle organizations across the world that are
involved in the manufacture and sale of counterfeit documents
used to illegally enter and/or remain in the United States.
I again want to thank the Committee for holding this
hearing, and I am now prepared to answer your questions.
Chairman Collins. Thank you, Mr. Johnson. You made an
interesting comment that the passport fraud that you have seen
was not primarily to facilitate illegal immigration and that
the value of having a U.S. passport is that it allows the
holder to conceal his true identity. Based on your considerable
experience, how easy do you think it would be for a terrorist
to obtain a fraudulent passport?
Mr. Johnson. I think it would be relatively easy,
unfortunately, because we know from past experiences that you
can go anywhere in the United States, any city, and you are
probably going to find someone on a street corner or somewhere
who is selling birth certificates, Social Security cards,
documents that can be used to obtain a driver's license and
apply for a U.S. passport ultimately. I do not think in my
experience that these so-called document vendors selling these
breeder documents would think twice about selling it to someone
who was here to commit terrorism or bank robbery or anything
else. They are out to make the quick buck.
These documents can sell for anywhere from $200 to as much
as $6,000 for sometimes a very poor quality document. So I
think it would be relatively easy, unfortunately, for someone
with these ideas in mind to do this.
Chairman Collins. Mr. Ford, the GAO found that although the
Terrorist Screening Center has been operational since December
2003, the State Department and the Center did not even begin
exploring the possibility of linking the names in the Terrorist
Screening Center system with the State Department's name check
system for passports until December 2004, and it is my
understanding that even today that link still has not been
established.
In your judgment, why did not the Terrorist Screening
Center start sharing information with the passport name check
system at the same time that it started sharing information
with the State Department's name check for visas?
It is odd to me because there is sharing of information on
visas, but there appears not to be sharing of information on
American citizens with ties to terrorism.
Mr. Ford. It is unclear to us why the information was not
shared initially when they stood up in December 2003. We have
been told that the focus initially was on the visa issue. We
were concerned about foreign aliens, potentially bad people
that live in other countries. The TSC visa system was set up so
that they could reduce the vulnerability in the visa world. But
it is not clear to us why passports were not thought of as
another potential vulnerability for sharing that information.
So, again, we never really got a very clear explanation as
to why the passport area was not considered at the time they
set up the Terrorist Screening Center.
Chairman Collins. Mr. Johnson, do you have any insights on
that? Did the State Department think about asking the Terrorist
Screening Center for its complete watch list?
Mr. Johnson. No, ma'am. I have no knowledge as to why that
was not done.
Chairman Collins. Mr. Ford, we find a similar problem
dealing with criminal fugitives and the FBI not sharing the
names of many State and Federal fugitives, including those, as
your testimony pointed out, who are wanted for very serious
violent crimes. Once again my question is the same. Why did not
the FBI make certain that the State Department had access to
its list of fugitives in order to prevent one of them from
getting a passport and fleeing the country?
The regulations prohibit the issuance of a passport to
someone with an outstanding Federal warrant. It seems a logical
step to have been taken.
Mr. Ford. Well, again, I do not know completely the reasons
why that information was not being shared. The State Department
indicated to us early on in our assignment that they believed
that they were getting Federal warrants through the U.S.
Marshals Service, and as the course of our work went on, we
found that, in fact, the U.S. Marshals Service database does
not contain all Federal warrants and that the FBI is a better
database, is more comprehensive, and includes not only Federal
warrants but also State warrants.
So again, it is not clear to us why this issue was not
pursued by the Department of State in terms of getting access
to the information. We do know that there was a dialogue
between the FBI and the State Department in late 2004 up
through just recently, we understand, about trying to find a
way to share this information.
It is not really clear to us why this was not considered
early on as a way to again foreclose a vulnerability.
Chairman Collins. Mr. Johnson, the GAO, in its computer
match, uncovered a case of a fugitive receiving a Federal
passport, an American passport, even in just the limited review
that it did. Have you had any experience with a fugitive trying
to apply for a passport at the office for which you worked?
Mr. Johnson. Yes, ma'am. In late 2003 there was an
individual who had committed a murder in Georgia, and it was
about 2 or 3 days previously. I guess the police had received a
tip that this individual was driving to Miami in an attempt to
get a U.S. passport in his true identity to leave the country.
So they just called our office. Basically the duty agent
answered the phone, and it was about 1:30 in the afternoon. And
the agent said, ``Well, let me go check, take the name and go
down to the passport agency and check and see if this person
had applied.'' And in fact, when she went down, the person had
applied for a U.S. passport and was coming to pick it up within
the next hour, and the passport was going to be issued.
So what happened was when he came to pick it up, two of my
agents detained him and his vehicle, which he had actually used
in the commission of the crime, and we were able to turn him
over to State authorities.
I would add that while he was not a Federal fugitive, he
was a State fugitive, a very brutal murderer, who later was
convicted and sentenced to life in prison.
Chairman Collins. But for that tip, the individual would
have been able to pick up the passport and flee the country; is
that correct?
Mr. Johnson. Yes, ma'am.
Chairman Collins. So it is not because there was an
information sharing system in place that this was discovered.
It was due to a tip which was followed up on quickly.
Mr. Johnson. Yes, ma'am.
Chairman Collins. Thank you.
Senator Carper, I know you are on a tight schedule. I have
some additional questions for our witnesses, but I would like
to yield to you.
Senator Carper. Thank you, Madam Chairman. I was just
handed a note that said my 10:15 call has been rescheduled for
3 o'clock.
Chairman Collins. In that case I will reclaim my time. No,
go right ahead. [Laughter.]
Senator Carper. Thanks, Madam Chairman.
And to our witnesses, thank you for joining us today. I do
not care who responds to this question. Either of you are
welcome to. But a person in this country who is interested in
getting a passport fraudulently, how might they go about it?
Mr. Johnson. The first thing, as I said earlier, they would
have to prove is their U.S. citizenship and their identity.
Typically they would either steal or buy some type of birth
certificate from a State. In some States, unfortunately, it is
relatively easy to go in and just get a copy of a birth
certificate without any proof of identification. So they would
procure or obtain a birth certificate from some State or one of
the territories.
Senator Carper. Could you slow down just for a second? So a
person alleging to be me or you or anybody else in this room
might be able to go to an agency within their State and ask for
a birth certificate, not have to present identification?
Mr. Johnson. In some cases that is correct, yes, sir.
Senator Carper. And obtain that?
Mr. Johnson. Yes, sir.
Senator Carper. Is that commonplace?
Mr. Johnson. It happens. I can think of numerous cases
where that has happened. But if they do not do that, certainly,
as I indicated earlier, there are plenty of people out there on
the streets who are illegal document vendors, and you can buy
blank birth certificates where you essentially fill in the
blank, what name do you want to use. You can buy birth
certificates that are legitimate in someone else's identity,
and then they typically would take that birth certificate and
apply for a driver's license or a State ID card. And with those
two documents, that should be sufficient, that is all the
information that is really needed to go and apply for a U.S.
passport. It can be a relatively simple process.
Senator Carper. Mr. Ford, would you concur with that?
Mr. Ford. Yes. In our discussions with the Diplomatic
Security Service, the individuals who investigate these type of
cases, use of eligibility documents like driver's license,
birth certificates can be used as a vehicle to illegitimately
get a passport.
Senator Carper. My staff, as they sometimes do, gave me
several questions that I might want to consider asking. The
first question starts off and says, it seems to me like our
first line of defense against passport fraud are the men and
women who work at places like the Postal Service that accept
passport applications and forward them to the State Department
for review.
In listening to this testimony today, Madam Chairman, I am
reminded the first line of defense probably is not the Postal
Service, it probably starts well before that in some of these
agencies that you are talking about that can issue a driver's
license or a birth certificate, or for the lack of enforcement
to crack down on folks who might be out on the streets trying
to sell these bogus documents.
How do we confront and deal with the sort of situations
that you just described?
Mr. Johnson. One, I think this is a big step because I
think it serves as a recognition that on Capitol Hill everybody
is looking at this, is this a problem. I am of the mindset that
we should always be proactive and not just react, and I think
if you give, for instance, Diplomatic Security the adequate
special agent resources to actively pursue these so-called
document vendors, I think you start in a proactive manner,
starting to eliminate and make it very difficult for these
people on the street to vend these and sell these documents.
Another way, quite frankly, is the sentences handed down
when you have someone convicted of passport fraud are very
small typically.
Senator Carper. Give us some idea what the range of
sentences might be for a first offense and multiple offenses.
Mr. Johnson. Someone with no criminal history, never been
convicted of a crime, they typically would get probation if
convicted of passport fraud. I can remember cases where someone
who has maybe been arrested multiple times on very heinous
crimes but never convicted. Therefore, it does not kick it up
in terms of the guidelines. So what would happen, that person
would get essentially probation or certainly less than 6
months, and I think that is a huge problem in the system
because it serves as no deterrence and it serves as no
punishment. I think if we recognize that it is something that
we want to go after, then we have to have a punishment that
meets the crime. In my estimation it totally undermines a lot
of our homeland security efforts by allowing these people to go
out there and commit this crime.
Senator Carper. In whose courts would crimes of this nature
be tried, and in your own view--and this would be for either of
you--what might be more appropriate sentences, particularly for
multiple offenses?
Mr. Johnson. These are all going to be tried typically in
Federal courts, U.S. Attorneys Offices around the country
prosecuting these cases.
We did a big study a couple of years ago trying to promote
the U.S. Sentencing Commission an initiative to raise the so-
called guidelines, base offense levels for passport and visa
fraud. We did a pretty in-depth study in terms of what would be
appropriate, and essentially, we looked at some of the other
like crimes, for instance, perjury before a government official
or a grand jury, false statements to a Federal agent. Typically
those crimes can get someone in the 18- to 24-month time frame.
And we sort of made the connection that, OK, if you are
fraudulently applying for a U.S. passport you are essentially
under mining homeland security. That we think would be
appropriate range for someone who commits this crime.
Senator Carper. Mr. Ford, any thoughts?
Mr. Ford. We really did not look at the sentencing issue
per se. The few cases that we identified that we did some
research on, we found that although the sentencing for passport
fraud may not have been extensive in terms of amount of time,
often they were connected to other much more violent crimes, so
the individual, in a few cases that we looked at, would be
prosecuted for the more violent crime. So the fact that they
were apprehended allowed Federal or State authorities to
prosecute them for more violent crimes, which of course had
much longer potential sentences. But we have not studied this
issue.
Senator Carper. Share with us, if you would, the range of
the kinds of people who might be seeking a passport
fraudulently. The ones we might be most concerned about are
those who may be terrorists or seek to commit some terrorist
act. I am sure there are some that are more benign. But just
give us the range of uses or backgrounds of the people that we
are concerned about here.
Mr. Johnson. Certainly in the 5 years I was in Miami, the
extremes were several murderers that were attempting to get
U.S. passports and different identities. I can think of
probably two or three cases right off the top of my head where
someone wanted for murder in a State was attempting to get a
passport in a totally different identity, bank robbers----
Senator Carper. For the purpose of leaving?
Mr. Johnson. For the purpose of leaving or just melding
into society. There was one case where it was an individual out
of Maryland who had allegedly killed a person and seriously
injured another. He came down to Florida, bought one of these
rather cheap counterfeit Virgin Islands birth certificates.
Senator Carper. What do they cost?
Mr. Johnson. I do not recall what these things range. One
person paid $6,000 for one of these documents. I mean on face
value you could tell it was not a very good document, but to
the criminal, OK, it is $6,000, it must be worthwhile.
Senator Carper. What do they go for up in, say, Bangor,
Maine? [Laughter.]
Just kidding.
Mr. Johnson. I am thinking about the Miami market. So this
individual came to South Florida, bought one of these
counterfeit Virgin Islands birth certificates, had the name
typed in using a totally different made-up name. And I had a
really impressive agent who worked the case, realized right up
front that it was a fraudulent case. He went and got an arrest
warrant in that bogus identity because our efforts to find him
were negative. So he put him in NCIC, and then a short while
after that a police officer in Palm Beach County stopped this
individual on the street corner, and the individual handed him
his driver's license and this bogus identity, and the warrant
came up wanted by Diplomatic Security for passport fraud. So we
still did not know who this individual was.
We put him into our custody, fingerprinted him, and soon
after the fingerprints came back from the FBI we realized who
he was because he was wanted for murder in Maryland. And that
is a classic example of had it not been probably for an
aggressive young Diplomatic Security agent, this murderer, who
had a totally clean identity, and apart from having been
fingerprinted and having his fingerprints in NCIC, he might
still be walking free.
Senator Carper. Madam Chairman, my time has expired. Could
I ask one more question?
Chairman Collins. Certainly.
Senator Carper. Thank you very much.
Talk to us about what other ways that we can, using
technology that we have today, that we can better ensure that
the person who is applying for a passport is indeed the person
that they say they are.
Mr. Johnson. There are so many different governmental
databases, law enforcement, intelligence, private sector, in my
mind something as important as issuance of a passport, you
should have as many cross-checks as possible. To me, having
stovepipes of different systems where only certain agencies can
get to it, or even stovepipes within your agency, totally
defeats what we are trying to do here. To the extent possible,
even if we have to pass laws to allow NCIC to be passed to
Consular Affairs, then maybe that is what we need to do because
I think we have to be extremely aggressive in developing
systems, intelligence and law enforcement sharing to prevent
these types of things. To me that is a big step.
Senator Carper. Mr. Ford, would you answer the same
question, please?
Mr. Ford. I totally concur that I think the issue of
sharing appropriate information with all the various parties
involved is critical to this process because the examiners in
the passport area, if they do not get a hit that an individual
is somebody they ought to be worrying about, then they are not
going to know not to approve the documentation for the
passport. I think this is the most critical issue.
I think with regard to at least the management of the
process, and as we say in our report, there is a need for more
training. Training was very inconsistent in the passport
offices. The acceptance agents, we have 7,000 of those around
the country. It is not clear to us to what extent individuals
at post offices and county clerks, places like that, are well
trained in this area. So I think our focus is on better
training, better awareness of what some of the fraud indicators
are, better information sharing, that those things in total
should help prevent fraud more than it is currently based on
our analysis.
Senator Carper. The last thing, just as succinctly as you
can, what should we do? Senator Collins, our Chairman, those of
us who serve on this Committee, what should we do?
Mr. Ford. I think that the one issue, again, we have not
studied it in detail, but I think there are some legal issues
regarding what can be shared between the law enforcement
community, basically the FBI and the State Department, that may
require some legislative changes.
Senator Carper. Mr. Johnson, what should we do?
Mr. Johnson. I would hope that as a result of these
hearings, that the Department of State, both in Consular
Affairs and in Diplomatic Security, would come forward with
some initiatives for additional resources. Throughout the
report they cite resources as one of the problems, and quite
frankly, I think that is something that this Committee maybe
can help them resolve.
Senator Carper. Our thanks to both of you. Thanks, Madam
Chairman.
Chairman Collins. Thank you.
Mr. Johnson, I want to follow up on that last question. We
have talked a lot about the vulnerability created by a lack of
information sharing. You have been on the front lines. You have
mentioned that the inadequate penalties are another issue that
needs to be addressed, but what about staffing, training? Is
there a sufficient staff that is dedicated to passport fraud?
Talk to us more if you will about the personnel and resource
constraints that the GAO identified.
Mr. Johnson. I will sort of split in both halves, first
with Consular Affairs and their passport agencies. I was still
at the Agency when they made the decision to eliminate their
assistant fraud program managers. This was I think in early
2004. I recall at the time telling the various Consular Affairs
officials that I really felt that was not a very good idea.
Many of these assistants had been in those jobs for years and
years, and had a great deal of local and national knowledge
when it came to fraud. I recognize what the Department's idea
was, to rotate the examiners through to get everybody a little
bit of a sharing of how fraud works, but in my mind, why not
leave the assistants there and then still rotate? You are in
essence multiplying your ability to identify fraud.
I guess they had their reasons for doing it. To me, coming
simplistically from a law enforcement standpoint, they
literally are the ones who have to identify the fraud. Why
would you want to shorten or potentially shorten or short staff
yourself? I think that is one thing from a resource standpoint,
that if anything, they should be beefing this up. I know that
they are looking at a period where the issuance of passports--
they are looking at maybe from 8 million to potentially 12
million. With that is going to come a lot more fraud. I think
you should be beefing up your efforts as opposed to cutting
back or shorting.
On the Diplomatic Security side, there is no organization
that is better at doing what they do, but the problem is they
have too many missions. The summer of 2004 in my field office
at the time was approximately 50 special agents, and at any
given time I would have five or six of my agents on rotation to
Baghdad to the temporary duty assignments in Iraq, not to
mention Kabul, Afghanistan, and other protective security
details. So it was literally moving chess pieces. Who am I
going to have this week? Because those agents were being pulled
for other priority missions.
I think there has to be a recognition that this is a
problem and that they have to dedicate the number of resources
they need to combat this problem, and that is simply what it
comes down to. I think they have the expertise, but they need
the intelligence, as I mentioned in my statement, they need
intelligence ability, and they just quite simply need more
agents.
Chairman Collins. Mr. Ford, I could see you nodding your
head in agreement when Mr. Johnson was outlining the personnel
and resource challenges. What did the GAO find with regard to
adequate staffing and also the elimination of the assistant
fraud manager position?
Mr. Ford. We visited 7 of the 16 passport offices, and we
telephonically contacted the fraud prevention managers in all
the other offices. A fairly consistent message we heard was
that the elimination of the assistant fraud prevention manager
was viewed as hurting the effort to look at fraud.
The Department wanted to expand training by having
individuals put in a rotational program. That made sense to us,
but the elimination of the assistant position, given the
workload problems that the fraud managers had in most of the
posts we visited, did not seem like was a good idea to us. Our
recommendation, basically we went to the State Department and
said, we think you need to reexamine the overall staffing
profile here because, again, the message was fairly consistent
in almost every passport office we visited. They said that this
is hurting the effort to identify potential fraud.
As Mr. Johnson indicated, if the volume of passports is
going to continue to grow over the next several years, it seems
the problem will be compounded unless there is enough people
out there who are trained in fraud prevention to really put a
kink into the potential that could be out there of the country
being vulnerable.
Chairman Collins. Mr. Johnson, in your testimony you
describe fraud rings that sell bogus breeder documents such as
birth certificates that are in turn used to secure a passport.
What is your evaluation of Federal efforts to crack down on
these fraud rings? Is there an organized Federal effort to go
after these rings that are selling the breeder documents?
Mr. Johnson. Not that I am aware of. I think it really
always came to--and I have worked all over the country in the
passport fraud arena--and it always came down to regional
nuances. I mean in some regions you might have--Diplomatic
Security would be aggressive in pursuing these document
vendors, and maybe the former Immigration, now Homeland
Security, ICE, would be aggressive. Other areas, the FBI might
have an interest, but unfortunately, I cannot say across the
board that any particular agency or any group of agencies would
wholeheartedly go after these rings. In my mind, again, I think
that is a little bit of a lapse, that we need to sort of have a
consolidated across the U.S. approach to combating this
problem.
Chairman Collins. That does seem to be an important gap
because if you can break the rings that are providing the bogus
documents, you prevent the person from getting the passport in
the first place.
Mr. Johnson. If I might add, sometimes--and I think the
report refers to this--that most of these individuals were not
successful in getting these passports issued, but you still
have an individual with a new birth certificate and a new
identity. While he or she may not have gotten the passport,
they are still out there walking around with a driver's license
and a birth certificate and a different identity. What are they
doing? It is just something that maybe the State Department
will--I am just saying that is a whole----
Chairman Collins. A whole other area for us to crack down
on. Thank you.
Mr. Ford, just one final question. On its comments on the
GAO's report, the State Department points to a new series of
unannounced audits that it is conducting that it started in
April to determine the effectiveness of anti-fraud programs at
various passport offices. And the State Department officials
have trumpeted these results in saying that they show only very
minor errors. What is your response to that?
Mr. Ford. First of all, we have not examined their audits
in detail. We have seen some information regarding the reported
results. With regard to the issue that it appears to be a minor
problem, looking at their analysis, I believe they extrapolated
their sample by indicating there could be the potential for
4,000 cases, if they extrapolated to all the passports being
issued. If that were the case, since I believe they referred
around 3,200 cases last year, that would indicate that the
potential for fraud is a lot greater than what was reported
last year through their fraud prevention system.
So again, I have not examined it in detail. I think it is
good that they are doing it, but it does point to the fact that
the potential for more fraud out there may be greater than what
they suggest.
Chairman Collins. Thank you very much for your testimony.
Senator Carper.
Senator Carper. I have no further questions. Again, our
thanks to both of you. Thanks, Madam Chairman.
Chairman Collins. Thank you very much. Your testimony has
been extremely helpful, and we look forward to working further
with you.
Mr. Ford. Thank you.
Mr. Johnson. Thank you.
Chairman Collins. I would now like to call forward our
second panel, which brings together three accomplished Federal
officials with the responsibility for issues related to the
security of the U.S. passport system.
Frank Moss is the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for
Passport Services. He is responsible for overseeing the
processing of some 8.8 million passport applications last
fiscal year.
Donna Bucella is the Director of the Terrorist Screening
Center and is on detail to the FBI from the Transportation
Security Administration, where she was the Southeast Area
Director.
Thomas Bush began his FBI career in 1975 in the
Identification Division. Last December he was appointed by
Director Mueller to be the Assistant Director of that division,
now called the Criminal Justice Information Services.
I want to thank all of you for being here today, and we
will start the panel by hearing Mr. Moss's testimony.
TESTIMONY OF FRANK E. MOSS,\1\ DEPUTY ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR
PASSPORT SERVICES, BUREAU OF CONSULAR AFFAIRS, U.S. DEPARTMENT
OF STATE
Mr. Moss. Good morning, Madam Chairman and Members of the
Committee.
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\1\ The prepared statement of Mr. Moss with attachments appears in
the Appendix on page 54.
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I am pleased to be here today to discuss how the State
Department is responding to concerns raised by the Government
Accountability Office in its report, ``Improvements Needed to
Strengthen U.S. Passport Fraud Detection Efforts.'' I want to
thank the GAO and especially their lead examiner, Michael
Courts, for their hard work on this project. As the GAO report
recognizes, the Department of State, especially the Bureau of
Consular Affairs and the Diplomatic Security Service, are
working hand in hand with elements of the Homeland Security and
Justice Departments to protect the integrity of the U.S.
passport. We acknowledge, however, that it is always possible
to improve, and welcome GAO's observations and suggestions.
The integrity of the passport rests upon three major
elements, the quality of the adjudication process, the security
features of the passport itself, and the introduction of
biometrics to make certain that the passport can only be used
by the person to whom it is issued. This is what I illustrate
on this charts to my right.\2\ Taken together these elements
form a comprehensive approach to passport security. Securing
the document and the adjudication process is particularly
important in an era when terrorists, transnational criminals,
and others seeking to enter the U.S. illegally, view travel
documents as valuable tools.
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\2\ The charts referred to appear in the Appendix on pages 63-65.
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While my written statement discusses this in greater
detail, let me highlight for the Committee just a few steps we
are taking to improve the passport's design and to introduce
biometrics.
We recently completed the first cover-to-cover redesign of
the passport in more than a decade. The new document will
include a host of new security features. These include
sophisticated new art work, printing techniques used in the
current generation of U.S. currency, and other changes that
will significantly increase the physical security aspects of
the U.S. passport.
This next generation U.S. passport, the e-passport, also
includes biometric technology that will further support the
government's border security goals. The e-passport includes a
contactless chip in the rear cover that will contain only the
data on the biographic data page of the passport and a digital
image of the bearer. I am happy to share examples with the
Committee, and some of the art work here to my left
demonstrates the new security features and some of the other
aspects of the new passports.
Let me discuss the GAO's recommendations and how the
Department of State is implementing them. We agree with the GAO
that enhanced interagency data sharing can significantly
improve passport adjudication. We have taken numerous steps to
meet that objective. For example, in April 2004 we signed an
MOU with the Social Security Administration that allows us to
verify Social Security numbers of U.S. passport applicants. We
have a longstanding and effective working relationship with
Federal law enforcement agencies. Today we have nearly 50,000
names of fugitives or other persons of interest to law
enforcement in the passport lookout system. Half of those
entries were made individually as a result of our outreach
efforts. The other half are based on data transfer from the
U.S. Marshals Service on persons subject to Federal fugitive
warrants.
To complement this information, we are working with the FBI
to add to the passport lookout system an extract of information
from their NCIC database. I am happy to report that last week I
received a letter from Mr. Bush that responds positively to our
request for access to this information. We appreciate this
positive response which we believe will enable us to include in
the passport lookout system information on persons subject to
State or local warrants. This is a long-sought objective of
ours.
We have also just signed an agreement with the Terrorist
Screening Center that will provide us information on American
citizens who may have a nexus to terrorism or to an ongoing
investigation. Under this agreement the State Department will
inform the TSC whenever any such individual applies for
passport services. In addition, the Department of State
provides the National Counter Terrorism Center, NCTC, access to
our PRISM database which includes images of all passport
applications since 1994 including the photographs of the
applicants.
GAO also recommends creating a national fraud library of
suspect documents. There are several different resources
containing such information, and we agree that finding a way to
bring them together is desirable. In this regard we are
pursuing access to the U.S. Secret Service's Questionable ID
Documents (QID) database. This database includes sections on
valid documents, stolen documents, and on counterfeits and
alterations. A significant advantage to this initiative is that
we at the State Department can contribute to the Secret
Service's database, and therefore assist them in their mission,
and of course it will also allow us to avoid significant
development costs because we will piggyback on what the Secret
Service is already doing.
The GAO recommends designating additional positions for
fraud prevention coordination and training in domestic passport
agencies and establishing a more formalized fraud prevention
training program. We agree and have taken several steps to make
this happen. We are adding more fraud prevention managers to
the staffs of our larger passport agencies. We have increased
the number of persons working in the fraud offices as well as
the length of time they spend there. These are on rotational
assignments. This will have a direct, positive impact on
improving training provided to the passport specialists who
adjudicate passport applications and stand as the first line of
defense against passport fraud.
Finally, under a Washington-based reorganization, we will
add to the staff that coordinates and backstops fraud
prevention operations. Part of the work of that expanded staff
will be to develop a national fraud training program for
passport specialists.
The GAO also looked at workload transfers from one domestic
passport agency to another. We do this, quite honestly, to make
the best use of our issuance capabilities nationwide. A
theoretical risk in doing so is that we could miss
opportunities to identify fraud. We believe that we address
this risk successfully through our selection of highly skilled
fraud program managers, by rotating senior passport specialists
through the Fraud Program Management Office, so that they can
assist and better train their staff, and by training all of our
newly hired specialists centrally.
Finally, the GAO suggested increased training and oversight
of the more than 7,000 passport acceptance agents nationwide.
These are, as you noted in the earlier round of testimony,
principally U.S. Postal Service employees and clerks of court
who accept applications from U.S. citizens and identify the
passport applicant as the person he or she claims to be. This
is, of course, only the first step in the passport adjudication
process.
Improved training is already under way through use of
Computer Based Training modules developed in cooperation with
the U.S. Postal Service that we are also adopting for use by
other facilities and deliverers of acceptance agent services.
We are also exploring initiatives to better monitor the
quality of the acceptance agents' work.
Chairman Collins, other Members of the Committee, thank
you, and at this time I am happy to answer any questions you
may have.
Chairman Collins. Thank you very much. Ms. Bucella.
TESTIMONY OF DONNA A. BUCELLA,\1\ DIRECTOR, TERRORIST SCREENING
CENTER
Ms. Bucella. Good morning, Chairman Collins. Thank you for
the opportunity to discuss the missions and objectives of the
Terrorist Screening Center as they relate to information
sharing with the Department of State.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ The prepared statement of Ms. Bucella appears in the Appendix
on page 66.
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The mission of the Terrorist Screening Center is to
consolidate the government's approach to screening terrorism
and to consolidate the identities of all known and suspected
terrorists into a single database.
The Terrorist Screening Center represents one of the most
unique support organizations to terrorist screening and law
enforcement operations ever conceived or implemented. The TSC
has been providing key resources since December 1, 2003,
including a single coordination point for terrorist screening
data, the Terrorist Screening Center's database, a 24/7 call
center for encounter identification assistance, access to
coordinated law enforcement response, a formal process for
tracking encounters, encounter feedback to appropriate
entities, and a process to address misidentification issues.
Since the TSC was established, the Department of State has
been a significant contributor to all of our overall success.
The Department of State is a full partner at the TSC, and one
of my executive deputies is a Department of State detailee. The
close on-site partnership with the Department of State has
enhanced our ability to administer the Visa Security Advisory
Opinion Review, the Visa Revocation Review, and nominations to
our database. Additionally, the Terrorist Screening Center and
State are working to ensure that appropriate officials will be
notified when a U.S. person is listed in the TSDB and/or
applies for a new, renewed, or amended U.S. passport. And we
have signed that agreement.
Visa Security Advisory Opinions are generated by the
Department of State Consular Affairs officers when a visa
applicant is, in fact, a possible match to the CLASS system.
The Department of State personnel at the Terrorist Screening
Center have reviewed over 138 Security Advisory Opinions since
December 1, 2003, our inception.
Visa Revocation Reviews are conducted for new entries into
our database to determine if those new entries have been issued
visas before the derogatory information surfaced. The Terrorist
Screening Center has reviewed over 52,000 new names to our
Terrorist Screening Center database, and we have alerted the
Department of State to about 850 cases of possible visa
revocation.
The Department of State specialists assigned to the
Terrorist Screening Center play a very important role in the
Terrorist Screening Center nominations process. The specialists
have the expertise to ensure that foreign individuals nominated
for inclusion into the Terrorist Screening Center database are
thoroughly evaluated and made available to overseas posts.
The screening of U.S. passport applications, a highlight of
the May 2005 GAO report, is a collaborative initiative that
began this past January when it was identified as a
vulnerability and basically a screening opportunity, and
proposed by our State Department representative that we get the
names of U.S. persons listed in the TSDB and make them
available to the Department of State during the passport
application process.
As I mentioned, the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) has
been signed. The TSC looks forward to continued collaboration
with the Department of State on this project. Since Homeland
Security Presidential Directive 6 was issued on September 16,
2003, the Terrorist Screening Center and the Department of
State have been partnering to protect our Nation's security
through the robust sharing of terrorist information. The
Terrorist Screening Center has provided support to those
functions identified by the Department of State as priorities
and will continue to expand our relationship. This close and
continuing cooperation contributed to worldwide efforts to keep
terrorists out of the United States and locate those who may
already be in our Nation.
The Terrorist Screening Center thanks the Committee for the
opportunity to provide clarity and looks forward to continued
work with the Committee in TSC's efforts to consolidate the
government's approach to terrorist screening.
Thank you.
Chairman Collins. Thank you. Mr. Bush.
TESTIMONY OF THOMAS E. BUSH, III,\1\ ASSISTANT DIRECTOR,
CRIMINAL JUSTICE INFORMATION SERVICES DIVISION, FEDERAL BUREAU
OF INVESTIGATION.
Mr. Bush. Good morning, Madam Chairman, and Members of the
Committee, and our condolences to Senator Lieberman and his
family.
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\1\ The prepared statement of Mr. Bush appears in the Appendix on
page 69.
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As you mentioned, I am the Assistant Director of the FBI's
Criminal Justice Information Services Division, otherwise known
as CJIS. By way of background, CJIS is responsible for five
services to law enforcement: Fingerprint identification;
uniform crime reporting; National Crime Information Center,
also known as NCIC; the National Instant Criminal Background
Check System; and Law Enforcement Online.
NCIC, the service which is of interest to this Committee
today, is a computerized database of documented criminal
justice information available to virtually every law
enforcement agency nationwide, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
Since its inception, NCIC has been a highly effective tool for
information sharing with local, State, tribal, and Federal
entities. NCIC is operated under a shared management concept
between our State and local and Federal criminal justice users.
The database currently consists of 18 files, 7 property files,
and 11 person files to include the Wanted Person Files.
During NCIC's first year of operation, which was 1967, 2
million transactions were processed. In May of this year, NCIC
processed an average of 4.6 million transactions per day, with
an average response time of less than 0.06 seconds. On May 27
of this year, NCIC processed a record 5.2 million transactions
in a 24-hour period.
I would like to outline some of NCIC files and features
that assist in immigration and border security. The Foreign
Fugitive File, established July 1, 1987, contains information
on persons wanted in connection with offenses committed outside
the United States. There are two types of records in the
Foreign Fugitive File--Canadian records and INTERPOL records.
The Immigration Violator File was established on August 25,
2003. In 1996, NCIC implemented the Deported Felon File. Today,
this is now a category of records within the Immigration
Violator File. Immigration Violator File includes two
additional categories of records, individuals wanted as
absconders, and individuals in violation of the National
Security Entry/Exit Registration System or NSEERS. As of July 1
of this year, there were 163,000 plus records in the NCIC
Immigration Violator File.
The Violent Gang and Terrorist Organization File, or VGTOF,
was implemented in December 1994. This file was designed to
provide identifying information about violent criminal gang and
terrorist organization members to protect the law enforcement
community and the public. Traditionally, NCIC Person Files
serve the needs of the criminal justice community and are
supported by the judicial process. Most typically, a warrant is
on file. However, with the creation of VGTOF, that philosophy
was expanded to support law enforcement, investigative and
information needs related to terrorism. When the Terrorist
Screening Center became operation in December 2003, the FBI
CJIS Division modified the NCIC VGTOF file to support TSC's
mission.
VGTOF is the means to make the terrorist screening
information available to the law enforcement community
nationwide. When an officer hits on a VGTOF terrorist record,
he is instructed to contact TSC for additional information on
the subject.
The Department of State Bureau of Diplomatic Security is a
fully authorized NCIC user when conducting criminal
investigations. Additionally, the FBI has provided the
Department of State Bureau of Consular Affairs with extracts of
the NCIC Wanted Person, Immigration Violator, Foreign Fugitive
files, VGTOF, and the Interstate Identification Index on a
daily and weekly basis for inclusion in its Consular Lookout
and Support System, as required by Section 403 of the U.S.
PATRIOT Act. The Department of State uses the information to
ascertain whether visa applicants have records indexed in NCIC
which might preclude the issuance of a visa.
In April 2005, CJIS received a request from Department of
State Passport Services for an extract of the FBI fugitives
contained in the NCIC system. Our immediate response was that
the FBI fugitives in NCIC, which is approximately 7,000,
represent only a fraction of the more than one million felony
and serious misdemeanor wanted person records entered into
NCIC. We requested that DOS Passport Services work with us
toward the ultimate goal of system interoperability and direct
NCIC access for passport screening. As an interim step toward
this goal, we have agreed to and have provided the requested
extracts to them as recently as, I believe, Monday of this
week.
In closing, I would like to thank you for allowing me the
opportunity to explain the use of NCIC for immigration and
border security. I would now answer any questions you might
have.
Chairman Collins. Thank you, Mr. Bush. It looks like there
has been some considerable progress made in the past few days.
Let me start, Mr. Moss, with a threshold question for you.
Do you believe that terrorists are trying to get their hands on
U.S. passports? Is this a problem?
Mr. Moss. Madam Chairman, I am unaware of any reports of
terrorists themselves, people we knew were involved in
terrorism, attempting to get a U.S. passport.
Taking it a little bit more broadly though, obviously we
are concerned about anyone who may be seeking a passport in
order to flee prosecution or to engage in activities inimicable
to our interests. That is why we think that these recent
breakthroughs we have had on terrorists, on exchanging
screening information with TSC and with the FBI, are major
steps forward toward making our borders more secure and
obviously making our passport screening system more robust than
has heretofore been the case.
Chairman Collins. Let me read from testimony that you gave
on the House side just recently. You said, ``We at the
Department of State are certainly aware of how sought after
this document is, not only by American citizens with legitimate
travel plans, but by illegal immigrants, as well as terrorists
and others who would do this Nation harm. A key objective of
the Department is to ensure that U.S. passports are issued only
to persons who are legitimately entitled to them. This is
particularly important in an era when terrorists, transnational
criminals, and others seeking to enter the U.S. illegally view
travel documents as valuable tools.'' This morning you seem to
be giving a different answer.
Mr. Moss. I am sorry, Madam Chairman, I misinterpreted your
question. In my testimony earlier, and even in some of the
comments I made today, I would like to differentiate between
what happens in terms of people applying for passports
domestically, and then the misuse of lost or stolen U.S.
passports around the world.
In the case of applying for passports in the United States,
I am unaware of any information on terrorists doing so, but
obviously, having the access to the TSC data will help us
ensure that does not happen.
The other side of the coin is when passports are lost or
stolen abroad. There is an active international market that
supports illegal immigration, transnational crime, and yes,
terrorism, trying to acquire lost or stolen documents, not just
from the United States but issued by legitimate governments
around the world. The 9/11 Commission dealt with this in depth
both in its comprehensive report as well as in an appendix it
wrote on the issue of terrorist travel.
In terms of trying to prevent the misuse of U.S. passports,
I would mention, for example, that whenever we become aware of
a lost or stolen U.S. passport, we provide that data to
INTERPOL so that it can be shared with governments throughout
the world. We have given INTERPOL information on some 660,000
lost or stolen passports over the last year. That is several
years worth of data, but it shows our commitment to try to
prevent the misuse of the U.S. passport.
We also invalidate the use of a U.S. passport for travel
once it has been reported as lost or stolen.
And the third point I would say is we have taken dramatic
steps to improve the physical security of the U.S. passport, so
that one of the longstanding vulnerabilities, which was
changing the photograph, the tactic we all saw in the movies
made in the 1960's, that just simply cannot be done now. We
think we have a very robust passport physically as well as
systems to prevent the misuse.
Thank you.
Chairman Collins. Mr. Moss, I agree with you that the
passport has improved greatly as far as becoming very difficult
to counterfeit, but that is not the focus of the GAO report,
nor our previous witnesses. What they are trying to alert you
to are very serious vulnerabilities where phony breeder
documents such as phony birth certificates or driver's licenses
could be used to secure a legitimate U.S. passport. We are not
talking about a stolen or lost passport falling into terrorist
hands. We are talking about vulnerabilities in the system that
could be exploited by terrorists using phony birth certificates
to obtain a U.S. passport, and that is what the GAO has tried
to alert you to, and that is what Mr. Johnson's testimony
suggests is a real problem.
Mr. Moss. Well, Madam Chairman, first of all, I do want to
thank the GAO for their work. They have alerted us to areas we
have to make improvements in. And I would like to thank you as
well, because in the Intelligence Reform Bill that you passed
last December, there were some important developments that
apply to this very issue you have talked about, moves toward
Federal standards for birth certificates, for example.
My understanding is that right now there are 8,000
different jurisdictions in the United States that issue birth
certificates, and there are something like 50,000 different
types of birth certificates in circulation. The same applies
clearly to the issue of driver's licenses.
The third point I would make is that is why it is so
important, we believe, to give so much training and so much
close management supervision to our passport specialists. These
are the people we depend upon to identify fraudulent documents
by their look, by their feel, by relationships between that
document and what the passport application says. This is an
area where we are making major investments.
The fourth point I would say is clearly we continue to
strengthen our fraud prevention program activities. For
example, mention was made of lost and stolen birth certificates
issued here in the United States. We have a particular concern
over one jurisdiction in the United States. We talked a little
bit about Hudson County in the earlier round of testimony, but
the other thing is that in one case involving, quite honestly,
Puerto Rico, we do subject any passport applications supported
by a Puerto Rican birth certificate to extraordinary security
reviews before issuance because of our concern over the
security of that document.
So we do have, I believe, a robust system in hand, and it
will only get better as we move toward Federal standards on
driver's licenses and birth certificates.
Chairman Collins. If you are not currently receiving
information from the Terrorist Screening Center on Americans
who are on the watch list, how would you know whether or not an
American with ties to terrorist groups is receiving a passport?
Mr. Moss. The way I would answer that is the following. For
about a generation we have depended upon a push system in which
Federal agencies and State and local law enforcement
authorities have shared data with us on persons of particular
concern to us. We are now trying to go to a system where
basically we pull that data from other databases. That is why
access to the TSC database is so important. The same applies to
Mr. Bush's offer of access to NCIC. I think we have a good
system right now. Can it get better? Yes. And I think that the
GAO report has advanced that process. The cooperation of my
colleagues here at the table will help us to do a better job in
the future.
But let me assure you, if any agency at this table or
another Federal agency or a State or local authority has a
concern about an individual, they can tell us right now. They
know how to get in touch with us. We will put that person in
the lookout system and prevent passport issuance to them until
we have resolved that problem.
Chairman Collins. Mr. Moss, in your written testimony you
said the Department of State is about to sign an agreement with
the Terrorist Screening Center that will provide information on
American citizens who are of concern to TSC due to the nexus to
terrorism or an ongoing investigation. I believe I heard you
say this morning that you have signed it. Could I ask when it
was signed?
Mr. Moss. It was signed last evening by the two agencies,
including by Donna Bucella here at the my left.
Chairman Collins. See, sometimes oversight hearings do have
the desired result. [Laughter.]
I am very pleased to learn that it has been signed. I think
that is a really important improvement to make.
Ms. Bucella, let me ask you, the Terrorist Screening Center
was sharing information on visas with the State Department, why
was there not sharing of information on U.S. citizens of
particular concern?
Ms. Bucella. Chairman Collins, I wish that I could tell you
when we set up the Terrorist Screening Center I just went
around to different government agencies and knocked on their
doors and they gave me their list.
What we have had has been a tremendous effort in trying to
gather the names of all suspected, known, international and
domestic terrorists from all the different agencies. What we
had to do is gather information in various forms. Some had full
names, some had partial dates of birth. We had to prioritize,
and still trying to gather our arms as the U.S. Government as
to all the names.
And so one of our first priorities was preventing people
from coming into the country, and so we went through the--
obviously, when we were set up, the State Department donated
part of their Tipoff staff to us, but that Tipoff staff dealt
solely with those individuals that were applying for visas,
keeping people outside the country. So we loaded up our system
using the Tipoff system. It was not until, I believe, January
of this year, when we were having discussions with the State
Department, that we realized that there was yet another
screening opportunity, and that was the U.S. passports.
And so the reason why--I read the GAO report, and when it
had that we were not cooperating, we were. We were just trying
to figure out what it is that you want, what it is that you
need, and how can we get it to you. And so that was the
discussion that we have had over the last couple of months with
our lawyers and making sure that we complied with the privacy
laws and things, and that is why we have recently just signed
the Memorandum of Understanding.
The implementation of this--because it is a technology
issue, it is really the connectivity--will be done before
August of this year.
Chairman Collins. Mr. Moss, did the State Department ask
for this information?
Mr. Moss. Madam Chairman, we have an effort going back 2 or
3 years now, trying to reach out to Federal agencies to acquire
additional information to put into our screening system. One of
our first successes was the U.S. Marshals Service. We were then
looking for other databases. By last December the letter left
us and arrived in January at TSC, it is almost immaterial.
Between ourselves we identified an opportunity to strengthen
our passport lookout system by incorporating the TSC's
information, and we have been working together since then.
And I would say the same applies to the FBI. We are trying
to make this database richer, and now of course, not only do we
have an offer of 7,000 additional names of persons subject to
Federal warrants, but this great development over access to
persons who are subject to State warrants and local warrants as
well.
Chairman Collins. Mr. Bush, that leads me into a question
for you. It seems to me that the FBI has a very strong interest
in making sure that fugitives do not gain access to passports
that they could use to flee the country. Can you explain to us
why the FBI took so long to make the names of its fugitives
available to the State Department so that you could be alerted
if one of these fugitives applied for a passport? I find it so
inconceivable that we have posters of the Ten Most Wanted in
our Post Offices, and yet we are not sharing that information
in databases throughout our government.
Mr. Bush. And let me backup what Mr. Moss has said.
Historically--and I was a fugitive hunter in the 1980's in the
Washington Field Office, and we were always encouraged and had
procedures to put stops individually, as he says, in a push
type of format with the State Department, and we often did
individually. So case agents--and I cannot speak about these
particular cases that were up here--had the opportunity, always
have had, and I know we took collectively large numbers of
fugitives and persons of interest and put them in the Tipoff
system, which when CLASS was searched would designate the fact
that they were wanted. But clearly, with the examples given
here, there were opportunities to catch individuals that were
applying that were not taken advantage of by our case agents on
an individual basis.
So as we move into this process to ensure in their pool
process to get as many in there as we can, then we will clearly
fill some of those gaps that we have had. But it has always
been--I remember doing it myself with the State Department, so
always had that option. We clearly did not put all of them in
there.
I think some of it was a resource issue. When you talk
about issuing 10 million passports a year that are name-based,
when NCIC records about a 10 percent or plus 10 percent hit
rate, so you are looking at about a million hits there on names
that are phonetic searches. And they did not even used to be
exact date of birth, they had a range. So you would pull out a
lot of false positives. So you had an impact there on resources
at the State Department and within the FBI, and that is what we
need to work around with access even to these 1.2 million
fugitives. That is going to create a lot of hit activity. That
is the back side to sharing information. It is the what do you
do with it when you get it and you get these hits? That is what
we want to work with them closely with, to a mutually agreeable
system of applying that service.
Chairman Collins. It seems a very burdensome, labor-
intensive process, however, to rely on individual case agents
trying to guess whether a fugitive is at risk of flight and
alerting the State Department. It seems much more efficient to
have a database sharing where perhaps you do not share all 1
million fugitives' names, but you do those convicted of serious
crimes. I mean it seems to me that you can deal with the data
issue overwhelming the system by selecting it based on the
seriousness of the crime, but it is disturbing to me that the
GAO's limited review found so many instances of fugitives who
had committed extremely serious crimes, and yet were not
included in the State Department system, and indeed, the GAO,
despite a very limited review, was able to come up with some
very egregious cases.
So I hope the FBI will work to come up with a system that
automatically shares the names of fugitives who have been
convicted, or who are wanted for serious crimes.
Mr. Bush. And clearly, there are more effective means.
There are other means with checking passenger manifests and
putting stops in the Treasury enforcement computer system that
would also pick up on some of these fugitives' travel, and the
fact that they obviously do not always use their true name. In
the case here, they obviously did.
But I think our mutual goal is to do the best we can and to
make it better wherever we can, whether it is terrorist related
or fugitive related.
Chairman Collins. Mr. Moss, one other question for you. We
talked a lot about the information sharing challenges and the
need to improve that, and indeed the agreement signed last
night, I think, is a very good step in the right direction, as
well as good timing for this hearing.
But the GAO and Mr. Johnson also identified a number of
other weaknesses in the State Department's overall fraud
prevention program. For example, GAO was critical of the
limited oversight and training of acceptance agents, the lack
of a consistent nationwide training program, the absence of a
centralized and up-to-date electronic fraud prevention library,
and the fact that headquarters' responsibility for fraud
prevention support is somewhat unclear. Mr. Johnson raised
concerns about the elimination of the assistant fraud manager
position, and suggested also that not enough resources are
focused on fraud detection and prevention.
What steps is the State Department taking to address these
concerns which are organizational, resource, training, or
oversight concerns?
Mr. Moss. I think we are in fact addressing each and every
one. Let me begin with the issue of the so-called elimination
of the anti-fraud, assistant anti-fraud program managers.
What we had was a situation where we had a couple of people
encumbering these positions and some other people who had been
assigned to this function basically on informal details at the
passport agency level. What we are trying to do, Madam
Chairman, in this effort, is to make certain that the knowledge
that is held by our fraud program managers really gets to--for
want of a better term, the passport floor. Passport fraud is
identified by our passport specialists. They are the people who
literally see the application, look at databases, touch the
birth certificates and things like this.
What we are trying to do by our current strategy is to
rotate our supervisory passport specialists through the anti-
fraud program office, have them spend 3 to 6 months there,
understand the anti-fraud tools, and then go back to help train
their own staff.
Second, we have also implemented a centralized training
program for our new passport specialists so that they all have
a thorough grounding in passport fraud detection efforts.
I should also talk a little bit about resources, both in
terms of the passport side, and I would also like to mention
briefly some developments on the Diplomatic Security side. We
are continuing to hire additional personnel. Our workload is
growing dramatically. You are well aware, of course, of the
Western Hemisphere Initiative that is coming along as well. We
are not trying to overburden our staffs. We are trying to hire
and keep our staff ratios in line with our workload. Also our
colleagues at Diplomatic Security have gone to a new model for
staffing their own offices around the country. They are
beginning to assign civil service personnel to those offices as
investigators so that they have the long-term continuity that
Mr. Johnson mentioned in his testimony.
On the question of the acceptance agents, I think there are
two things I would like to mention. First of all, most of the
acceptance agents are employees of the U.S. Postal Service,
have been vetted by the U.S. Postal Service, and are U.S.
citizens. The U.S. Postal Service has developed a computerized-
based training program for those people. We are so impressed
with it that we are actually acquiring rights to use it to help
train those non-Postal Service acceptance agents, clerks of
court, a handful of universities, things like this, some public
libraries around the United States. We also use our own
customer service staffs in the passport agencies to do outreach
to these agencies.
The final point I would say is that if an acceptance agent
has any question about a passport application, they simply
accept it, they flag it for us, and we take it from there. They
have a very limited role, basically, to ensure that the person
applying for a passport is who they claim to be. We make the
decision on passport issuance. That is inherently a Federal
Government responsibility.
So I really think that between our work with DS, the
additional personnel we are assigning to the anti-fraud program
responsibilities at our largest agencies, our rotational
activities, and our training opportunities for all of our
staffs that we already had in place, we have a robust strategy
to help address many of the suggestions and recommendations
made by the GAO.
Chairman Collins. Thank you for that summary statement.
I want to thank all of the witnesses who have participated
in our hearing today.
As Mr. Moss indicated, this Committee spent a great deal of
time last year drafting intelligence reform legislation--
sweeping reforms. One of the major issues that we focused on in
the hearings as a result of the 9/11 Commission report was the
lack of information sharing among Federal agencies, a lack that
prevented agencies from putting together the pieces of the
puzzle that might have allowed us to thwart the attacks on our
country on September 11, and that is why it is particularly
frustrating to me personally to see that there are still
serious examples of a lack of consistent information sharing
that could be harmful to our homeland security.
In the case that the GAO has identified and that you are
all working to remedy, it is particularly frustrating to me
because it does not require a new law to be passed. It does not
require a new Executive Order. It does not require a massive
new appropriation. What it requires is simply to have agencies
working together to share vital information to help protect our
Nation against terrorists and other criminals who would do us
harm.
I want to close this hearing by urging you to work very
closely together to improve the system. I realize there are
technological challenges. I realize there are the problems of
false positives. But in this age of databases and computers,
surely we ought to be able to come up with a system that allows
us to stop issuing passports to fugitives wanted for serious
crimes, and to terrorists. I do not feel confident that we have
such a system now. I believe we are making progress, and I
think the agreement signed is a major step in the right
direction. But I urge you to redouble your efforts. This is so
important. I think Secretary Powell was correct when he said
that the integrity of the U.S. passport is absolutely essential
in the global war on terrorism.
So this is an issue that the Committee is going to continue
to follow very closely. We look forward to getting an update
from you as implementation goes forward, as you meet the August
goal that you have set for implementation. I realize there will
be challenges, both from technology and privacy concerns and
other issues, but surely we can do better.
Again, I thank you for your cooperation with this
investigation, and I look forward to working not only with this
panel, but our previous one, to make sure that the system for
issuing passports is as secure as it can possibly be. Thank you
for being here today.
The hearing record will remain open for 15 additional days.
I want to thank the GAO for its excellent investigation in
this area, and I want to thank my staff for their hard work.
This hearing is now adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 11:16 a.m., the Committee was adjourned.]
A P P E N D I X
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