USCIS plans $100 million-plus biometrics and identity technology project

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) is preparing to spend more than $100 million on a new biometrics and identity technology project that will support machine learning, entity resolution and cloud-based applications used across the immigration system.

The project, Immigration Biometrics and Identity Services (IBIS), is not described by USCIS as a new biometric database. Instead, an official Department of Homeland Security (DHS) acquisition forecast describes it as a “combined” IT project that will develop, operate and maintain technology supporting biometrics and identity management, scheduling and data analytics.

USCIS classifies IBIS as a new requirement, but the forecast does not identify the existing systems or contracts that are being combined, nor does it say IBIS will replace a particular biometric system or the agency’s existing Biometrics Information Management Services contract.

The word “combined” appears in USCIS’s description of the requirement, but the agency has not yet explained precisely what is being brought together.

What the forecast does describe is a potentially significant piece of the technology infrastructure USCIS will use as immigration processing becomes increasingly digital and identity-centered.

The agency says IBIS will provide “secure, scalable, and modern IT solutions” supporting data analytics, machine learning, entity resolution, biometrics and identity management and scheduling.

Entity resolution is the process of determining when records that may contain different names, spellings, identifying information or other attributes refer to the same person.

Multidisciplinary contractor teams will develop, operate and maintain cloud applications using commercial and open source tools.

The project will use agile development and DevSecOps practices, with the contractor responsible for development, operations, security, incident response and technical support for both internal USCIS applications and systems used by the public.

DHS estimates the contract will be worth more than $100 million. USCIS expects to issue the solicitation October 22 and to make an award during the third quarter of fiscal 2027.

The planned contract completion date is June 30, 2032. The procurement will be competed through the General Services Administration Schedule as a full small business set-aside.

The forecast does not disclose what machine learning models IBIS will use, what data sources will be subjected to entity resolution, which biometric modalities the applications will process or what existing USCIS systems will ultimately fall within the project.

The project comes amid a much broader USCIS effort to reorganize immigration processing around digital records and stronger biometric identity verification.

In a sweeping proposed biometric rule published in November, DHS said it wants to move toward a person-centric model in which immigration records are organized around unique identities and biometrics are used to reduce the government’s dependence on names, dates of birth and other biographic identifiers.

The proposed rule is separate from the IBIS procurement, and nothing in the acquisition forecast says IBIS is being acquired to implement it. But the two initiatives are moving in the same technological direction.

Under the proposed rule, DHS said biometrics would be used for identity management throughout the immigration lifecycle.

The department said biometric identity management would allow records to be associated more reliably with a particular person even when names change, spellings differ or biographic information contains errors.

DHS also proposed expanding the circumstances under which biometrics could be collected, including from people associated with immigration requests regardless of age and, in certain circumstances, U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents.

The proposal also addresses enhanced and continuous vetting and the reuse of previously collected biometrics. DHS said the broader objective is to maintain and verify a person’s identity across later immigration encounters rather than repeatedly treating each filing as an isolated transaction.

USCIS has already been tightening some of those identity verification practices. In March, the agency said its strengthened screening and vetting measures included changes to photograph reuse and biometric identity verification when previously collected fingerprints are reused.

At the same time, USCIS is separately acquiring technology intended to move some identity checks away from traditional manual, in-person document inspection.

A May DHS acquisition forecast for Enterprise Remote Document Authentication describes a $5 million to $10 million commercial software procurement capable of authenticating U.S. and foreign identity and work authorization documents.

The proposed system would capture document images, perform presentation-attack detection and facial matching, authenticate machine-readable zones and barcodes and extract structured information using optical character recognition.

USCIS said processing would occur within agency or approved DHS environments and that the technology is intended to address the limits of processes that have historically depended on manual, in-person review.

That procurement is a separate requirement from IBIS, but it illustrates the kind of identity verification capabilities USCIS is simultaneously building around its immigration systems.

An even larger shift became explicit this month.

An interim final rule on electronic filing, effective August 11, gives USCIS authority to require electronic filing of benefit requests once a form has been available electronically for at least 180 days.

The rule itself does not immediately make any particular form mandatory to file online; USCIS must separately announce those requirements and provide advance notice.

DHS estimates that roughly 6 million petitioners annually could be affected by mandatory electronic filing under the rule.

More significant for IBIS is what DHS says it intends to do with the resulting digital information.

The department said moving away from paper will make USCIS data more available for advanced analytics aimed at reducing fraud and enhancing national security.

A fully digital environment, DHS said, can support cross-case and cross-system text analytics, pattern detection, automated background checks and continuous vetting while making it easier to compare information across immigration cases and government systems.

The October solicitation should provide the first detailed look at what USCIS means by the “combined” IBIS project and, most importantly, which existing systems, data flows and identity management functions the contractor will be responsible for.

Article Topics

biometrics  |  identity management  |  immigration  |  Immigration Biometrics and Identity Services (IBIS)  |  procurement  |  U.S. Government  |  USCIS