 Travellers from Australia and other Visa Waiver Program (VWP) countries will encounter some new procedures in the weeks ahead as the United States improves and upgrades the security along its borders. Enhanced safety measures are designed to ensure that visitors from across the world will continue to feel safe coming to our shores.
The United States is taking a number of steps with the international community to bring travel documents and procedures into the digital age. The globalised system of passport and visa security will be more secure and better protected from fraud and abuse by terrorists, drug traffickers, and persons who would seek to do harm.
For Australian travellers who visit the United States for business or tourism without a visa, the first transition came into place in September, 2004. As these visitors enter the United States at airports and seaports, they will be enrolled in the US-VISIT program. This system is a fast and easy step incorporated into international travellers’ normal encounter with U.S. immigration officials. The process uses an inkless digital scan of fingerprints and a digital photograph. All data obtained through US-VISIT is securely stored and available only to the authorized U.S. officials protecting the safety and security of U.S. citizens and international travellers.
Australian citizens who have travelled with a visa to work, study or engage in research since January 5, 2004, have already experienced this quick and easy process. Since the implementation of US-VISIT, almost 8 million visitors have passed through the system. To date, the system has already enabled U.S. authorities to prevent the entry of more than 600 criminals and immigration violators.
Under the terms of the VWP, the U.S. government has reciprocal agreements with 27 countries, including Australia, that allow tourist and business travellers to enter the United States for up to 90 days without a visa. As of October 26, 2004, however, each visitor must carry a machine-readable passport in order to enter without a visa. A machine-readable passport carries biographical data in a specified format that meets internationally agreed-upon standards for content and design that allows for readability. Australia has issued machine-readable passports since 1984.
In October 2005, an additional measure of safety for international travel documents will be added for travellers from Australia and other VWP countries. Using a global standard adopted by the International Civil Aviation Organisation, the United States and its VWP partner nations will incorporate a computer chip with a digitised photo in each passport.
This will allow a visual and computerised link between the document and the person who carries it.
Introduced incrementally, these changes in travel documents and procedures should add less than a minute to the current entry procedures. Some challenges may arise in this transition, but I am confident that visitors to the United States will benefit from our new border procedures as we work to make travel to the US safer for everyone.
Please note:
All passports must be machine readable otherwise you will need to obtain a US Non-Immigrant visa before travelling.
If you have a child added to a parent’s passport, you will need to take particular care. Even if the parent’s passport is machine readable, any children included on that passport will require a visa or must travel on their own machine readable passport.
A machine readable passport can usually be identified by two typeface lines of text at the base of the photo page. For example:
P<AUSBLOGS<<JOE<MARK<<<<<<<<<<<<<
E1234567<5AUS6804095F1256789<<<<<<<<02
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