The deadline for the introduction of biometric passports
for US Visa Waiver countries has now passed.
From today, 26 October, all countries currently taking part in
the US Visa Waiver programme will have to issue new biometric
passports to their citizens. Current passport holders in the UK
will still be able to visit the US without a visa, but their
passport will have to carry machine readable personal details at
least.
A deadline was previously set for all Visa Waiver countries to
issue passports with digital photos. The UK has met the deadlines
for both the digital photo and biometric requirements when issuing
new passports.
Those UK users with a glued in photo can still visit the US
without a visa, providing they have a machine-readable passport.
The UK has been issuing biometric passports since this spring, and
they contain a chip with face-mapping technology that matches the
digital photo in the passport and the personal details at the
back.
The biometric passports are supposedly designed to counter
forgeries. The US was originally demanding the distribution of
biometric passports by 26 October 2005, but the deadline was put
back after the European Union said many countries would not be
ready.