Updated November 11, 2026

CBP biometric exit: face scans when you leave the US, opt-out rules and data retention

When you leave the United States on an international flight, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) uses its cloud-based Traveler Verification Service (TVS) to take a photo at the gate and match your face to your passport or visa photo. As of September 2026, CBP operates biometric exit at 66 airports, requires in-scope non-U.S. citizens to participate, and allows U.S. citizens to opt out in favor of a manual document check by a CBP officer or gate agent. Under CBP's privacy policy, newly captured U.S. citizen photos are deleted within 12 hours of verification, while non-citizen records are enrolled in the Department of Homeland Security biometric system.

What CBP biometric exit collects and how it works at the gate

CBP's biometric exit system is built around the Traveler Verification Service (TVS), a cloud-based facial comparison service operated by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Before your international flight boards, your airline sends the flight manifest to CBP through the Advance Passenger Information System (APIS). That manifest contains your name, date of birth, country of citizenship, passport number, country of issuance, passport expiration date, itinerary details, and an airline-generated alphanumeric unique ID (UID).

Using that manifest, CBP's Automated Targeting System (ATS) Unified Passenger Module (UPAX) pulls existing photographs of the passengers on your flight from government databases. These include photos from U.S. passports, U.S. visas, prior CBP entry inspections, and other DHS encounters. The system converts those historical photos into numeric biometric templates that cannot be turned back into pictures. It then loads them into a temporary virtual gallery for your flight inside a secure cloud environment.

When you walk up to the departure gate, you step in front of a camera connected to the TVS cloud over an encrypted connection. You do not give fingerprints in the standard boarding lane. The camera takes a live photograph of your face, converts it into a template, and compares it against the pre-loaded gallery for your flight. If the system finds a match, a light signals clearance, you board the plane, and CBP updates your APIS departure record from reported to confirmed.

If the camera cannot capture a clear image or fails to match your face after repeated attempts, you are directed to a CBP officer or trained representative at the gate. During manual exception processing, the officer checks the physical authenticity of your passport and confirms that you match the document. For non-U.S. citizens whose identity cannot be confirmed by face match, the officer can use a wireless handheld device to scan fingerprints against the DHS Automated Biometric Identification System (IDENT), and if no record is found in IDENT, run a check in the FBI's Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System (IAFIS).

• Biographic data collected via airline manifest: name, date of birth, citizenship, passport details, flight itinerary, and airline unique ID.
• Biometric data collected at the gate: a live facial photograph converted into a vendor-specific numeric template that cannot be reverse-engineered into a picture.
• Reference photos used for matching: passport photos, visa applications, prior border crossing records, and previous DHS immigration encounters.
• Fallback biometrics if face matching fails: manual passport inspection, or wireless fingerprint checks against IDENT and IAFIS for non-U.S. citizens.

Who must participate vs. who can opt out

Whether you have to stand for the departure camera depends on your citizenship. Under federal law and DHS regulations, CBP is mandated to biometrically verify non-U.S. citizens when they enter and exit the United States. The May 2017 TVS Privacy Impact Assessment explains that in-scope travelers (defined under 8 CFR 235.1(f)(ii) as travelers required by law to provide biometrics upon entry) are not allowed to opt out of the TVS process. If an in-scope non-U.S. citizen refuses biometric identity verification at departure, the privacy assessment notes that they may be denied boarding.

U.S. citizens are not required to have their picture taken. CBP's biometrics privacy policy as of July 2026 states that U.S. citizens who do not wish to submit to facial photo capture may request alternative processing. Similarly, CBP media guidance notes that foreign travelers who are exempt from providing biometrics may also notify an officer to have their travel documents inspected manually.

Even when U.S. citizens opt out of the facial scan, they are still subject to CBP inspection upon international departure and must present a valid passport for manual review. Once verified manually, CBP still records the biographic departure in APIS based on the boarding pass and manifest data. If you are preparing for what happens on the other side of your trip, our guide to CBP border questions covers the arrival inspection, and our Global Entry interview guide walks through trusted traveler enrollment.

Biometric exit rules by traveler type (from CBP Privacy Policy and DHS/CBP/PIA-030(b))

How U.S. citizens opt out at the departure gate: step-by-step checklist

CBP requires clear signage at every boarding gate where facial comparison is used. Signs are posted in English and 12 other languages (Arabic, French, German, Hindi, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, Simplified Chinese, Spanish, Traditional Chinese, and Turkish) to inform passengers before they reach the camera. Travelers can also ask for a printed tear sheet at the gate that explains the legal authority for the inspection, routine uses of the data, and how to opt out.

If you are a U.S. citizen and prefer not to have your face scanned when boarding an international flight, follow this five-step checklist we put together from CBP's published procedures:

• 1. Spot the CBP privacy notice before you reach the boarding pass reader. Look for the posted CBP Biometric Departure sign near the gate podium so you know facial capture is active on your flight.
• 2. Keep your physical U.S. passport in hand. Because you will not use the camera to verify your identity, the agent or officer must inspect your physical travel document.
• 3. Speak up before stepping in front of the camera lens. As you approach the gate agent or CBP officer, state plainly: 'I am a U.S. citizen and I would like to opt out of the biometric photo.'
• 4. Hand over your passport and boarding pass for manual verification. The CBP officer or trained airline representative will visually match your face to your passport photo, check the document's validity, and scan your boarding pass to confirm your exit in APIS.
• 5. Ask for a CBP tear sheet or note DHS TRIP if you run into an issue. Airline staff are not permitted to view CBP's camera photos and are trained to process manual checks, but if you believe you were improperly delayed or denied boarding, you can file a formal inquiry through the DHS Traveler Redress Inquiry Program (DHS TRIP).

How long CBP keeps your photo and departure records

CBP separates what happens to your photograph from what happens to your written (biographic) travel record. The airlines and airport partners never get access to the photos taken by the TVS system, and the cameras at the loading bridge do not display the stored database images.

Under CBP's biometrics privacy policy as of July 2026, CBP retains newly captured photos of U.S. citizens for no more than 12 hours after identity verification, and only for continuity of operations purposes. Inside the commercial Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) that performs the matching, all traveler facial images and templates are purged immediately after flight departure and no later than the conclusion of the flight. Note that CBP's May 2017 TVS Privacy Impact Assessment allowed temporary photo retention in the isolated ATS-UPAX system for up to 14 days for system audits and algorithm evaluation, before CBP adopted the stricter 12-hour deletion limit for U.S. citizen photos.

For in-scope non-U.S. citizens, photos are not deleted after the flight. CBP enrolls non-U.S. citizen departure photos into the DHS Automated Biometric Identification System (IDENT) to verify identity and confirm departure. According to DHS's August 2024 Privacy Impact Assessment, IDENT holds more than 320 million unique identities, processes more than 400,000 biometric transactions per day, and is being replaced by the Homeland Advanced Recognition Technology System (HART) as DHS's primary biometric repository.

Your biographic exit record (your name, passport number, and flight details from your boarding pass) is kept much longer than the gate photograph. CBP retains biographic exit records from boarding passes for 15 years for U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents in Border Crossing Information (BCI), and for 75 years for non-immigrant visitors in the Nonimmigrant Information System (NIIS), consistent with DHS records retention schedules.

CBP biometric exit data retention schedule (from CBP Privacy Policy and DHS/CBP/PIA-030(b))

How to record your departure on your phone with Verify My Exit (CBP Link)

If you leave the United States without going through an airport biometric gate, such as crossing a land border or departing from a port without exit cameras, CBP offers a mobile tool called Verify My Exit (VME) inside the CBP Link mobile application. Updated in November 2026, VME allows non-U.S. citizen travelers to biometrically record their own departure so their immigration record accurately shows they left on time.

Recording a timely departure helps non-immigrant visitors (including those who entered after answering ESTA arrival questions) avoid false overstay flags, delays, and secondary referrals the next time they return to the United States. To use Verify My Exit, follow these steps from CBP's VME guidance:

• 1. Wait until you have physically left the United States. The CBP Link app checks your device's geolocation and requires you to be at least 3 miles outside of the United States at the time you submit.
• 2. Open Verify My Exit in the CBP Link app within 24 hours of your departure. Sign in using your government sign-in account.
• 3. Take a live selfie in the app. VME uses live facial biometric matching to compare your selfie against your arrival record and enrolls the biometric confirmation in DHS IDENT.
• 4. Check your confirmation email and the 'View My Exit' screen. After submitting, you receive an email at your government sign-in address. Tap 'View My Exit' in the app to see every traveler submitted under your account.
• 5. Verify the green check mark. A green check mark next to a name means the departure was successfully recorded. A red exclamation point means the submission failed. Tapping the box next to the name shows the captured biographic and document details and the date of your submission.

Where CBP uses biometric exit: 66 airports, land borders and seaports

As of September 2026, CBP has processed more than 1 billion travelers using biometric facial comparison across air, land, and sea ports, preventing more than 2,346 impostors from illegally entering the United States. On the entry side, facial biometrics are active at 238 airports (including all 14 CBP Preclearance locations), 39 seaports, and all pedestrian lanes at the Southwest and Northern land borders.

On the departure side, CBP operates biometric exit at 66 airports for international air departures. Out of the 238 airports where CBP uses facial comparison for arriving flights, 66 also run facial comparison for departing international flights, which is 27.7% by our calculation from CBP's Airports with Biometrics Technology directory as of July 2026.

Major international departure hubs with active exit cameras include Atlanta, Boston, Chicago O'Hare, Dallas-Fort Worth, Denver, Detroit, Houston Bush, Los Angeles, Miami, New York JFK, Newark, Orlando, San Francisco, Seattle-Tacoma, and Washington Dulles. Biometric exit also operates across key regional gateways, including Austin, Charlotte, Honolulu, Las Vegas, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Raleigh-Durham, Salt Lake City, San Diego, San Juan, and Tampa.

Accuracy standards, FOIA requests and DHS TRIP redress

To prevent false rejections at the boarding gate, CBP requires vendor cameras to meet International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO ISO 19794-5) and ANSI/NIST-ITL 1-2011 standards, and sets an accuracy goal of at least a 96% True Acceptance Rate (TAR) in airport and seaport exit environments. Cameras are programmed to capture multiple frames, guide your gaze, provide proper lighting, and use a time-out feature that sends the best image if none cross the quality threshold.

If you want to request copies of the exit records CBP holds on you in BCI, NIIS, or ADIS, or contest their accuracy, you can submit a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) or Privacy Act request online through CBP's FOIA portal or by mail to the CBP FOIA Headquarters Office (1300 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Room 3.3D, Washington, D.C. 20002). Note that while U.S. citizens, lawful permanent residents, and individuals covered under the Judicial Redress Act have statutory Privacy Act rights, CBP also evaluates access and amendment requests from other foreign nationals on a case-by-case basis, subject to law enforcement exemptions.

If you experience repeated matching failures, are referred for extra screening, or are denied boarding during the biometric exit process, you can apply for redress through the DHS Traveler Redress Inquiry Program (DHS TRIP) online or by mail at DHS TRIP, 601 South 12th Street, TSA-901, Arlington, VA 20598-6901.

Practice example

Our records do not show a confirmed departure from your last trip to the United States. When and how did you leave?

State your exact departure date, the port or airport you left from, and your airline and flight number or land border crossing in your first sentence. Do not guess the date or argue with the officer about why the system missed your exit. If you left through a land border or an airport without a biometric gate and used the Verify My Exit feature in the CBP Link app within 24 hours of leaving, tell the officer and offer to show your government sign-in confirmation email or the green check mark on the View My Exit screen showing the date and document captured. If you did not use the app, have physical or digital proof of your timely departure ready to hand over if asked, such as your outbound boarding pass, airline itinerary receipt, or the entry stamp in your passport from the country you traveled to next.

CBP uses departure records in APIS, ADIS, and IDENT to check whether non-U.S. citizens complied with their terms of admission or overstayed. Giving the exact date and showing either a Verify My Exit confirmation or independent travel proof resolves an unrecorded exit quickly without triggering an unnecessary secondary referral.

Related guides

• CBP border questions
• Global Entry interview guide
• ESTA arrival questions

This is interview practice, not legal advice. For questions about your own case, talk to an immigration attorney. Visaful is not affiliated with the U.S. government or the Department of State.