Ken Gantt welcomes biometric community members to recent Joint Biometrics Operational Board.

Action-Oriented Biometric Boards in Place

More than 50 people representing various government agencies and all branches of the military joined the Biometrics Task Force for its fourth Joint Biometrics Operational Coordination Board in Crystal City on Jan. 9.  The following day, the Joint Biometrics Technical Coordination Board met.

As the leading agency for the Department of Defense and Executive Agent for biometrics, the BTF has enhanced its efforts to communicate and be responsive to all government entities employing biometrics by bringing representatives together on a regular basis.  “The JBOCB provides ‘a voice’ to the biometrics community, which helps bring us together,” said Maj. Avram Isaacson, former Technical Integrations Division Chief.

Toward the end of last summer, the board met three times in as many months.  It was important to establish financial goals and much time was dedicated to the Execution and Spend Plan review for FY07, 08, and 09 with an overview provided by Isaacson and Ken Gantt, Requirements Branch, Technical Integration Division.  Discussions also centered on new and emerging requirements for the 26 organizations represented.

The recent JBOCB meeting also looked at funding and requirements with an eye toward FY10 and beyond. As USMC Capt. Marcus Johnson outlined future funding requirements, he explained that while,” we won’t be getting iris scans as we storm the beach,” and so therefore biometrics are not a first Tier priority, identity solutions are considered Tier II and the Marines are already looking into funding the next generation equipment and support that will be needed.

The group heard from LTC Deborah Theall from Army’s Project Manager Biometrics shop on the Biometric Enterprise Core Capabilities and the next generation Automated Biometric Identification System that will include multi-modal capability, blade servers and a “FEDEX” like tracking capability, in which reports that have been sent can be tracked through the biometric enterprise process. As often happens in a room of multi-service members, questions were raised about word definitions – in this case the word “enterprise.” To help address this concern, the BTF is publishing a biometrics glossary of terms that can be found on the website here.

After the lunch break, National Ground Intelligence Center representatives explained the future of systems being developed to prioritize or triage biometric requests that come to its analysts and explained the importance of joint capability within its Biometric Intelligence Resource (BIR)/ Automated Identity Management System (AIMS). A lively discussion on data sharing protocol resulted from questions raised during this discussion.  William Vickers, Director of the BTF’s Integration Directorate, asked to have a data call issued to identify the challenges and issues surrounding data sharing. During a joint venue such as this, information can be easily disseminated for discussion, decisions can be reached more rapidly, and, as with the case of data sharing questions, action can be taken.