Sponsors (6)
The bill quickly curtails DHS use, retention, and interagency sharing of certain biometric apps to protect privacy, but does so at the cost of operational burden, potential disruption to interagency and investigatory functions, and risks from remote removal actions on non‑DHS devices.
Taxpayers and federal employees: biometric images (photos/fingerprints) collected by the specified apps will be deleted promptly, reducing the privacy risk from long‑term retention of sensitive identifiers.
State, local, Tribal, and territorial agencies (and residents of those jurisdictions): the bill bars sharing these apps/data with non‑DHS agencies, limiting broader government use and secondary transfers of biometric data.
Federal employees and device owners: DHS must remove and may remotely disable the specified apps on DHS systems and covered non‑DHS devices, reducing risks from unauthorized app operation on government devices.
Immigrants and DHS operations at ports of entry: restricting app use to ports and requiring biometric captures be deleted within 12 hours may hinder DHS's ability to investigate identity fraud or conduct follow‑up checks.
State, local, and non‑DHS federal agencies: agencies that previously relied on shared access to these apps and data will lose that tool, potentially disrupting interagency identity‑verification and operational workflows.
Taxpayers and DHS operations: locating, deleting, and remotely disabling app copies and purging images across systems on short notice will impose operational costs, IT workload, and administrative expense.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Limits DHS use of two named mobile biometric apps to ports of entry, bans intergovernmental sharing, mandates app removal/remote disabling, and requires destruction of U.S. citizens' stored biometrics (12-hour limit at ports).
Official title: To prohibit the use of facial recognition mobile phone applications outside ports of entry, and for other purposes.
Introduced January 15, 2026 by Bennie Thompson · Last progress January 15, 2026
Directs the Department of Homeland Security to issue agency-wide rules within 30 days that bar use of two named mobile biometric apps (and their successors) except to identify people at ports of entry. It requires DHS to stop sharing the apps with other governments, remove and remotely disable copies of the apps (except for port-of-entry use), and to destroy stored images, photos, and fingerprints of U.S. citizens captured by those apps — with biometric captures at ports of entry destroyed within 12 hours.