Description
This paper focuses on the growing use of biometrics for the identification of asylum seekers and migrants in the UK and The Netherlands. I will argue that the move from immobile to mobile scanners further entrenches discrimination and exclusion not only by preventing free movement of certain “undesirable” migrants, but also by isolating them within the spaces they live. Based on interviews with Dutch immigration authorities and secondary research on new handheld biometric technologies, I will look at how the materiality of fingerprint scanners directs the process of collecting biometric data and the strategies employed by immigration authorities. I argue that fingerprinting practices are actively involved in bordering practices when, for example, authorities sweep through a particular city to fingerprint and deport irregular migrants and “failed” asylum seekers, and when used in “stop and search” inspired strategies of the West Yorkshire Police. I will then argue that the different human and nonhuman entities of the biometric assemblage come together as a “virtual bordering” that counts as a form of exclusion and harm in that it a) prevents free movement of certain undesirable migrants compared to those privileged subjects carrying desirable passports who flow easily across borders; and b) isolates them within the cities, town, villages in which they live. Ultimately, the processes of identification constituting biometric technologies lead to exclusion and harm by separating out individuals from a wider community, denying them certain types of access and doing material damage to the migrants affected by this.
