These biometric technology figures cover the measurement periods and populations identified in the available source material. Estimates, surveys and forecasts retain their reported scope.
Key Biometric Technology Statistics
The main findings are:
- An industry estimate placed the global biometrics technology market at $59.31 billion in 2025 (2025 estimate; Global market).
- The most accurate algorithms in the 2018 FRVT failed about 0.25% of FBI mugshot searches.
- In fiscal year 2020, 18 of 24 surveyed U.S. federal agencies reported using facial recognition (FY 2020; 24 CFO Act federal agencies).
- DHS’s legacy IDENT system stored more than 290 million identities in 2023 (2023 report; U.S. DHS IDENT).
- CBP had processed more than 807 million travelers with biometric facial comparison technology by September 2025 (through September 30, 2025; U.S. CBP).
- In the Smart Borders interim survey, 80% of border guards were more confident in the added value of biometric equipment (2015 interim pilot; Participating EU border guards).
- The 2018 FRVT tested 127 algorithms from 39 commercial developers and one university (FRVT submissions).
- NIST reported facial-recognition accuracy improved by up to 30% between its 2010 and 2013 tests (2010-2013; NIST FRVT).
- Sixteen of 24 surveyed agencies used facial recognition for digital access or cybersecurity (FY 2020; U.S. federal agencies).
- HART’s 2022 rebaseline increased estimated program costs by $354 million (U.S. DHS HART).
- CBP used facial biometrics for U.S. exit at 57 airports by September 2025.
- In the same interim survey, 82% of border guards found the proposed biometric technology user-friendly (2015 interim pilot; Participating EU border guards).
- The 2018 FRVT used 26 million mugshot images representing 12 million individuals (FBI-provided mugshot dataset).
- In one-to-one verification, false-positive rates across demographic groups often varied by factors of 10 to more than 100 (2019 study; NIST-tested algorithms and demographic groups).
- About 60,000 facial-recognition searches were conducted without training requirements in place (Oct 2019-Mar 2022; Selected U.S. agencies with available data).
Contents
- Key Biometric Technology Statistics
- Biometric technology statistics: market scale and measurement basics
- Facial recognition accuracy and demographic performance statistics
- Federal agency adoption and law-enforcement use of biometric technology
- Fingerprint and facial biometric identity-system scale statistics
- Border-control biometric technology adoption and traveler outcomes
- Biometric technology participation, acceptance and operational trends
Biometric technology statistics: market scale and measurement basics
- An industry estimate placed the global biometrics technology market at $59.31 billion in 2025 (2025 estimate; Global market). (Facial Recognition Technology (Part III):…)
- The 2018 FRVT tested 127 algorithms from 39 commercial developers and one university (FRVT submissions). (Facial Recognition Technology (Part III):…)
- The 2018 FRVT used 26 million mugshot images representing 12 million individuals (FBI-provided mugshot dataset). (Facial Recognition Technology (Part III):…)
- The 2019 FRVT evaluated 189 algorithms from 99 developers (NIST FRVT). (Facial Recognition Technology (Part III):…)
- The 2019 FRVT demographic analysis covered 18.27 million images of 8.49 million people (Four operational photo collections). (Facial Recognition Technology (Part III):…)
Industry estimate cited by NIST; not a government market census.
Evaluation participants are not all deployed products.
Dataset is mugshots and does not represent every operational image condition.
Algorithm evaluation count, not installed-system count.
Collections came from State Department, DHS and FBI databases.
Facial recognition accuracy and demographic performance statistics
- The most accurate algorithms in the 2018 FRVT failed about 0.25% of FBI mugshot searches. (Facial Recognition Technology (Part III):…)
- NIST reported facial-recognition accuracy improved by up to 30% between its 2010 and 2013 tests (2010-2013; NIST FRVT). (Facial Recognition Technology (Part III):…)
- In one-to-one verification, false-positive rates across demographic groups often varied by factors of 10 to more than 100 (2019 study; NIST-tested algorithms and demographic groups). (Facial Recognition Technology (Part III):…)
- In one-to-one verification, false-negative rates often varied by factors below 3 across demographics (2019 study; NIST-tested algorithms and demographic groups). (Facial Recognition Technology (Part III):…)
- NIST reports the ANSI/NIST-ITL biometric data-exchange standard is used in 160 countries (as reported 2019; International law-enforcement biometric exchange). (Facial Recognition Technology (Part III):…)
Applies to the most accurate algorithms and mugshot conditions, not all systems.
Improvement range across tested algorithms; not a universal accuracy percentage.
Often-varied range across algorithms and groups; not a single pooled rate.
Algorithm-specific and generally smaller than false-positive differentials.
NIST statement concerns standard use, not population coverage.
Federal agency adoption and law-enforcement use of biometric technology
- In fiscal year 2020, 18 of 24 surveyed U.S. federal agencies reported using facial recognition (FY 2020; 24 CFO Act federal agencies). (Facial Recognition Technology: Current and…)
- Sixteen of 24 surveyed agencies used facial recognition for digital access or cybersecurity (FY 2020; U.S. federal agencies). (Facial Recognition Technology: Current and…)
- About 60,000 facial-recognition searches were conducted without training requirements in place (Oct 2019-Mar 2022; Selected U.S. agencies with available data). (Facial Recognition Technology: Federal Law…)
Agency survey; reported use is not transaction volume or effectiveness.
Reported agency use; categories can overlap.
Approximately reported; only agencies with available data.
Fingerprint and facial biometric identity-system scale statistics
- DHS’s legacy IDENT system stored more than 290 million identities in 2023 (2023 report; U.S. DHS IDENT). (Biometric Identity System: DHS Needs…)
- HART’s 2022 rebaseline increased estimated program costs by $354 million (U.S. DHS HART). (Biometric Identity System: DHS Needs…)
- The HART initial operational capability moved from December 31, 2020 to September 30, 2023 between the 2019 and 2022 plans (2019 versus 2022 plans; U.S. DHS HART). (Biometric Identity System: DHS Needs…)
- The 2022 HART plan added 33 months beyond the 2019 plan for initial capabilities (2019-2022 rebaseline; U.S. DHS HART). (Biometric Identity System: DHS Needs…)
- DHS fully implemented 5 of 12 selected HART privacy requirements (2023 review; U.S. DHS HART). (Biometric Identity System: DHS Needs…)
- IDENT stored more than 268 million separate and distinct identities as of April 2021 (U.S. DHS IDENT). (Homeland Security: DHS Needs to…)
- Before the COVID-19 pandemic, IDENT’s fingerprint gallery grew by about 2 million records per month (pre-pandemic; U.S. DHS IDENT). (Homeland Security: DHS Needs to…)
- IDENT processed nearly 350,000 transactions per day on average before the pandemic (pre-pandemic; U.S. DHS IDENT). (Homeland Security: DHS Needs to…)
- The HART program was estimated at $4.3 billion in total cost in 2021 (2021 estimate; U.S. DHS HART). (Homeland Security: DHS Needs to…)
Identity records are not necessarily unique living people or current records.
Change in estimate, not final realized cost.
Schedule plans, not actual delivery dates.
GAO-reported schedule extension; complete-program date was not planned.
Selected requirements, not all privacy controls.
System identities are not equivalent to people or transactions.
Approximate historical rate; gallery records are not necessarily unique people.
Average reported by DHS; transaction types are not specified in the cited passage.
Historical estimate later characterized by GAO as unreliable under best-practice review.
Border-control biometric technology adoption and traveler outcomes
- CBP had processed more than 807 million travelers with biometric facial comparison technology by September 2025 (through September 30, 2025; U.S. CBP). (Biometrics: Environments)
- CBP used facial biometrics for U.S. exit at 57 airports by September 2025. (Biometrics: Environments)
- CBP had expanded facial biometrics to 39 U.S. seaports by September 2025. (Biometrics: Environments)
- The Smart Borders pilot tested facial-image enrolment and verification at 10 border-crossing points (2015 pilot; EU Smart Borders pilot). (Smart Borders Pilot Final Report…)
- The Smart Borders pilot reported facial-verification accuracy reaching 93% (2015 pilot; EU border pilot). (Smart Borders Pilot Final Report…)
- False-acceptance rates used in the Smart Borders pilot ranged from 0.1% to 1% (2015 pilot; EU border pilot). (Smart Borders Pilot Final Report…)
Cumulative processing count; not necessarily unique travelers or successful matches.
Airport count, not passenger volume.
Location count, not usage rate.
Pilot locations and equipment; not EU-wide operational performance.
Pilot result; conditions, equipment and success definition are specific to the test.
Rates used for the pilot and do not establish universal biometric performance.
Biometric technology participation, acceptance and operational trends
- In the Smart Borders interim survey, 80% of border guards were more confident in the added value of biometric equipment (2015 interim pilot; Participating EU border guards). (Smart Borders Pilot Final Report…)
- In the same interim survey, 82% of border guards found the proposed biometric technology user-friendly (2015 interim pilot; Participating EU border guards). (Smart Borders Pilot Final Report…)
- Traveler satisfaction in the interim Smart Borders pilot was 92% at air borders (2015 interim pilot; Participating air-border travelers). (Smart Borders Pilot Final Report…)
- Traveler satisfaction in the interim Smart Borders pilot was 87% at land borders (2015 interim pilot; Participating land-border travelers). (Smart Borders Pilot Final Report…)
- Traveler satisfaction in the interim Smart Borders pilot was 88% at sea borders (2015 interim pilot; Participating sea-border travelers). (Smart Borders Pilot Final Report…)
- In the EU pilot evidence summarized by EUR-Lex, 46.6% of respondents trusted biometric technology to always identify them properly (2015 pilot survey; Third-country-national travelers in EU pilot). (Smart Borders Pilot Final Report…)
- In the same survey, 20.8% tended to have no trust that biometric technology would always identify them properly (2015 pilot survey; Third-country-national travelers in EU pilot). (Smart Borders Pilot Final Report…)
- About 1 in 10 travelers in the EU pilot felt very uncomfortable providing fingerprints or a facial image (2015 pilot survey; Third-country-national travelers in EU pilot). (Smart Borders Pilot Final Report…)
- In the EU pilot, 21.3% felt very uncomfortable with iris scanning (2015 pilot survey; Third-country-national travelers in EU pilot). (Smart Borders Pilot Final Report…)
- In the EU pilot, 38.7% felt comfortable providing fingerprints and 39.6% felt comfortable providing a facial image (2015 pilot survey; Third-country-national travelers in EU pilot). (Smart Borders Pilot Final Report…)
Interim pilot survey; sample and field sites are limited.
Interim pilot survey; not all border guards.
Pilot survey and stated satisfaction measure, not system accuracy.
Pilot survey and stated satisfaction measure.
Survey result summarized in EU legal document; trust is not measured accuracy.
Trust response, not a technical error rate.
Approximate survey summary; applies to the pilot population.
Survey response, not a rejection or failure rate.
Comfort categories are survey responses and should not be treated as adoption.