Bersin: Air manifest system ready for advance data

Bersin: Air manifest system ready for advance data    U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Alan Bersin said his agency is able to process advance air cargo manifests sooner than currently required, but a former high-ranking official says new demands may require an accelerated timeline for modernizing the automated systems used to crunch that data for potential threats.

Bersin

   'The agency needs to get more information earlier and run it through a targeting system that has robust, advanced analytics so that it becomes a decision-support tool for a trained analyst,' Jayson Ahern, who retired last December as acting commissioner of CBP, told AmericanShipper.com on the sidelines of a freight transportation conference in Fort Lauderdale last week.
   The Department of Homeland Security, which includes CBP, is studying how to obtain pre-departure information from airlines to improve aviation security in the wake of last month's parcel-bomb plot from Yemen.
   Under current rules, air carriers must electronically submit advance manifest data to CBP four hours prior to arrival, or at 'wheels up' in North and South America above the equator. The manifest data includes the master and house air waybill numbers for consolidated shipments, the trip or flight number, carrier code, airport of arrival, airport of origin, scheduled data of arrival, total quantity of units, total weight, a precise cargo description, shipper name and address, and consignee name and address.
   CBP processes the data through its Automated Targeting System to look for anomalies by matching it against a set of risk-based rules and intelligence. Cargo that is determined to be high-risk is examined upon arrival in the United States.
   Department of Homeland Security officials have stated they are working with the air cargo industry to transmit the data sometime before departure so inspections can take place at origin, although they and industry representatives acknowledge that all the data may not be readily available then due to the expedited nature of the air transport sector. The government is also looking at whether additional information can be obtained from carriers to supplement the manifest.

Ahern

   Ahern, now a principal at the Chertoff Group, said CBP needs to re-evaluate whether the schedule for deploying a new automated manifest system for air needs to be moved up the priority scale in light of the current circumstances.
   The Automated Commercial Environment (ACE) is a massive information technology overhaul of CBP's legacy system that supports the agency's trade processing and security functions. The ACE development has been underway for almost a decade, but has been slowed by mismanagement and technical issues. The current system processes vessel, rail, truck and air manifests, but all the manifest systems eventually are to be upgraded and transferred over to ACE. The new system also will serve as a communication portal with the trade community and consolidate all the programs so that border officers can see data about shipments or importers on one screen.
   'Is the Automated Manifest System robust enough to capture all the information the agency will need and in the time they will need it, or does the development and deployment of the new release need to be moved up sooner rather than later?' Ahern said.
   An accelerated modernization schedule for air manifest may require Congress to restore some of the money that was recently cut from the ACE program, Ahern suggested. CBP's fiscal year 2011 budget cuts $75 million from ACE compared to the 2010 appropriation from Congress. The drop from $228 million to $153 million follows another $75 million funding drop the year before.
   If the current system doesn't efficiently and accurately accommodate pre-departure manifest data then CBP needs to make a case for accelerating the air manifest development, Ahern said.
   But Bersin said the agency plans to stick with its schedule of rolling out vessel and rail manifest functionality, followed by cargo release, before deploying the new air manifest.
   'The development of protocols with regard to air cargo is a higher priority than actually getting it to the single portal,' Bersin said during an interview in his office at CBP headquarters in Washington.
   CBP and Transportation Security Administration officials are trying to determine what new data would provide security benefits, when to transmit it, how Customs officers would go about alerting airlines overseas to hold a shipment, and how it would be inspected, among other issues.
   'The important priority that the trade has pointed out to us is that we actually get the cargo release part of this done,' Bersin said. 'We think the trade is the better source of priorities than us deciding that because of this Yemen event we should change the priority.'
   Many experts within and outside DHS say that new security-related functions added to the ACE development program after the 9/11 terror attacks contributed to the system's cost overruns and delays.
   'We'll have that system (air manifest) in any event. We collect that data now with regard to advance passenger information. So we have the IT capacity to certainly receive the data. The key is whether or not it's through the ACE portal. We think we can eventually, easily incorporate that information flow into the ACE portal.
   'The important thing is restoring the public's, and particularly the trade's, faith in ACE,' Bersin said. ' Eric Kulisch