Keeping an eye on travelers in approaching vehicles while locating and manually entering license plate numbers is a particularly challenging task for Customs inspectors. Correct entry of these plates is critical in ensuring they are crosschecked in the Treasury Enforcement Communications System (TECS) and the National Crime Information Center (NCIC) databases for possible matches with potential criminal suspects. While inspectors have an excellent record of meeting this challenge, Customs continues to search for ways to make our data more accurate and the inspector's job safer - the latest development toward that goal is the Customs License Plate Readers (LPR) System. | | Photo Credit: James Tourtellotte |
| Supervisory Customs Inspector Joseph Misenhelter and Under Secretary for Enforcement Jimmy Gurule observe traffic passing through the LPRs.
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Manual entry of plates compromises eye contact with approaching traffic. With the LPR reading and recording vehicle plates, the Customs inspector can give more attention to other vital border inspection duties like maintaining eye contact with the vehicle, and its occupants. Years in development, the LPR has demonstrated reading accuracy of over 90 percent of vehicle license plates, whether traffic is incoming or outgoing. The LPR includes five different components that help capture license plate data and convert it to an electronic format to cross check the TECS and NCIC databases for possible record matches. On average, the complete process takes less than a second. To date, 281 LPRs have been installed and are operating along the Northern and Southern borders. How an LPR works: - Two pairs of infrared detectors sense when vehicles approach the inbound or outbound vehicle inspection lanes. The first sensor pair locates the front of the vehicle and triggers the front camera and illuminator. The second sensor pair does the same for the rear of the vehicle.
- A compact strobe illuminator system produces a short flash that lights up the license plate. The illuminator is synchronized to the shutter of the camera and is largely invisible to the naked eye.
- Housed in a bullet-resistant casing, a video camera reads the license plate. Its variable shutter speed is sensitive enough to trigger in 1/10,000th of a second and provide fast and reliable license plate reading.
- A processor distinguishes between license plates issued by all U.S. and Mexican states, and Canadian provinces.
- A protocol converter then allows the LPR to interface with TECS and NCIC to identify possible record matches.
- The extracted data is sent to TECS along with the lane identifier. The TECS response is then displayed on the primary terminal, just as if entered manually. LPR captures the plate and the response before the vehicle is anywhere near the primary inspector.
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