DHS/USCIS/PIA-081 United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Information Data Share

On January 9, 2019, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to share biometric and associated biographic data on refugees seeking to resettle in the United States. DHS and UNHCR entered into this MOU to expand the scope of the existing information shared through the State Department to support the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP). Under the 2019 MOU, UNHCR is now directly sharing biometric and associated biographic information with DHS Office of Biometric Identity Management (OBIM) Automated Biometric Identification System (IDENT) (soon to be replaced by Homeland Advanced Recognition Technology (HART)). The electronic transmission of data between UNHCR and IDENT/HART is facilitated by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) Enterprise Service Bus (ESB). USCIS is conducting this Privacy Impact Assessment (PIA) to evaluate the privacy risks associated with collecting and using biometric and associated biographic UNHCR data for identity verification purposes. This PIA is limited to covering the collection and use of UNHCR data for identity verification purposes, as well as to identify any incident of potential identity fraud, by DHS and other entities authorized by the MOU. Any additional uses of UNHCR data will be addressed in a future PIA. August 2019

Associated SORN(s)

• DHS/ALL-041 External Biometric Records
• DHS/USCIS-017 Refugee Case Processing and Security Screening Information