Originally Posted by
ffsim
You're not going to get an argument from me on that.
Again, it just doesn't sound terribly unreasonable to implement reasonable measures to ensure the person you've granted a visa to is the person you're letting into the country. In addition to a picture (which is pretty standard for many visa applications) there's a requirement to give your fingerprint (which is pretty standard on e-passports).
It's very unreasonable (to demand biometrics such as fingerprints along with other biodata) when governments are poor masters of privacy rights and such demanded information can be misused by those who get this info and missuse the info by doing so without the consent of the target of biometric capture. And to require this of visitors rather than citizens (in the case of Canadians and Americans) is because this all would risk an end the moment there is massive documented fraud where the fraud used stolen government-captured biometric data to create a massive mess for a bunch of Americans or Canadians. Note whose exempted from biometric capture on arrival in the U.S. and probably in Canada too.
Can't wait to see what the cyber-thieves do with US OPM records for a few million people when they get their non-face biometric data too. Massive ID theft related concerns is eventually going to make the government's target citizens of Canada and the U.S. too. Then the government will mismanage that data too. And then, voilą.