BANGKOK, Oct. 9 (Xinhua) -- The Thai Immigration Bureau on Wednesday announced that the newly installed biometric system had helped airport and border immigration officials detect over 45,000 foreigners overstaying their visas.
The biometric identification system went into effect nationwide on July 1, 2019.
Immigration Bureau Commissioner Pol Lt Gen Sompong Chingduang told the media on Wednesday that the biometric system contributed to identifying and verifying foreigners who were blacklisted and using fake passports.
"Since trialing the biometric system in June 2019 and then going effective from July 1, 2019, over 45,000 foreigners had been arrested for overstaying their visas thanks to the biometrics system," said Sompong. "The arrests also resulted in 90 million baht (2.968 million U.S. dollars) in fines."
The commissioner said the new biometrics system had helped Thailand improve its security measures to meet the international standard.
The Thai Immigration Bureau has invested 2.16 billion baht (71.2 million U.S. dollars) for the biometric system used in identifying a person by matching fingerprints and faces.
About 2,000 biometric scanners have been installed in 170 immigration checkpoints including airports, sea and land border safety services.
