The new biometric system that fingerprints and photographs all incoming foreigners at airports and seaports prevented 846 undesirables from entering the country over the past year, the Immigration Bureau said Friday.
All were forced to leave Japan immediately, immigration official Aiko Oumi said.
The number accounts for 8.5 percent of about 10,000 foreigners whom immigration officers at airports and seaports expel every year after learning, through questioning and other measures, they had criminal records or were involved in illegal acts.