Foreigners arriving in Japan will be photographed and fingerprinted on arrival as part of measures to prevent terrorism, under a measure approved by Japan's parliament today.
Civic groups and lawyers have said the legislation, approved by parliament's upper house, risks breaching human rights and invading individuals' privacy.
The new legislation, which had previously passed the lower house and now becomes law, exempts children under 16, diplomats and "special permanent residents" including ethnic Koreans.
It allows Japan to deport any arriving foreigner it considers to be a terrorist, and requires planes and ships arriving in Japan to submit lists of passengers before arrival.
The starting date for such mandatory fingerprinting will be determined under a separate government ordinance, Kyodo news agency said.
In a sign of the bill's controversial nature, a pro-South Korea group that aims to promote the rights of Korean residents in Japan expressed "strong regret" at the bill's passage.
"Although special permanent residents are exempted, the revised bill could pose a danger in Japanese society of encouraging a trend to view all foreigners as if they were criminals and we have been strongly opposed," the Korean Residents Union in Japan said in a statement.
Japan's Federation of Bar Associations had called for the bill to be scrapped, saying fingerprinting foreigners violates a constitutional requirement to treat people with respect.
A police report in December said Japan was at risk of attack because of its close links with the United States. Fingerprinting and photographs were introduced at US immigration checkpoints in 2004.
But the issue is a particularly sensitive one in Japan, where local governments were long required to fingerprint all resident foreigners, including "special permanent residents" of Korean and Chinese descent.
Many of these residents are descendants of those brought to Japan as forced labour before and during World War Two. Local government fingerprinting was halted in 2000.