The Government has launched a drive to ensure Britain protects "one of the toughest borders in the world".

Almost all visitors to Britain will be counted in and out of the country and checked against security "watch-lists" by 2014, it was announced.

The checks, part of the Government's £1.2 billion electronic e-Borders system, will apply to more than 99 per cent of visitors from outside the European economic area by 2010 and extended to include Europeans by 2014.

Passengers whose names come up as security risks will be placed on "no-fly" lists and banned from flying into the UK.

UK Border Agency is also piloting new technology at Manchester Airport that will use facial recognition scanners to compare people's faces with biometric passports.

The e-Borders system, which records all travellers' names, nationalities and dates of birth gathered from passports checks, has already screened 50 million passengers, leading to more than 2,000 arrests.

Home Secretary Jacqui Smith said: "The UK has one of the toughest borders in the world and we are determined to ensure it stays that way.

"Our hi-tech electronic borders system will allow us to count all foreign nationals in and out of the UK, while checking them against watch-lists.

"These checks make up just one part of Britain's triple ring of security, alongside fingerprint visas for three-quarters of the world's population, and the roll-out of ID cards for foreign nationals locking people to one identity."

© Independent Television News Limited 2009. All rights reserved.