Is the world ready to go passport-free in 2024?

The days of suffering when flying are almost over. Thanks to new technology that is making airport immigration easier than ever, the globe is getting ready to say goodbye to the passport age. The United Kingdom’s new Home Office has announced plans to enable “frictionless travel” at Britain’s borders. Let’s take a closer look at the future of seamless travel. The UK’s latest “frictionless travel” plans The UK Home Office has revealed plans to equip airports with new, high-tech e-gates that feature advanced facial recognition technology, according to Dailymail. The government anticipates that this new technology will raise Britain’s border to the level of other developed countries, including Dubai, which employ facial recognition for 50 different nationalities. The new e-gates will go through trials later this year. [caption id=“attachment_13580872” align=“alignnone” width=“640”] Passengers queue inside the departures terminal of Terminal 2 at Heathrow Airport in London, Britain. Reuters[/caption] The aim, according to UK Border Force director-general Phil Douglas, is to establish an “intelligent border” that makes use of “much more frictionless facial recognition than we currently do.” For visitors from abroad who are entering the UK without a visa, Britain has already begun to roll out electronic travel authorisations (ETAs). Per passenger, the scheme costs about Rs 1,000. To board planes into the UK, travellers must download an app, complete a series of questions, scan their passports, and submit a photo. Only those who receive an ETA are permitted to board. In February, citizens of Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan will also be able to utilise the ETA programme, which is now in use for Qataris. The Home Office also wants to introduce ETA for all visitors — including citizens of Europe — to the UK who do not require a visa for brief visits. In order to apply for a UK passport today, tourists who are British or Irish must first provide their biometric information. The UK’s 15 air and rail transport hubs have more than 270 e-gates in place; these will all need to be replaced with the new technology, which officials claim will be more secure and accelerate the processing of passengers. Originally only available to visitors from the UK and the EU, British e-gates are now used by visitors from Canada, Iceland, Japan, New Zealand, Australia, America, and a number of other nations. Countries that use biometric passport clearance As the technology grows in popularity, biometric passport clearance is a trend that will probably start to take off at more airports. The biometric “Smart Gates” tunnels, which employ facial recognition to authenticate travellers’ IDs in as little as five seconds, were launched in 2018 at Dubai International Airport. Instead of using real passports, travellers are also permitted to authenticate themselves using their fingerprints or face scans. However, most of the contactless smart gates at the airport terminals in Dubai still need travellers to scan their passports as they arrive and exit. Because Aruba has digital IDs that meet International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) requirements, travellers can use secure digital versions of their passports on mobile devices. As the number of air travellers is projected to keep growing globally, Singapore also announced plans to introduce automated immigration clearance starting 2024, which will allow passengers to depart the city-state without passports. [caption id=“attachment_13153642” align=“alignnone” width=“640”] Singapore has introduced biometric immigration clearance at its Changi airport starting 2024. Pexels[/caption] “Singapore will be one of the first few countries in the world to introduce automated, passport-free immigration clearance,” Communications Minister Josephine Teo announced during a parliament session, during which several changes to the country’s Immigration Act were passed. Biometric technology, along with facial recognition software, is already in use to some extent in Changi Airport at automated lanes at immigration checkpoints, according to CNN. But the upcoming changes will “reduce the need for passengers to repeatedly present their travel documents at touch points and allow for more seamless and convenient processing.” Facial recognition technology is already in use in some capacity at airports around the world, including those at Hong Kong International Airport, Tokyo Narita, Tokyo Haneda, Indira Gandhi International in Delhi, London Heathrow, and Paris Charles de Gaulle. According to Euro News, in October, Finland became the first country to test digital travel documents. The country launched the trial in partnership with Finnair, the Finnish police and airport operator Finavia. As a trial, it is currently only available for Finnair passengers travelling to or from London, Manchester, or Edinburgh. The Finnish Border Guard noted that the digital passport, known as Digital Travel Credentials (DTC), is a digital version of the physical passport and is equally reliable. Seamless travel is the future The vast majority of travellers support the use of biometrics to simplify airport formalities. As per a poll conducted by the airline trade association IATA in November 2022, “75 per cent of passengers want to use biometric data instead of passports and boarding passes.” Major US airlines, including American Airlines, United, and Delta, have been testing biometric check-in, bag drops, and boarding gates at a few airports for the past few years. However, physical passports will soon be fully phased out. “Today biometrics are attached to the physical document. In the future, people will be able to travel to different countries with digital versions of their passports stored on their mobile devices,” CNN Traveler quoted Jeremy Springall, senior vice president at biometrics firm SITA AT BORDERS as saying. According to a recent study by consulting company Oliver Wyman, “walk-through, contactless immigration” would be available at several airports by 2030. Many airports are expected to base their facial recognition systems on Singapore Changi’s design, according to the report. The UN-run International Civil Aviation Organisation is spearheading the global push to create a common digital identity that will be utilised in conjunction with facial recognition technology at airports. With inputs from agencies