Starting today, December 1, the Ministry of Civil Aviation introduces a new digital service to provide paperless entry at airports. It is a biometric-based computerised processing system for flight travellers known as Digi Yatra. In order to automatically process passenger information at checkpoints including entrance point check, security check, and aircraft boarding, the service uses facial recognition technology.
Digi Yatra is a new facial recognition boarding service introduced by the government at major airports. The technology will help in initiating paperless processing of passengers at airport checkpoints and along with self-bag drop and check-in service and facial recognition to identify pax and data recall. So, now passengers travelling by air will not have to carry their ID card and boarding pass for the boarding process.
The aviation ministry is launching the paper-less travel system in phases for domestic flight passengers. For the first phase, the service has been launched at seven airports. Starting today, the service is available at three airports — Delhi, Bengaluru, and Varanasi. By March 2023, Digi Yatra will be live in four more airports, including – Hyderabad, Kolkata, Pune, and Vijayawada. Subsequently, the government will rollout the technology across the country.
The Digi-Yatri smartphone app must be used by travellers to scan the QR code on their boarding pass to create travel documents using their Aadhaar and submit a photo of themselves.
When they scan their boarding card at the airport, the e-gate will take a picture of them and compare it to the data they submitted.
After the passenger’s identity has been confirmed, the gates will open, allowing them to go to the security checkpoint and boarding gate, where their face will once again be taken. The passenger can proceed and board the aircraft after verification.
The project’s main idea is that travellers would be able to pass through multiple checkpoints at airports using paperless and contactless processing, establishing their identification by using facial features that might be connected to their boarding permit.
