Facial recognition technology at 4 airports to be introduced by March next year: Centre

Facial Recognition Technology (FRT) has not yet been introduced at any of the airports in India, replied Minister of State in the Ministry of Civil Aviation General V K Singh (retd) to a question in Lok Sabha on Thursday.

The question was asked by MPs Feroze Varun Gandhi and Ram Shankar Katheria. Singh said FRT has not yet been introduced at any of the airports in India. However, the Airports Authority of India (AAI) is working on a project of FRT-based Biometric Boarding System as part of the first phase of Digi Yatra Implementation at four Airports (Varanasi, Pune, Kolkata, and Vijayawada).

He added that the proposed Digi Yatra Central Eco-system is planned to go live in March 2022. It is to be scaled up in a phased manner for adoption across various airports of the country.

On being asked about the safeguards taken by the Government to prevent the leakage of passenger data, he said that as per the Digi Yatra policy, registering for the Digi Yatra Central Ecosystem is optional to the passenger. For availing the Digi Yatra services, passengers would send the travel details (Pax details, PNR and Facial Biometrics) through an app to the Biometric Boarding System of the respective departing airport.

Moreover, if for a particular journey, the passenger does not want to avail the Digi Yatra services then the passenger has an option to not send the data and use the existing manual process at airports.

Consult our source for more details: https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/industry/transportation/airlines-/-aviation/facial-recognition-technology-at-4-airports-to-be-introduced-by-march-next-year-centre/articleshow/88049590.cms