World’s first airport to require biometric boarding to reach in 2025

As end-of-summer travel lines back up at TSA airport checkpoints within the U.S., one overseas airport goes all-in on a biometric passenger experience. The Smart Travel Project at Zayed International Airport in Abu Dhabi will involve biometric sensors at every airport identification checkpoint by 2025.

Airport security and travel experts have generally cheered the move.

“They’re boldly moving forward in adopting facial recognition because the means to let travelers into their system, and I commend them for doing it,” said Sheldon Jacobson, an engineering and computer science professor on the University of Illinois. Jacobson has been studying airport security because the Nineteen Nineties and helped the TSA develop its pre-screening program, which allows some travelers within the U.S. to skip the checkpoints. “Facial recognition is the long run, and we’ll begin to get intelligent with airport security and concentrate on the traveler relatively than the items they convey. By doing that, you create a special paradigm,” Jacobson said. “What they’re doing in Abu Dhabi is just the start, however it has to start out somewhere.”

Going completely paperless from the parking garage to your seat-back tray table is unnerving to some who wonder if a Crowdstrike-type outage could bring down fully electronic boarding systems and grind travel to a halt. But Jacobson says those are very rare events, and even when the system completely shut down due to an outage, the web advantages of a biometric travel experience over time will outweigh the prices.

Zayed International Airport’s program relies on a partnership with the federal government. The UAE’s Federal Authority for Identity, Citizenship, Customs & Port Security collects biometrics from any traveler arriving within the UAE for the primary time. The airport then uses this database to confirm passengers passing checkpoints. The airport didn’t reply to a request for comment on its plans. Saeed Saif Al Khaili, General Director on the United Arab Emirate’s Federal Authority for Identity, Citizenship, Customs, and Port Security, said in a recent press release that the Biometric Smart Travel project “goals to boost the travel experience at Zayed International Airport from curb to gate, ensuring high levels of safety and security.”

Jacobson says the TSA tends to maneuver more slowly and incrementally on changes, and that the UAE’s political system allows for faster implementation of programs, so this all-encompassing collection of biometric data likely would not fly within the U.S., at the least not now. Every time recent biometric programs are introduced, he said, there’s “tremendous pushback.”

Still, the U.S. public appears to be getting more comfortable with usage of biometrics at airports.

In keeping with data analytics firm J.D. Power and Associates, a majority (53%) of those surveyed at major U.S. airports say biometrics in airports are an excellent idea or they’re willing to make use of a biometric security check. An extra 12% say they’re an excellent idea but have privacy concerns.

Among the many concerns expressed are what sort of data someone would want to offer in the course of the biometric enrollment process, and whether biometric security processes can be used to trace movements throughout the airport, or if biometric data can be used outside the airport.

“To make the technology more widespread and permit airports and travelers to reap the benefits of it, airports should establish clear guidelines and processes and make travelers aware of potential uses. Buy-in from travelers is crucial,” says Mike Taylor, J.D. Power’s senior managing director of travel, hospitality, and retail.

Shawn DuBravac, futurist and creator of “Digital Destiny: How the Latest Age of Data Will Transform the Way We Work, Live, and Communicate,” said he believes biometrics will transform travel. “While we have seen growing use of biometric sensors to streamline travel, the vision of a totally paperless experience by next 12 months is incredibly ambitious,” he said.

Travel veterans generally agree that some facets of biometrics can be involved in future airport visits if they don’t seem to be already. DuBravac sees biometrics at airports within the U.S. used as a tool to make the human element more responsive.

“As an alternative of managing mundane tasks like document verification, personnel can provide higher levels of customer support, assist travelers with special needs, and be certain that the general passenger experience is efficient and welcoming. Automating routine processes will empower a more human experience,” he said.

Billionaire Elon Musk lauded Zayed’s innovation, commenting on X in response to a video that showed a traveler breezing through check-in on the Abu Dhabi airport that the U.S. must “catch up.”

“Musk’s comments are near wishful pondering,” said Irina Tsukerman, a national security lawyer and fellow on the Arabian Peninsula Institute. She noted that privacy concerns and costs would likely prevent the implementation of an entire biometric airport experience within the U.S.

“This worked in Abu Dhabi because UAE is a small, wealthy monarchy with a high degree of population trust in the federal government and sufficient resources to devote to technical innovation,”  Tsukerman said. The identical ingredients aren’t in place within the U.S. “Transition to full automation for all eligible travelers can be time-consuming, onerous, expensive, and meet resistance from airport employee unions,” she said.

Despite Musk dinging U.S. airports, it is different from there’s not a biometric presence in america.

In 2018, LAX became one in all the primary airports in america to pilot biometric boarding, and today, it’s used as an option for qualifying passengers.

“At LAX, we use biometrics to support our airline partners and federal authorities to hurry up the means of boarding international departing flights,” said Ian Law, chief digital transformation officer, Los Angeles World Airports, which incorporates LAX. There are as much as 4 biometric lanes at each international departure gate and facial recognition technology will be used to do touchless, paperless traveler verification.

“Airlines are in a position to significantly reduce the time needed to board a flight, cutting the time travelers stand in line,” Law said.

While no U.S. airports are near Abu Dhabi’s goal of a very biometric airport, loads of airports in america at the least use some biometrics. In keeping with the TSA, its PreCheck option is currently available at greater than 200 airports with over 90 participating airlines nationwide and has a voluntary facial recognition component. To be approved for PreCheck, participants fill out a web-based form, pay a fee, undergo a background check, an in-person interview, and might opt-in for a facial recognition scan.

Clear, a publicly trading company, has also made inroads into greater than 55 U.S. airports, allowing those that pay a fee and undergo prescreening to skip the lines and board biometrically. The service has made some lawmakers balk at making a tiered system of travelers, and in California a gaggle of lawmakers tried – but failed — earlier this 12 months to limit Clear.

Travel technology provider Amadeus is just not involved within the Abu Dhabi airport’s biometric program but has them at other airports, equivalent to Dubai, Vancouver, Perth, and London’s Heathrow airport. Chris Keller, vp of airport and airline operations at Amadeus, says that for the foreseeable future, airports will give you the option to implement paper backups if there’s a technological issue. “We expect increasing numbers of passengers to make use of biometrics, but there’ll at all times be a gaggle, perhaps people who need special assistance or premium passengers, who will select an agent-assisted experience and like a paper document,” Keller said.

Jacobson says that would-be criminals can be thwarted by the indisputable fact that their faces can be known in a biometric airport system. “Once the person is understood this has a deterrence effect and drives down the chance,” he said. But he also indicated that Musk’s comments lack proper context. “It is just not that we’re behind, that is an incremental means of growth and development,” he said. “We can’t get there this week. It takes a certain quantity of will and proof of concept.”

For instance, when PreCheck in was rolled out in 2011 it had taken eight years from proposal to implementation.

“Individuals are uncomfortable with change, anytime you make changes we’ve got to do it more efficiently, more securely and fewer intrusively,” Jacobson said.

Within the U.S., it’ll probably be awhile until getting from terminal check-in to airplane seat involves just showing your face.