Brisbane Airport trials SITA facial recognition technology

Australia’s Brisbane Airport has launched a trial of facial recognition technology develped in partnership with SITA and Air New Zealand.

The new SITA Smart Path biometrics-based technology allows passengers to present their details at a self-service check-in kiosk and, when ready to board, use an automated boarding gate to verify their identity using face recognition technology to access the aircraft.

Brisbane Airport is the first Australian airport to trial this secure walkthrough experience at check-in and the boarding gate using SITA’s biometric technology, which integrates with the airport’s existing common-use solutions. With SITA Smart Path, once travel documents are linked to the biometric at check-in, the passenger can complete the boarding process without the need to present a boarding pass, a passport or travel documents.

Air New Zealand passengers are the first to trial Smart Path at Brisbane Airport, with plans to expand the service to more international airlines in the coming months.

“A key benefit of working with SITA is its technology integrates with our existing common-use infrastructure – check-in kiosks and boarding gates – and can be used by any airline that operates on a common-use kiosk,” said Roel Hellemons, general manager strategic planning and development, Brisbane Airport Corporation. “As we progress we hope to integrate with various government systems for immigration and border checks.”

Smart Path can be extended throughout the airport to include any processes and checkpoints that require document checks. Over the coming months, Brisbane Airport and SITA will work together to use the technology in a variety of scenarios.

Sumesh Patel, SITA president, Asia Pacific, commented, “Australia has long been recognized as a leader in secure border management and passenger processing. Now Brisbane Airport is leading the way with SITA Smart Path. This is a single, secure, self-service process which simplifies passenger processing for everyone – airlines, airports and border authorities. It is early days at Brisbane Airport but already the response from passengers has been positive.”

SITA Smart Path is unique in the market because it was designed to meet the demands of the world’s airlines for a common-use, biometric, passenger self-service solution. Any airport and any
airline using any common-use platform can use SITA Smart Path.

Last month, Bologna Guglielmo Marconi Airport introduced SITA’s self-serve automated border control gates to speed up the immigration process for passengers from the European Union who hold a biometric passport.

Article Topics

airports  |  Australia  |  biometrics  |  facial recognition  |  SITA