Under the guise of easing congestion, UK air travelers can now look forward to having their faces scanned when they travel by air. The biometric facial scan is yet another in a long line of smoke screens designed to make passengers embrace the illusion of safetyduring travel. One benefit to the scan is the eventual elimination of manual passport screening.
The biometric scan is designed to recognize characteristic points of the face or individual contours of the iris of the eye. With an accuracy rate of 40% or less, many are skeptical that the planed roll out this summer will be viable. In addition to questions of accuracy, there remains some issue with passenger control when or if someone is rejected by the unmanned, fully automated system.
For the scans to work, people would have to have opted for a biometric passport. There is currently a voluntary similar system in place for business travelers in the UK that scans the iris of the eye. The technology in use thus far has not sped up travel for business travelers, and officials fear that implementing the technology this close to peak summer travel may make airline bottlenecks that much worse.
Phil Booth of the No2Id Campaign said: “Someone is extremely optimistic. The technology is just not there. The last time I spoke to anyone in the facial recognition field they said the best systems were only operating at about a 40% success rate in a real time situation. I am flabbergasted they consider doing this at a time when there are so many measures making it difficult for passengers.”
No comments:
Post a Comment