Eight international airports in Australia will install biometric egates for departures from Vision-Box.
The 92 ABC eGates will be installed in departure terminals within Australia’s eight international airports, allowing users to scan their passport and continue through rather than approach an immigration official for processing.
The installation will take place between June 2015 and July 2016.
The eight airports are: Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide, Gold Coast, Cairns and Darwin.
Australia has been using Smartgates for arrivals since 2007 but the process in now seen to be a bit dated. Passengers have to go to a kiosk to get a ticket that shows they are eligible to use the Smartgates and then they use the ticket to gain entrance to the Smartgate.
The arrivals SmartGates are from Morpho so this is a significant success by Vision-Box.
How it works
The new process is simple:
- the first step is to present the ePassport – to be automatically authenticated
- the second step is to look at a camera, the face image is captured and matched against the biometric data stored in the document
The new egates promise performance and reliability improvements, and cut out the ‘kiosk’ stage of the process which continues to require arriving passengers to line up to get a ticket before proceeding to the smartgate itself.
While the identity of the passenger is being verified at the departures SmartGate, Border Protection Officers will be monitoring the information in real-time, whether through a stationary border control station or mobile devices, which will display any alerts to facilitate a prompt reaction by the Officers to imminent threats.
According to Custom’s smartgate privacy policy, the biometric data captured by the machines can be exchanged with a range of Australian security agencies such as the AFP, state and territory police, the Department of Agriculture, the Department of the Environment, AUSTRAC, and overseas customs and immigration authorities, among others.
Jean-François Lennon, Vision-Box’s Vice-President for Global Business Development & Sales:
“The implementation of a new generation of Automated Border Control technology is a great step forward for Australia, meaning a boost in the country’s national security measures at departures, adopting a hassle-free approach. Furthermore, by monitoring borders through the extended use of facial recognition, taking full advantage of our last generation passenger-centric solution, controlled through user-focused supervision software, Border Protection Officers may focus on added-value duties, such as profiling and surveilling high-risk travellers. This not only enhances national security but creates more effective and efficient processes. Of course, not to mention the users: travellers will certainly notice the difference, taking advantage of a happy flow when leaving Australia!”
There are no current nationality exclusions. Most passengers will be able to use the departures SmartGates.
Due to the design of the departures SmartGates, passengers must be a minimum height of 120cm and able to understand and follow the processes without assistance.
In order to deploy this world reference project, Vision-Box®, as prime contractor, counts on the collaboration with service partners IBM Australia and ESP Global Services.
