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The head of the UK Border Force has told the Times that – inspired by advanced border control technology in use elsewhere in the world – new e-gates will be installed that allow arrivals into the UK using only facial recognition.
Under this plan, passengers arriving in UK airports will not be required to present their passports to cross the border.
In an interview with the Times, Phil Douglas, director-general of Border Force, set out his aim to create an “intelligent” UK border, which uses “much more frictionless facial recognition”.
At present, there are more than 270 e-gates installed at 15 UK air and rail ports, including Heathrow, Manchester and Gatwick airports. Although originally restricted to UK and EU arrivals, e-gates have since been extended to include arrivals from many other countries. They compare data stored on a chip integrated into the passport with a photograph or fingerprint taken at the gate to verify the passport holder’s identify.
These e-gates – which have suffered a few high-profile failures, including an outage during the May bank holiday last year – will be replaced with more advanced e-gates capable of verifying the identity of arrivals using facial recognition alone. The new gates promise to be faster and more secure than their predecessors.
Douglas spoke about his experience using the more advanced e-gates when entering Australia, which left him “really impressed” by the technology.
“I had to apply for an electronic travel authorisation in advance and used my smartphone to read the chip in my passport,” he told the Times. “That sent the image of me in the chip to the Australian authorities. When I arrived in Australia, I didn’t even have to get my passport out of my bag. It is a really interesting concept.”
Trials of the new e-gates are likely to begin in airports this year ahead of launching a full procurement process.
According to Douglas, the use of legacy passport desks, at which the identity of arrivals is verified manually, will probably “fall away” in the next two to three years as a consequence of the new e-gates and the ability to target people of interest to authorities.
In his prominent role at the helm of Border Force, Douglas has reflected on the relevance of paper passports as biometric technology continues to advance. Last year, he told the Airport Operators Association that he would like to see “a world of completely frictionless borders where you don’t really need a passport”, although he also acknowledged that there is a public attachment to passports.
Meanwhile, the EU is also in the process of upgrading border security. It is due to introduce its delayed entry/exit system (EES) in October. This is an automated system for registering non-EU passport holders’ data – including biometric data – on their first visit, after which their identity can be verified using this data. EES will replace stamping passports manually.
