Facial Recognition Pilot Project at Madrid Airport to be Extended for Contactless Passenger Experience

The national airports authority AENA is part of the consortium which includes Iberia, Inetum, and Thales, which is to carry out an R+D project with the aim of seeking new ways to operate in the air travel industry with the new health measures imposed since the Covid-19 outbreak.

The proposed project allows the biometric detection of passengers thanks to the use of tablet-type mobile equipment, which will improve their airport experience by streamlining the entire process and elimination all physical contact, enhancing still further the safety of all airport procedures.

The use of such mobile equipment also incorporates the concept of mobility, meaning that a limited number of units will be sufficient to deal with a large number of flights to different destinations. In addition, the system boasts improved detection capabilities, making it possible to identify passengers even when they are wearing face masks.

The initiative is being supported by the CDTI, Spain’s industrial technology development agency, through a research and development cooperation programme, thus contributing to the improvement of the technological level and the digitisation of Spanish enterprises via the development of innovative ideas.

For this R+D programme, in compliance wither the new measures of contactless security, the facial recognition programme deployed at the Adolfo Suarez Madrid-Barajas Airport, now in the pilot project stage, will serve in the development of new functionalities, integrating them into a single listing process by means of a dedicated application and security and boarding controls.

With this aim, leading companies in their respective industries have joined to achieve the necessary development and validation Iberia, as and airline, Inetum, as a systems integration company, Thales, as a provider of biometric technologies and identity validation processes, and AENA, as operator of Spanish airports, with responsibility for the intermediate integration systems between airline and biometric engine.