by mapi
A recent article in CBS Los Angeles revealed that the Los Angeles International Airport will allow airline passengers to check their own luggage using self-service kiosks.
“Available in Aisles B and C of the ticketing lobby, the self-service system can be used by passengers flying with Asiana, Cathay Pacific, Lufthansa and Norwegian airlines, with Scandinavian Airlines scheduled to be added. The pilot will later expand to also include Air France/KLM, ANA, British Airways, Korean Airlines, Singapore Airlines and EVA.”
A Los Angeles World Airports news release revealed that self-service luggage kiosks would probably also use facial recognition to identify airline passengers.
“The equipment is capable of using additional biometric technology, such as facial recognition, which may be tested later on.”
Despite being purposely vague about how self-service luggage kiosks are being used to identify airline passenger they did at least acknowledge that they plan to use facial recognition.
None of the articles identify who the manufacturer of these kiosk is, however I think I may have figured it out.
A likely culprit is SITA Aero who sells “Drop&Fly” kiosks to airports around the world. Once a passenger checks their luggage at Drop&Fly kiosks, SITA Aero has numerous ways to identify airline passengers as the video below explains.
Airline passengers will be prompted to scan their passports or Real-ID’s until the TSA begins using facial recognition.
A TSA news release revealed how airlines use “Smiths Detection” to scan and identify individual passengers’ luggage.
“TSA is testing a computed tomography (CT) scanner to screen passengers’ carry-on luggage. The unit, which creates a 3-D image of the contents of the bag, is being tested in one lane at the checkpoint. The other technology in use is Credential Authentication Technology (CAT), which allows TSA to validate the security features of a passenger’s photo identification and match that information against the Secure Flight vetting system.” (To find out more about Smiths Detection CT scanners click here.)
The Department of Homeland Security and the TSA is so fixated on using facial recognition to identify airline passengers that they are hosting the “2020 Biometric Rally” which is specifically designed to use facial recognition to identify individuals in airports.
“The 2020 Biometric Technology Rally creates a new technical challenge for industry: reliably identifying small, free-flowing groups of individuals in crowded environments, like airports or ports of entry.”
The whole purpose of DHS’s 2020 Privacy Technology Demonstration is to figure out how companies and people are defeating facial recognition.
“Now it’s time to take the training wheels off and see how well these systems deal with more realistic conditions—identifying groups of people that opt-in to using the system, while avoiding bystanders in a crowded environment who have not opted-in. We believe that this structured scenario will challenge the biometrics industry to continuously innovate for the benefit of travelers and DHS stakeholders” Arun Vemury, Director of DHS S&T’s Biometric and Identity Technology Center said.
Using DHS’s own words, they will use what they learn to “provide feedback to industry participants to accelerate and improve product capabilities, and guide researchers to enable the development of next generation capabilities.”
Meaning, DHS’s Biometric and Identity Technology Center is constantly devising new ways to use facial recognition to identify everyone.
When airports use TSA Precheck facial recognition, it is not to speed up check-in lines as they would have you believe. The reality of facial recognition is much darker: it is being used to track and identify individuals.