British travellers returning to the UK through 12 major airports, including Cardiff and Bristol, will soon no longer need to scan their passports at e-gates, as UK Border Force rolls out new facial recognition technology.
Manchester Airport recently completed a three-week trial of the new contactless facial recognition e-gates. By early next year, all e-gates at Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Heathrow, Manchester, Edinburgh, Gatwick, Glasgow, London City, Luton, Newcastle, and Stansted airports will feature the upgraded system.
How the new e-gates work
Passengers using the e-gates who have their face captured on camera will not be required to scan their passport. However, they must still carry their passport for check-in and boarding purposes.
The new system works by uploading a digital gallery of arriving passengers' photographs and using live cameras to match faces with that day's list. Unlike the previous e-gates, travellers do not need to open and scan their passport, making the process considerably faster.
Faster and more secure border control
Phil Douglas, the director general of Border Force, said: "It will mean we have a more secure border and a much faster transit through the airport. It's quicker, it's more modern, it's more secure."
Mr Douglas told the Sunday Times that contactless gates could accelerate border control by up to 25%. The new system launched this month and is initially only accessible to British passport holders.
Plans for expansion and fallback procedures
There are plans to potentially extend it to other nationalities eligible to use e-gates at a later stage.
Under the new system, airlines will transmit a collection of passport photographs of arriving British passengers to border control at each airport. These images will be compiled for the e-gates to utilise as a reference point. Mr Douglas explained: "We know who's coming and can load up that gallery of who is arriving; it's not a one in 60 million check, it's a one in tens of thousands check."
If the e-gate fails to recognise a passenger's face, they will be prompted to scan their passport; if that proves unsuccessful, the passenger will be directed to a Border Force officer at a manned desk.
