Airport technology manufacturer SITA has deployed its most comprehensive biometric project to date at Beijing Capital International (PEK), allowing a fully automated counter-to-aircraft experience supported by facial recognition technology. 

Using the SITA Smart Path product, passengers need to “enroll” just once by registering their facial token during check-in. Subsequent touch points such as at a bag drop point, security and boarding can then be contactless and automated. The system is also employed when paying for duty-free, doing away with the need to present a boarding pass. 

SITA said the technology has added benefits in the COVID-19 era, allowing shorter queuing times and removing any form of contact between staff and travelers. A test also showed the system can process and board 400 passengers on an Airbus A380 flight in less than 20 min., according to SITA. 

Six hundred biometric checkpoints were set up across PEK, including 250 lanes of automatic gates, 80 kiosks and 30 self-bag drop stations. 

“The ability to leverage existing infrastructure is vital in the post-COVID era, as it allows airports and airlines to easily adapt their existing kiosks and boarding gates to biometric or low-touch passenger processing,” SITA Asia Pacific president Sumesh Patel told Aviation Daily. He added that SITA has seen growing demand for biometric and automatic solutions to improve passenger processing, a requirement “that is more important than ever” due to the challenges posed by the coronavirus. 

“An important element of this work is managing the highly sensitive data efficiently, securely, and ethically—in line with local and international regulations such as GDPR,” he said. 

China is known for its facial-recognition capabilities for homeland security purposes. However, Geneva-based SITA said its Smart Path technology is an algorithm-agnostic system, thus not relying on Chinese algorithms. 

The project period was initially planned over six months at the end of 2019, but was interrupted by the outbreak of COVID-19 in China.

Smart Path is currently undergoing various stages of deployment at various airports including Miami Airport (MIA), Orlando (MCO) and Qatar Hamad International (DOH).

SITA has worked with Chinese airports since 1981, including Guangzhou Baiyun International (CAN), Shanghai Hongqiao (SHA) and Shanghai Pudong (PVG), as well as with China’s big three state-owned airlines.