Facial Recognition Technology at Airports: On Thursday, Minister of State in the Ministry of Civil Aviation General VK Singh (retd.) said that though facial recognition technology (FRT) has not yet been introduced in any of the airports in India, the Airports Authority of India (AAI) is working on a project of FRT-based Biometric Boarding System as a part of first phase of Digi Yatra.

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According to an ANI report, the minister informed this while replying to a question in Lok Sabha today. Singh also informed that the first phase of Digi Yatra will be implemented at four airports - Varanasi, Pune, Kolkata and Vijaywada.

He further added that the proposed Digi Yatra Central eco-system is planned to go live on March 2022. It is to be scaled up in a phased manner for adoption across various airports of the country.

General Singh also informed about the safeguards taken by the government in order to prevent the leakage of passenger data. As per the Digi Yatra policy, registering for the Digi Yatra Central Ecosystem is optional for the passenger. In order to avail the Digi Yatra services, the passengers would have to send the travel details, for instance, Pax details, PNR and facial biometrics through an app to the Biometric Boarding System of the respective departing airport.

As per the ANI report, Singh said, "The Digi Yatra Central Ecosystem envisages assessments (by independent teams to assess the level of security and system resilience to protect PII) and periodic audits by governing/ regulatory bodies twice every year. Facial recognition is as per Industry ISO standards with best in class National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) listed algorithms complying to Data Privacy and Data protection requirement as laid down by government."