A top U.S. travel security official said Tuesday that a proposed system to link passenger ‘risk profiles’ embedded in computer chips to scans of their irises is “something that’s long overdue.”
The Transportation Security Administration’s John Pistole told the Associated Press Tuesday that the International Air Transport Association’s proposal to link scans of passengers’ eyes to their risk profiles embedded in computer chips in their passports is something that the TSA is working toward.
“We’re not at the checkpoint of the future yet but we’re working toward that. I think eventually we will see something similar,” he said at IATA’s annual conference in Singapore.
IATA created a demo of how the system would work at its conference in Singapore. The association is calling it the “Checkpoint of the Future,” where passengers would go through separate checkpoints according to the profiles that the authorities have on them.
“Passengers should be able to get from curb to boarding gate with dignity,” IATA Director General Giovanni Bisignani told the AP. “That means without stopping, stripping or unpacking, and certainly not groping.”