Digi Yatra launched at 3 airports based on Facial Recognition Technology

Union Minister for Civil Aviation Jyotiraditya Scindia today launched Digi Yatra for New Delhi, Bengaluru and Varanasi airports to achieve contactless and paperless processing of passengers at the three airports based on Facial Recognition Technology (FRT).

Digi Yatra in the first phase, will be launched at 7 airports. Hyderabad, Kolkata, Pune, and Vijayawada will be the next four airports where Dig Yatra will be launched by March 2023.

The service is presently being launched only for passengers travelling on domestic flights. Digi Yatra App is available on both IoS and Android. It is voluntary in nature.

The Minister said the Digi Yatra project envisages a traveller passing through various check-points at the airports through a paperless and contactless process using facial features to establish his or her identity which could be linked to the boarding pass.

To use this facility, one-time registration on Digi Yatra app is required using Aadhar based validation and a self-image capture. The project has tremendous advantages of improving passenger convenience and ease of travel.

The Minister said that keeping in mind the privacy of passengers, there is no central storage of Personally Identifiable Information. Passenger’s ID and travel credentials are stored in a secure wallet in the passenger’s smartphone itself. The uploaded data will utilise blockchain technology and all the data will be purged from the servers within 24 hours of use.

With Digi Yatra, India will now stand in the ranks of world class airports like Heathrow in London and Atlanta in the USA.

Explaining the benefits of Digi Yatra, the Minister stated the example of Dubai Airport where passenger time up to 40 percent was saved due to this technology. A similar technology saved nine minutes per aircraft time at the Atlanta Airport. The Minister also said that compared to other ports of call, the Indian system has been made far more seamless from entry to exit and therefore will be one of the most efficient systems across the world.

With Digi Yatra, India is setting a new global benchmark for a seamless, hassle free and health risk free process at airports.

Later the Dig Yatra will be implemented across various other airports in India as well, the minister said.