Singapore airport may use facial recognition to find stragglers
Ever been delayed on a flight because of straggling fellow passengers?
That might be an annoyance of the past at Singapore’s Changi airport which is testing facial recognition systems that could, in future, help locate lost travellers or those spending a little too much time in the duty-free shops.
This comes as the island state embarks on a “smart nation” initiative to utilise technology to improve lives, create economic opportunity and build community ties.
However the proposed use of cameras mounted on lampposts that are linked to facial recognition software has raised privacy concerns.
Steve Lee, Changi Airport Group’s chief information officer, told Reuters that the airport’s experiments are not from a “big brother” perspective but solve real problems.
“We have lots of reports of lost passengers...so one possible use case we can think of is, we need to detect and find people who are on the flight. Of course, with permission from the airlines,” said Lee.
Changi’s newest terminal, T4, already uses facial recognition technology to offer selfservice options at check-in, bag drop, immigration and boarding. Luggage is dropped at unmanned booths that take your photo and match it against your passport. You are snapped again at an automated security gate at immigration - a picture that is used to verify your identity at the boarding gate. Changi is exploring how facial recognition can be implemented in its three older terminals for automated bag drop and immigration. REUTERS
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