Seamless travel: digital identity’s golden use case
*Please note that these thought leadership pieces represent the views of the contributing companies and do not necessarily reflect techUK’s own position.
The global air travel industry has consistently expanded over recent decades. Whilst welcome, this continued growth in demand also poses significant challenges for the industry, not least a capacity crunch which is particularly acute in Europe. EUROCONTROL predicts that by 2050, the industry may not be able to serve as much as 13% of future demand due to a lack of airport capacity.
At Amadeus we are one of the companies working to address this long-term challenge by applying technology throughout the passenger journey to remove friction, support a better travel experience and importantly, so more passengers can be served with today’s existing physical infrastructure. Digital identity and biometrics have emerged as critical technologies that are helping to transform the experience of travel.
During a typical journey, travelers must share identity information like passport details with airlines in advance. There’s a need to check-in, drop a bag, undergo immigration checks and then to board the aircraft. The passenger must present travel documents and confirm their identity at each step. Add car rental and hotel check-in and it’s not uncommon for a journey to include ten different identity checks. Doing identity manually can be frustrating and adds significant time to the interaction, often resulting in queues that limit airport capacity.
End-to-end biometric journeys
Set against this backdrop, the travel industry is rapidly adopting biometrics to automate identity checks at every step in the journey.
Passengers can now enroll for biometrics from their mobile in advance or via a kiosk at the airport. The passenger no longer needs to present documents, instead they are recognized and their identity confirmed by matching the image captured at the airport checkpoint to the enrolment image.
This simple biometric experience is possible at check-in, bag drop, pre-security, lounge, boarding and immigration – with potential to extend to car rental, hotels, cruise terminals and destination experiences. With a platform approach to identity, the passenger enrolls once and can use biometrics at all touchpoints that have been enabled.
Amadeus provides biometrically enabled solutions at all these touchpoints – mobile phone, kiosk, assisted desk, bag drop, CONFIDENTIAL boarding gates, immigration gates. Our platform brings it all together, connecting these touchpoints and stakeholders while seamlessly interoperating with any biometric hardware.
A growing number of UK aviation stakeholders are embracing an end-to-end approach to passenger processing. Amadeus has long been active in the UK aviation ecosystem— collaborating across airlines, airports, ground handlers, and border authorities—to enhance the check-in experience, expand self-service options, and support secure immigration processes, with biometrics used in most cases.
Just this month Perth Airport in Australia went live with the country’s first end-to-end biometric departure process. Travelers, with selected airlines, can check-in and opt for biometrics at self-service kiosks. Then when dropping bag and boarding the aircraft, passports and boarding passes can remain in the passenger’s pocket. Instead, a brief face scan is all that’s needed to validate the passenger’s identity and retrieve their travel records.
Recently, other areas of the travel industry have begun to apply biometric technology. In May MSC Cruises became the first maritime business to offer an end-to-end biometric experience for its passengers by combining digital identity technology with biometrics. The system went live at the newly opened MSC Cruise Terminal at PortMiami, which can process up to 36,000 passengers a day using the new system (the equivalent of three next-generation cruise ships).
MSC guests create a secure digital ID in the company’s app and check-in from home. Biometric totems and biometrically enabled desks allow guests to enroll for biometrics at the port if they prefer. A secure, privacy-sensitive 1:1 biometric matching process occurs which matches the passenger’s facial scan to their passport, securing their eligibility to travel and biometrically embark the ship just with their face in a subsequent step. The new process has proven to reduce MSCs average embarkation time by 50%.
The potential of digital wallets for travel
With biometric infrastructure becoming more widespread across the travel sector it’s important there is an effective user interface that allows travelers to securely store and share their digital travel and identity documents. Just as they have for CONFIDENTIAL payments, digital wallets are becoming available that provide this simple user experience for travelers.
This summer Amadeus and Lufthansa completed successful testing of the EU Digital Identity Wallet for a number of travel use cases. The wallet allows travelers to store their passport and provide their details quickly and easily to an airline with a single click – greatly simplifying online check-in. Similarly, passengers can share biometric profiles and identity documents during the journey by tapping their device at checkin kiosks, bag drop points or immigration gates. Digital wallets are particularly attractive because they allow travelers to practice consent-based sharing, with the ability to keep track and manage how their data is shared on a decentralized basis. Member states intend to make the EU Digital Wallet available to citizens next year and we expect its introduction to further accelerate the adoption of digital identity across the industry.
Digital identity enables the EU’s new Entry Exit System
The much-anticipated EU Entry/Exit System (EES) is due to go live from October in a phased approach lasting an estimated six months. From that point, all member states will need compliant solutions at the border.
As the EES is introduced, one of the expected challenges will be processing large numbers of third country travelers who's facial and fingerprint biometrics haven’t yet been captured on the EES system. The requirement for fingerprint scanning to be observed by a border officer means a degree of manual processing is inevitable.
Finland has been preparing for this moment since 2015 when the Finnish Border Guard started to design its process. Through close collaboration between the Finnish Border Guard (RAJA) and Amadeus, the country has been able to deliver an optimal EES process based on detailed modelling and advanced flow orchestration.
This modelling examined factors like; the number of travelers expected at peak times, how many of those travelers are thirdcountry nationals and how long the EES process will take. These insights were encapsulated in a solution design process CONFIDENTIAL that created an EES compliant platform, while maximizing terminal space.
The optimal process at Helsinki Airport means that only 60 EES Pre-registration kiosks needed to be deployed to ensure the timely processing of incoming non-EU passengers. This compares to some similar sized airports that have deployed double to triple this number of devices to process a similar number of travelers using the EES. So, how has Finland done it?
Key to Finland’s EES process is the smart use of biometrics and platform technology, in a fully EES compliant fashion, so travelers do not need to re-present their passport again at the desk when interacting with an officer, or even at the eGate if they are eligible to use it. In fact, Finland is the only EU Member State where this passport re-presentation step has been successfully streamlined, delivering more contactless and secure transactions.
Doing so is expected to help Finland and Helsinki Airport cut processing times by at least 30%. The collaboration occurring in Finland is significant, which has helped the country to become an EES pioneer.
While the UK is not part of the EES, it is expected the country will introduce a similar process over the coming years, meaning biometric identity will become even more crucial to the effective operation of the UK’s borders.
What’s next for digital identity in travel?
Over the coming few years we expect it to become commonplace to store all travel and identity documents in a digital wallet and to be able to use that wallet to quickly progress through the travel industry and government administered checkpoints. Although this may sound like the ideal end-state for travel, additional innovation is occurring.
With innovations in free-flow biometrics, seamless travel is progressing to the next level by enabling industry to identify travelers while they walk through the immigration area. This concept is already a reality with one major country already removing physical barriers at immigration. The first installation of Amadeus’ seamless corridor means travelers no longer need to queue at an eGate – instead they are identified as they stroll CONFIDENTIAL through the corridor, which has increased border crossing capacity in the range of 20X compared to traditional eGates.
The UK represents one of the world’s busiest aviation markets with more than 300m passengers served by UK airports last year. Environmental and economic constraints mean that expansion of physical airport capacity in the UK is particularly difficult. It’s for these reasons that adoption of digital identity across the UK’s travel and transport sector offers such significant benefits, with the opportunity to support economic growth through a well-functioning travel industry that can meet demand.
Author
Adrian James
Head of Northern Europe, Airports, Amadeus
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Sue leads techUK's Technology and Innovation work.
This includes work programmes on cloud, data protection, data analytics, AI, digital ethics, Digital Identity and Internet of Things as well as emerging and transformative technologies and innovation policy.
In 2025, Sue was honoured with an Order of the British Empire (OBE) for services to the Technology Industry in the New Year Honours List.
She has been recognised as one of the most influential people in UK tech by Computer Weekly's UKtech50 Longlist and in 2021 was inducted into the Computer Weekly Most Influential Women in UK Tech Hall of Fame.
A key influencer in driving forward the data agenda in the UK, Sue was co-chair of the UK government's National Data Strategy Forum until July 2024. As well as being recognised in the UK's Big Data 100 and the Global Top 100 Data Visionaries for 2020 Sue has also been shortlisted for the Milton Keynes Women Leaders Awards and was a judge for the Loebner Prize in AI. In addition to being a regular industry speaker on issues including AI ethics, data protection and cyber security, Sue was recently a judge for the UK Tech 50 and is a regular judge of the annual UK Cloud Awards.
Prior to joining techUK in January 2015 Sue was responsible for Symantec's Government Relations in the UK and Ireland. She has spoken at events including the UK-China Internet Forum in Beijing, UN IGF and European RSA on issues ranging from data usage and privacy, cloud computing and online child safety. Before joining Symantec, Sue was senior policy advisor at the Confederation of British Industry (CBI). Sue has an BA degree on History and American Studies from Leeds University and a Masters Degree on International Relations and Diplomacy from the University of Birmingham. Sue is a keen sportswoman and in 2016 achieved a lifelong ambition to swim the English Channel.
Associate Director - Technology and Innovation, techUK
Laura Foster
Associate Director - Technology and Innovation, techUK
Laura is techUK’s Associate Director for Technology and Innovation.
Laura advocates for better emerging technology policy in the UK, including quantum, future of compute technologies, semiconductors, digital ID and more. Working alongside techUK members and UK Government she champions long-term, cohesive, and sustainable investment that will ensure the UK can commercialise future science and technology research. Laura leads a high-performing team at techUK, as well as publishing several reports on these topics herself, and being a regular speaker at events.
Before joining techUK, Laura worked internationally as a conference researcher and producer exploring adoption of emerging technologies. This included being part of the team at London Tech Week.
Laura has a degree in History (BA Hons) from Durham University and is a Cambridge Policy Fellow. Outside of work she loves reading, writing and supporting rugby team St. Helens, where she is from.
Elis joined techUK in December 2023 as a Programme Manager for Tech and Innovation, focusing on Semiconductors and Digital ID.
He previously worked at an advocacy group for tech startups, with a regional focus on Wales. This involved policy research on innovation, skills and access to finance.
Elis has a Degree in History, and a Masters in Politics and International Relations from the University of Winchester, with a focus on the digitalisation and gamification of armed conflicts.
