[IP] German Airline Tests Biometric Tickets

[David Farber <dave@farber.net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: Lorrie Cranor <lorrie+@cs.cmu.edu>
Date: July 6, 2005 10:52:41 PM EDT
To: Multiple recipients of list stop <stop@privacy.cs.cmu.edu>
Subject: STOP:: German Airline Tests Biometric Tickets
Reply-To: lorrie+@cs.cmu.edu


http://apnews.myway.com//article/20050707/D8B67B8O2.html

German Airline Tests Biometric Tickets

Jul 6, 8:21 PM (ET)

BERLIN (AP) - The German airline Lufthansa has started testing  
tickets encoded with passengers' thumbprint data in hopes of speeding  
up check-ins without compromising security.
The 14-day trial started Monday with Lufthansa employees trying out  
the system, spokesman Thomas Jachnow said. If all goes well, the  
airline wants to roll it out in 2006.
Though people will still be able to check in for flights using the  
"classic system," the voluntary use of biometric data would make the  
process quicker, Jachnow said.
Passengers would get tickets encoded with their thumbprint data, then  
check themselves in by placing their thumbs on a machine. Frequent  
fliers would have their thumbprint data encoded on their frequent  
flier cards instead of their tickets, Jachnow said.
The German government is also starting to make use of biometric data  
in travel documents and will start issuing passports embedded with  
facial data in November. A fingerprint will be added in March 2007.

-------------------------------------
To manage your subscription, go to
 http://v2.listbox.com/member/?listname=ip

Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/