New Delhi:  The Civil Aviation Ministry is going to introduce the face recognition technology in the airports in India in the name of DIGI YATRA. Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia launched DIGI YATRA from the Indira Gandhi International Airport, Delhi on Thursday.

The Government introduced the DIGI YATRA face recognition initially in three airports namely Delhi, Varanasi and Bengaluru from Thursday. Air passengers can get paperless entry at three selected airports including Delhi, Bengaluru and Varanasi to make air travel hassle-free through DIGI YATRA.

DIGI YATRA is conceived to achieve contactless, seamless processing of passengers at airports based on Facial Recognition Technology (FRT). The airport will use facial recognition software termed as DIGI YATRA for entry, said officials.

In the first phase DIGI YATRA will be launched at seven airports. DIGI YATRA has been initially launched at three airports including Delhi, Bengaluru and Varanasi on Thursday to be followed by four airports namely Hyderabad, Kolkata, Pune, and Vijayawada by March 2023.

Later, it would be implemented across various airports in the country. The service is currently being launched for domestic flights passengers only. DIGI YATRA App is available on both IoS and Android.

After launching the DIGI YATRA project at Delhi airport the Minister said that the project conceived by DIGI YATRA Foundation under the Ministry of Civil Aviation.  The project envisages a traveller pass through various checkpoints at the airports through a paperless and contactless processing using facial feature to establish her identity which could be linked to the boarding pass.

To use this facility, one-time registration on DIGI YATRA app is required using Aadhaar-based validation and a self-image capture. The project has tremendous advantages of improving passenger convenience and ease of travel, he said.
About the privacy features of the project, keeping in mind privacy, there is no central storage of Personally Identifiable Information (PII). A passenger’s ID and travel credentials are stored in a secure wallet in the passenger’s smart phone itself.

The uploaded data will utilize block chain technology and all the data will be purged from the servers within 24 hours of use. India will now stand in the ranks of world class airports like Heathrow in London and Atlanta in the US, with DIGI YATRA.