Pioneering seamless passenger experiences in Italy

Aeroporti di Roma Fiumicino has launched a Seamless Flow™ One-ID pilot in partnership with Vision-Box, a leader of biometric recognition and digital identity management solutions.

Passengers flying from Rome to Amsterdam will participate in facial biometric recognition for a quicker, easier and more secure journey.

Emiliano Sorrenti, CIO/CTO at Aeroporti di Roma, said: “Special thanks to the Rome Airports’ Technology Team and Vision-Box for helping Rome Fiumicino Airport to set a major milestone of its digital transformation with full seamless flow experience. We are happy to be the first airport in Italy and one of the first in Europe facilitating fast and safe passenger experiences.”

With the support of ENAC, the Italian Civil Aviation Authority and the State Police, Fiumicino is the first airport in the country to launch a six-month trial of biometric-based security and self-boarding checks. Fiumicino is the largest airport in Italy with throughput of approximately 43 million passengers in 2018.

Vision-Box’s Seamless Flow™ solution provides the enrolled travellers with an end-to-end self-service experience, from check in, through security and boarding. Passengers who choose to opt-in identify themselves using their facial biometric characteristics against their official travel documents to transact with the airport systems. The Vision-Box Orchestra™ platform manages the passenger flow process while complying with EU Data Privacy regulations and operating under customer-centred business rules.

The system is fast, easy and secure. Initially, a smart IoT device captures the traveller’s face, measures the quality of facial biometric characteristics and electronically acquires the information contained in the passport and boarding-pass. This dataset becomes associated with the face through appropriately specialised edge cameras, in full compliance with the privacy policy. With this system, it will no longer be necessary to show documents or boarding passes.

No photo will be saved. The system temporarily processes the biometric coordinates of the face which, similarly to what was already occurring with e-gates for automated border control, are used to identify passengers. This system allows the use of dedicated lanes, simplifying the whole airport departure process. The temporarily-used information is deleted once the passenger is boarded.

Miguel Leitmann, CEO at Vision-Box, said: “Vision-Box is extremely proud to accompany Aeroporti di Roma Fiumicino in its digital transformation programme in the world of seamless travel, offering a premium passenger-centric experience to participating travellers. Together we aim at establishing the practical foundations of IATA One-ID for Italy, by leveraging our market knowledge and worldwide real-life expertise in simplifying the lives of passengers by using biometrics in a responsible and scalable manner.”