The first-ever biometric corridor for train travel opened today at Eurostars London terminal.
The system lets users skip ticket gates and manual border control in the UK.
After baggage inspection and a passport check at the French border, theyre free to board the train.
Initially, the system will only be available for Eurostars Business Premier and Carte Blanche passengers.
But the company aims to extend the service to all customers and perhaps more borders.
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SmartCheck is years in the making.
The next year, live trials of the contactless service began at Eurostar.
Thats when we decided to shoot for the free-flow experience.
A day before the launch, TNW trialled the tech.
Aside from some issues with mobile internet in the station, the experience was seamless.
After entering the biometric lane, we strolled straight past the facial verification checkpoint.
From the other side, we could see the system uses a commercial iPad.
This is not surveillance.
Users can choose whether to enrol or not.
Similar tech has been tested atairports, but this is the first deployment at a train station.
According to iProov CEO Andrew Bud, rail travel presents extra challenges for biometric corridors.
The space is also different.
Another difference is the level of surveillance.
According to Bud, the biometric systems in airports are more intrusive than SmartCheck.
In this case, its sitting in your phone.
Once verified, the information is only shared with the ticket gate and passport control services.
After a maximum of 48 hours, its deleted from these systems.
Privacy campaigners have also raised fears aboutsurveillance creep.
Normalising facial verification, they warn, will accelerate adoption of intrusive monitoring tech.
In response, Bud emphasises that SmartCheck is strictly an opt-in product.
The users, he adds, will only be comparedto images they submit, rather than any mass database.
This is not surveillance, he said.
As evidence, the company can point to recent research.
Surprisingly, white men were the lowest-performing of the demographic groups for the top 20 algorithms.
Concerns will persist, but iProovs research suggests the public will embrace the tech.
In the future, they could get many more chances to try it.
Story byThomas Macaulay
Thomas is the managing editor of TNW.
He leads our coverage of European tech and oversees our talented team of writers.
Away from work, he e(show all)Thomas is the managing editor of TNW.
He leads our coverage of European tech and oversees our talented team of writers.
Away from work, he enjoys playing chess (badly) and the guitar (even worse).
