Electronic passports, digital wallets, app-based travel documents… what is digital identity, how is it different — and what does it mean for aviation? To learn more, we quizzed the experts at airline trade group IATA, the International Air Transport Association via spokesperson Katherine Kaczynska.
The digital identity agenda spans a variety of industries and purposes, and its definition is as a result somewhat amorphous at the edges. In the most expansive definition, it is in essence a combination of attributes, credentials and metadata that can uniquely identify someone, captured and stored via an electronic medium such as a passport chip, mobile app, or database.
“For travel,” IATA’s Kaczynska tells us, “digital identity will cover the same information about the person as available in a physical ID document, such as a passport, but in a digital format stored securely in the passenger’s digital wallet on their phone. It may also include other attributes, such as proof of visa or boarding pass.”
Over time, the use of digital identity has expanded through the adoption of biometric passports — by necessity taking over a decade per country owing to the replacement cycle of passports — to initiatives like the provision of advance passenger information, self-service immigration and customs kiosks, through to electronic travel authority systems such as the United States’ ESTA.
The COVID-19 pandemic and resulting travel restrictions drove urgent digital innovation around matching sensitive health data to travellers, while the development and widespread acceptance of those systems, as well as the very common use of QR codes, resulted in a post-shutdown expansion of systems like the web application developed by Japanese authorities for combined immigration, customs and tax-free shopping, Visit Japan Web.
Interoperability adds inherent standardisation — and requires partnership working
All these developments required, and still require, much discussion and collaboration. In recent years, Kaczynska says, “the biggest topics would be privacy, data protection and interoperability. For the best possible solution that provides the best privacy and data protection, IATA recommends decentralised digital identity solutions. This technology allows the passenger to have control of their data and determine with whom they share their data. This is a principle underpinning our industry standards, and we believe that this way, airlines can meet various privacy laws and regulations across jurisdictions.”
The key organisation spanning those jurisdictions is the UN body, ICAO, the International Civil Aviation Organization, which has long maintained standards such as Doc 9303 for machine-readable passports and other travel documents [PDF].
On the IATA side, Kaczynska notes, “we design our standards to support interoperability. This means passengers should be able to use one single digital identity for multiple trips at multiple locations. We are also closely monitoring the development of the ICAO Digital Travel Credential (DTC) [PDF] and the EU Digital Identity Wallet standards to ensure alignment and compatibility.”
Aviation continues to balance the adoption of new technologies with an often unwieldy technology stack, multiple international standards, specific state of entry or operation requirements, and other considerations.
“Airlines, airports and governments are all key players and they will have their own roles,” Kaczynska says. “Governments’ support will be essential for the industry to move ahead with this new technology. The legacy systems may need to be adjusted to support new technology, but those system providers already work with us to building standards. Therefore, we consider that the legacy systems wouldn’t necessarily become a blocker, but would quickly accommodate any changes needed.”
IATA’s One ID is the airline building block for digital identity
IATA’s proposal for the connected, contactless passenger journey is called One ID, with benefits for passengers, airlines, airports and governments.
The goal, Kaczynska says, is “to transform passenger experience using digital identity and biometric technology. We are building standards and recommended practices in cooperation with our member airlines and industry partners. The industry is focusing on the standards and tools needed to support the adoption of this new decentralised identity technology into the global aviation ecosystem.”
If ICAO’s Digital Travel Credential standard becomes as trusted and strong as is likely, it will make a substantial difference to border control processing given that much of the routine immigration work — and a growing amount of more complex checks — can be done in advance of the journey.
Here, Kaczynska explains, “the airline industry can leverage trust from the DTC to provide for seamless and contactless travel processes and the use of digital identity for their journey. The use cases for Government and Industry for international travel are different. The data needs are different. The DTC provides borders with the ability to receive the complete and intact passport data in advance, directly from passengers, in a way that can be authenticated as securely as if the passenger was at the border gate and enabling robust pre-travel risk assessment.”
The benefit multiplier of combining standards is within range in the near future
Combining the ICAO DTC with IATA’s One ID will be a major advance in digital identity.
“Using the One ID standards, the aviation industry can leverage off the security and trust that the DTC and/or eMRTD [electronic machine readable travel documents] provide while protecting the passenger’s privacy through only receiving the minimum data necessary, in a trusted and verifiable format, enabling simple and contactless experiences for passengers,” Kacyznska says.
More widely, adopting standards from outside aviation may well make sense in a growing number of cases, like the W3C Verifiable Credentials (VC) for digital identity.
“The use of W3C VC may help unlock various possibilities for airlines and even other parties in the travel supply chain to improve their customer experience. In the future, passengers could manage their preferences and entitlements in a VC format on their mobile and easily communicate them with the relevant service providing parties in a privacy-preserving way, so that they can be offered a more personalised and seamless experience throughout their travel,” Kaczynska explains. “This can then extend beyond the airline or airport, and into rental cars, hotels, cruises, destinations and events where an entire leisure or business trip can be digital and seamless, using intuitive technology that passengers are familiar with from modern retailing in other sectors.”
Author: John Walton
Published: 13th December 2024
