In the past week, the Blog has embraced two hi-tech advances in business travel: iris recognition, and mobile phone boarding cards.
The whole process of having my eyes scanned took just a few minutes in a small office next to security at Heathrow Terminal 5. I just looked into a screen and aligned my eyes with two green dots. So far, I've had only one chance to test it. Coming back into Heathrow from
My colleague Richard sounded a warning note. He found that registration has a time expiry on it, so I will one day find that I am ejected from the iris booth, probably in front of a queue of grinning colleagues.
As for checking in online and having the boarding pass sent to your mobile, I can see that this is going to be useful for when you're on the move and out of reach of a printer. I've had two boarding passes sent to my mobile this week, but wasn't brave enough to rely on them alone and ended up taking old-fashioned paper to the airport instead.
Someday - off in the future - you won't even need that cellphone boarding pass. As Iris recognition continues to advance it will recognize you automatically as you approach the gate. As you mentioned your concern that the cellphone boarding pass (barcode) might not work, the same concern exists for people using a biometric sensor in this case iris.
I think it boils down to a term the biometric industry uses - "habituation"- after you use the technology a few times you get very comfortable with it. The barcode example is on target.
Just ask some of the folks which have been using Privium at Schipol airport for the past several years. Once you are comfortable using an automated border crossing (Privium uses iris too)- there is no going back to the old fashioned way of crossing the border.
Today biometrics are great for "frequent" users. Some people who use it once a year or so hesitate and steer away from the unfamiliar, after all we are creatures of habit aren't we.