ID Tech Digest – December 17, 2024

Welcome to ID Tech’s digest of identity industry news. Here’s what you need to know about the world of digital identity and biometrics today:

Rear view of a woman using a tablet device while standing at an airport gate or terminal, depicting modern travel and mobile technology usage.

IDEMIA Secures 10-Year Contract to Upgrade Australian Airport Biometric Systems

IDEMIA has secured a 10-year contract extension with Australia’s Department of Home Affairs to enhance biometric technology deployment at Australian airports. The agreement includes upgrading SmartGate systems and kiosks with biometric verification capabilities to streamline passenger processing and improve security. IDEMIA’s technology enables automated identity verification through facial recognition, reducing wait times while ensuring accurate identification. The deployment supports Australia’s border modernization efforts ahead of anticipated increases in international travel.

Virgin Mobile UAE Launches Facial Recognition eSIM System for Tourist Arrivals

Virgin Mobile UAE has introduced a facial recognition system for eSIM activation, allowing tourists to activate mobile connectivity immediately after clearing immigration or Smart Gates at UAE airports. The fully digital process integrates with Dubai International Airport’s biometric passenger screening infrastructure, operational since 2023, to streamline identity verification and eliminate the need for physical store visits. This initiative supports Dubai’s growing tourism sector, which recorded over 11.93 million visitors between January and August, and aligns with the UAE’s broader digital transformation goals in telecommunications and identity systems.

C-DOT Partners with Trois Infotech to Develop Drone-Based Facial Recognition in India

India’s Centre for Development of Telematics (C-DOT) has partnered with Trois Infotech to develop drone-based facial recognition technology for aerial surveillance and real-time intelligence gathering. The collaboration combines C-DOT’s telecommunications expertise with Trois Infotech’s drone systems to advance domestic surveillance capabilities and reduce reliance on foreign vendors. The initiative will integrate real-time data processing with India’s existing mobile network infrastructure, supporting broader government efforts under the Make in India program.

OR Tambo Airport Faces Disruptions Due to Biometric System Failure

OR Tambo International Airport has experienced disruptions due to technical failures in its biometric movement control system, delaying passenger processing. This setback follows earlier challenges with South Africa’s airport biometric systems, including the termination of IDEMIA’s implementation contract and the suspension of Acsa’s Chief Information Officer over procurement issues. In response, Airports Company South Africa (Acsa) announced plans to introduce backup infrastructure to prevent future disruptions, similar to redundancy measures adopted at other international airports.

iDenfy Achieves SOC II Certification Amid Geographic Expansion

iDenfy has achieved SOC II certification, validating its data security practices across key trust service criteria such as security, availability, and privacy. This certification complements iDenfy’s existing ISO 27001 and ETSI TS 119 461 credentials, reinforcing its commitment to safeguarding sensitive information, including biometric and government-issued ID data. The announcement follows the opening of iDenfy’s new Delaware office, supporting its expansion in the U.S. market. CEO Domantas Ciulde emphasized plans to target sectors like healthcare and insurance, which require specialized compliance measures.

ID Talk: TECH5’s Rahul Parthe on Decentralized Identity and the Future of Digital Public Infrastructure

In this week’s ID Talk podcast, Rahul Parthe, CTO, Chairman, and co-founder of TECH5, discusses how decentralized digital identity systems are transforming national infrastructure, particularly in the Global South. Parthe explains how decentralization reduces reliance on centralized systems, lowers cyber risks, and cuts costs by enabling secure, device-based data exchanges. He highlights TECH5’s modular approach to scalable and privacy-preserving digital ID systems, emphasizing the importance of resilience against modern cyber threats. By decentralizing data and infrastructure, nations can enhance security while empowering citizens through more efficient and adaptable digital identity solutions.

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December 17, 2024 – by Tony Bitzionis and Alex Perala

Related News

Partners

FaceTec’s patented, industry-leading 3D Face Verification and Reverification software anchors digital identity, creating a chain of trust from user onboarding to ongoing authentication on all modern smart devices and webcams. FaceTec’s 3D FaceMaps™ finally make trusted, remote identity verification possible. As the only technology backed by a persistent spoof bounty program and NIST/iBeta Certified Liveness Detection, FaceTec is the global standard for 3D Liveness and Face Matching with millions of users on six continents in financial services, border security, transportation, blockchain, e-voting, social networks, online dating and more. www.facetec.com

AuthenticID provides 100% automated identity verification and fraud detection solutions that are leveraged by companies worldwide, including 2 of the top 3 U.S. Banks, 8 out the top 10 wireless providers in North America, and 2 of the 3 credit bureaus. Using proprietary computer vision and machine learning technology, these solutions help companies accurately verify the identity of their users across retail, digital and call center environments for onboarding and ongoing re-authentication events; KYC, IAM, and more. The solutions are easy to integrate and provide customers a large ROI by stopping fraud losses, increasing customer conversion at onboarding, reducing operational costs and allowing quick and cost-effective operational scalability, all while ensuring global privacy regulations are complied with. https://www.authenticid.com/

Anonybit is a privacy-focused technology platform that provides decentralized solutions for securing personal data, particularly biometric information. Rather than storing sensitive data in centralized repositories, which are vulnerable to breaches, Anonybit uses a distributed architecture that breaks data into smaller encrypted bits and stores them across a network of decentralized nodes. This approach ensures that no single entity has access to the full dataset, enhancing privacy and security, even preventing insider threats. Anonybit is used by leading banks, fintechs and other enterprises for critical biometric identity functions like deduplication and blocklist checks, step up authentication, passwordless login and account recovery https://anonybit.io/

Identity Week aims to be a significant identity industry catalyst. It’s our mission is to help accelerate the move towards a world where trusted identity solutions enable governments and commercial organisations to provide citizens, employees, customers and consumers with a multitude of opportunities to transact in a seamless, yet secure manner. All the while preventing the efforts of those intent on doing harm. https://identityweek.net/

The Biometric Digital Identity Prism is a market landscape framework designed to help influencers and decision makers understand, innovate, and implement digital identity technologies and solutions. This innovative framework for understanding and evaluating the rapidly evolving biometric digital identity marketplace is the only market model that is truly biometric-centric based on the foundational conviction that in the age of digital transformation the only true, reliable link between humans and their digital data is biometrics. https://www.the-prism-project.com

ID R&D is an innovator of biometric facial liveness, document liveness, and voice biometrics. Ranked #1 by NIST, our patented passive approach to liveness, and specialized detection of voice clones, injection attacks and deepfakes, empowers KYC and authentication systems with fast, accurate and secure biometric verification technologies. Over 140 partners in more than 70 countries are collectively processing hundreds of millions of identity checks per year. ID R&D solutions easily integrate with mobile, web, messaging, smart speakers, set-top boxes, and IoT devices. Learn more: www.idrnd.ai