Indonesia’s Directorate General of Immigration has begun operating biometric “Seamless Corridors” at Jakarta and Surabaya airports, in what is being described as the first deployment of biometric travel corridors at national scale. The system uses “biometrics on the move” technology from Amadeus to verify travelers as they walk, replacing traditional document checks at staffed booths and eGates. The Directorate has been steadily expanding Indonesia’s biometric border infrastructure, with Vision-Box previously deploying over 150 biometric touchpoints at Jakarta and Bali airports and HID’s technology reducing queues drastically at seaports.
Eligible passengers can enroll through the All Indonesia app, which consolidates immigration, customs, health, and quarantine declarations into a single digital channel. Once registered, travelers share passport details in advance so that immigration authorities can run background checks before arrival. At the airport, facial biometrics captured by multiple cameras along the corridor are matched against the pre-enrolled data, allowing travelers to keep moving while their identity is verified. This approach builds on Indonesia’s broader digital identity initiatives, including mandatory biometric e-SIM registration and VFS Global’s electronic visa platform.
The system was stress-tested during this year’s Hajj, when Indonesia processed more than 50,000 pilgrims using the corridors. Authorities report that each corridor handled more than 30 border crossings per minute at peak, delivering more than a tenfold capacity increase compared to existing biometric eGates. The corridors are currently targeted at elderly and disabled passengers, with longer term plans to expand access to the broader traveling public as part of the country’s All Indonesia digitalization initiative.
Amadeus says the deployment is the result of over a decade of work on on-the-move biometric capture and matching. The Indonesian implementation relies on a multi-camera acquisition pipeline capable of tracking multiple faces and bodies at walking pace, combining facial recognition with 3D imaging. The corridors augment the country’s 243 existing automated border control gates rather than replacing them, and are intended to reduce queuing pressure at peak times while offering more inclusive service for travelers who need assistance. Similar capacity improvements have been documented globally, with Singapore’s Changi Airport reducing processing times to 10 seconds and Chennai planning a 60% reduction.
The project is being delivered in collaboration with local partner Sinergi Teknoglobal Perkasa, which emphasizes that technical knowledge transfer is part of the agreement so that Indonesian teams can operate and evolve the system over time. For Amadeus, Indonesia’s rollout is being framed as a reference implementation for other governments looking to combine digital identity, pre-clearance, and biometrics in airport settings without relying on large centralized biometric databases.
Sources: Amadeus; IdentityWeek; Aerospace Global News
—
By the ID Tech Editorial Team
