By Steve Ranger, 5 October 2006 14:35
NEWS
More that 2.5 million ePassports have been issued since the new biometric documents went into production in March.
The Identity and Passport Service (IPS) has now switched all its production over to the new style of passport, a process which began earlier this year.
IPS executive director for service delivery Bernard Herdan said the design is the "most secure passport ever issued by the UK".
He said the changeover to ePassports had taken place over a number of months, while the agency also dealt with record levels of demand for passports.
He said: "In combination with enhanced background checks and plans to interview first-time passport applicants from next spring, this new more secure passport will deliver a step-change in our ability to combat passport fraud and forgery."
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The agency also pointed out that the switchover to biometric passports means the UK has beaten the US Visa Waiver deadline, so UK travellers can still travel visa-free to the US.
The new passports include a chip with the holder's facial biometric, with facial recognition software used to check passport applications against a list of known passport fraudsters. But the additional security comes at a cost - passport prices have increased to £66, up from £42 last year.
Immigration controls have also been tightened - immigration officers can carry out 'biometric checks' on any passenger who holds a biometric travel document to confirm that they are the rightful owner.
Comments
There are 3 comments. Join the discussion
1. Richard
Will this really make us safer?
The facial features stored on the chip *may* be useful for computer checking - so long as the chip has not become damaged by everyday wear.
But, these facial features will only be a simplified summary of someone's face: Tests of facial recognition technology have produced very poor results.
Also, the photos are printed digitally in these passports: They are often such poor printing quality that they are useless for human identification of the holder.
The rules for the original photos are also causing much grief: The software which "extracts" the facial features from the photos is easily confused: No smiling, no spectacles, image of face must be correct size, no shadows, plain background, etc. etc. Even then, thousands of photos have been rejected.
It's certainly a "step-change" in cost and complexity, but it's hard to see this as a step forward or see how it will actually improve real "security."
2. Charles Smith
The quality of photo printing in the passport is so poor that the effectiveness of the passport has been reduced. The passport office scan the original photo and reprint it on the passport with a very poor resolution quality.
The RFID chip built into the document looks very fragile and unprotected except by flexible plastic. I'll bet there will be an increase in damaged passports - an you won't know until you are standing at the immigration desk.
3. anonymous
This is using technology for the sake of it to line someone's pockets - nothing more. The human brain is far more useful for recognising a person from a picture than any computer. This is about as useful as ID cards... - I am sure someone will get rich out of it though...
I recently travelled from Dublin to Heathrow without once even going through passport control - Very strange with Heathrow full of machine-guns currently... Good job Ireland has no history of terrorists... ;o)
Lets hope the terrorists are more stupid than the authorities and don't spot the loop hole... ;o)