Passport Australia passports systems and technology director, John Osborne, said immigration authorities only started collecting and storing digital passport images of sufficient quality to generate biometric algorithms in 1999.
Despite this impediment, the Australian Customs Service (ACS) is moving ahead with its program. Qantas long-haul crews are being invited to volunteer to participate in six-month pilot program to test the performance of automated face verification technology, SmartGate. The architects of the pilot program expect it to commence later this year.
The trials will let Australian Customs officers walk the technology through its paces before it is implemented across a broader cross-section of Australian passport holders.
The ACS said that while its initial tests of the SmartGate program were very encouraging, it needed a low-risk passenger group to test the performance of the system in a live environment.
"[The pilot] will give us a chance to further develop the systems accuracy and the elements that go towards that system's accuracy," said Leon Bedington, spokesperson, for the ACS.
The technology requires five pictures of each volunteer to be taken from different angles simultaneously to test the performance of different images.
The automated passport and face scanning equipment will be installed at the customs entry points reserved for Qantas crew. Qantas crew members have been told that the biometric verification process will take around 10 seconds.
If the SmartGate pilot is successful in its first six months, said Bedington, then the system will be extended to Qantas crews indefinitely before being applied to a broader cross-section of Australian passport holders.
Customs officials say early tests showed promising results but there may be a few pitfalls associated with using the system.
For a start, the verification system's accuracy is confined to Australian subjects; the systems can't detect individuals who obtaining passport fraudulently in other countries.
"Even if it only becomes usable for Australian passport holders its very worthwhile because half the people travelling through our gates are Australian passport holders," said Bedington.
Bedington said that reducing resources dedicated to manual checks at Australian airports would help customs staff cope with expected increases in passenger traffic without sacrificing sophisticated intelligence and security management tasks.
