As travel becomes more available with COVID-related restrictions lessening, more and more people decide to cross borders once again. However, the remaining restrictions can introduce even more bottlenecks than we've seen in the past for movement through airports and other terminals. With the growing number of travelers, these bottlenecks become more problematic. Trying to catch a tight airline connection when you’re faced with an hour-long wait for security or immigration checks is a major frustration for many. As we identify remedies for this dilemma, we’ll take a look at IT solutions for the travel industry powered by:

1. Electronic visa management

2. Automatic border control (ABC) systems

3. Self-service ID verification

4. CCTV monitoring

5. Foreign name recognition

There are many IT solution providers for the travel industry, including Adaptive Recognition, a leader in the document scanner and related electronic ID verification industry for decades. Several of their products will be featured in our examination of the best tools for unclogging check-in lines of all kinds.

Visa and Other Document Management

Many countries now require a visa, in addition to a passport, to enter. Usually, when a country requires a visa of another country's citizens, the second country often reciprocates that requirement.

While some countries issue a tourist visa at the border without previous arrangements, many require the prior acquisition of one. This oftentimes means an arduous procedure, whether done online via a designated website of the country in question or in person at that country’s embassy/consulate. And we haven’t even mentioned an obvious downside of the COVID pandemic when states require documentation of COVID testing, vaccination or both.

Sadly, all these requirements offer abundant opportunities for forgers and fakers. As a countermeasure, travel documentation has become more complex, which is bad news for criminals - and travelers. Because more complex documentation means more complicated immigration procedures.

Basically, IT solutions for the travel industry has become virtual necessities to make the authentication process of passports, visas, and COVID certificates fast and smooth. And that process requires electronic document readers to reduce travel delays.

The EES (European Entry/Exit System) requires all EU external border crossings to begin using biometric identification - via fingerprint or facial recognition - by May 2022. Seeing how the coronavirus delayed many things, the aforementioned deadline could be delayed further. However, that doesn’t mean there are no signs of the new system already. In fact, at Röszke, Hungary, the automatic border control (ABC) system installed for travelers arriving from Serbia is already EES-compliant.

How It Works

When a traveler approaches the e-gate, their passport and other required documents are scanned by an Adaptive Recognition Combo Smart Kiosk Scanner integrated into the e-gates. When the documents are authenticated, the door to the biometric reading chamber opens. The traveler steps inside, and the facial recognition reader records their facial image. That image is compared with the photo in the authenticated document. If it matches, the traveler is granted access.

This system is an excellent example of the effective use of IT solutions for the travel industry.

Self-Service ID Verification

At major airports, more and more airlines are leaning towards using self-service kiosks only for checking in passengers and issuing luggage tags. Large numbers of passengers can be processed much faster than if a human gate agent has to enter information manually and wait precious seconds, even minutes, for the system to produce the necessary credentials for boarding. Document scanners and other IT solutions for the travel industry make this possible.

Here again, the Combo Smart Kiosk scanner is the ideal tool since it’s compact, fast, secure - and can be seamlessly integrated into the kiosk.

Closed-Circuit Television (CCTV) Monitoring

With the large numbers of people passing through airports and other terminals, security is always a concern. The areas outside the security check-ins are open to virtually everyone, some of whom may have less than honorable intent.

Automated surveillance is a significant IT solution for the travel industry. With large areas to be monitored, long-range security cameras and automatic event recognition reduce the amount of human attention needed to see what’s happening and appropriately react to it.

Adaptive Recognition’s line of Intellio Initio CCTV cameras offers several options to meet various users’ needs, from fixed- or variable-focus to bullet or dome configurations. All Intellio models include:

• * Infrared detection for night vision

• * Automatic intelligent event detection

• * Tripwire detection that alerts security if someone crosses an electronically identified line

• * Stolen object and sabotage recognition.

• * Intelligent live view that only displays those sectors that have movement

Foreign Name Recognition

Travelers come from many different countries. In many cases, their names and other information in their documents are in other than Latin characters. This can interfere with the proper operation of some document readers. When a human agent or clerk enters data manually, characters that aren’t on their computer keyboard by default can be a major problem. In addition, manual entry equals slow speed and the possibility for typographical errors.

Adaptive Recognition’s passport and document scanners recognize characters in several languages and record them accurately. With their devices, typos can finally be a thing of the past.

As we’ve explored IT solutions for the travel industry, we see that modern travel would be virtually impossible without state-of-the-art electronic devices. Accelerating authentication, reducing data-entry errors, and the easy but thorough verification of documents are just the core reasons why the use of electronic scanners and other tools is a must.

Adaptive Recognition has been a leader in the production and continued development of ID scanners of all kinds for many decades now.