b'SECURITYPHL 41are today. One important factor the PHL team discovered wasHow It Worksthat overhead lighting makes a big difference: It has to be brightNEC calls its facial recognition system I:Delight. Employing tall, enough to capture clear images.slender devices with a vertical range of about 3 to 7 feet, PHLs We learned some good lessons throughout the process,biometrics hardware can be mounted to counters or on movable says Kalpesh Trivedi, project manager with Arora Engineers. Thepoles for more flexibility. pause [starting in 2020] actually helped us prepare better.About 72 hours before a flight, airlines are required to send CBP manifest data, including the identities of passengers Choosing Experience Over Price and crew, as well as details about planned cargo. CBP starts Mehta and his team didnt get to visit other airports to see similarits vetting process for the information it has in advance, and biometrics systems at work due to pandemic-related travelpassengers verify their passport information when they check in restrictions during the early phases of the project. However, hefor the flight. was able to leverage the teams wide industry network to gatherAt the airport, the gate agent announces that passengers more information.will be boarding a biometric flight, and fliers step up to the Id call people from airports using facial recognition to seecamera. Their photos are sent to CBP over high-speed internet how it was going, Mehta remembers. We had the luxury ofconnections, and CBP matches each photo to its gallery of seeing it only recently and got a quick demo at LAX.verified passports, visa and available photos already on file. In In October 2022, PHL chose a partnership of SITA and NECless than two seconds, CBP replies to the biometric system with to supply the software and hardware components for its faciala unique identifier, which confirms the match. If the passenger recognition system. Mulhern Electric Company, a local firm with ais good to go, the camera displays a long history at PHL, led the project.green light, and the traveler walks onto the boarding bridge. SITA and NEC had both the experience and the ability to integrate into the common-use systems we already operate atSherry Stein, SITAs chief technology the airport, Mehta says. In that regard, it was a no-brainer. Weofficer for the Americas, notes that matching didnt go just for lowest cost; we wanted experience.fingerprints used to be the most reliable mechanism for border crossings, but that NEC, one of the largest biometric solutions providers in world,has changed. Over time, facial recognitionSHERRY STEIN has been in the biometrics game for more than 20 years, says Vice President of Advanced Recognition Systems Jason Van Sice. In 2009, NECPlanning and Design|Program & Construction Managementwas recognizedFacilities Management|IT|Asset Managementwith top marks for its still image face recognition technologyArora is proud in benchmark testing of biometricsto provide project technology conductedJASON VAN SICE management support by the U.S. National Institute of Standardsfor the implementation and Technology. Two key metrics for theof cutting edge facial companys high ranking are a low falsebiometric technology acceptance rate, or what NEC explains asfor 25 gates in the percentage of imposter users identified as genuine users and a low false rejectionTerminals A-East and rate, which is the inverse measure. NECA-West at Philadelphia achieved 0.1% for the first category and 2%International Airport!to 4% for the second, surpassing its rivals in the marketplace. Van Sice notes that Japan-based NECLEARN MORE AT: operates in disparate industries and locationswww.aroraengineers.com/around the world, and working closely with anproject/phl-biometric-exitsaviation specialist like SITA makes sense. We are very careful to focus on what we do well, which is why we partner with SITA, hearoraengineers.comRethinking Infrastructure|explains. NEC is providing thought leadershipAtlanta|Baltimore|Boston|Charlotte|Chicago|Dallas|Los Angelesand expertise [along with the hardware].Nashville| Miami |New York|Orlando|Philadelphia| St. Petersburg |San JoseAirportImprovement.comMarch | April 2023'