DigiYatra App’s Beta Version Successfully Launched at BLR Airport

Bangalore International Airport Ltd (BIAL) has been
pioneering the DigiYatra effort from its early concept days and pilot trials
have been held since January 2017 at BLR Airport. DigiYatra – the contactless,
seamless processing of passengers at airports, based on the use of single token
face biometrics for verification of passengers is a significant project led by
the Ministry of Civil Aviation and the Government of India.

For the first phase rollout of the DigiYatra Central
Ecosystem (DYCE), BLR Airport is one of the two selected airports in India and
passengers experienced this new-age, contactless and seamless process that
commenced on 15th August 2022.

At BLR Airport, the DigiYatra Biometric boarding
system at e-gates is operational and being rolled out at full scale for all
domestic airlines in a phased manner, covering checkpoints for domestic travel.
Passengers experienced a seamless check-in, passed through security, and
boarded their respective flights using their single token face biometric for
validating their identity and their boarding pass

Vistara Airlines and AirAsia are the two airlines that
are currently integrated with DigiYatra. Passengers can easily enroll on the
DigiYatra app from the comfort of their homes. The app is currently available
on Google Playstore for Android users, and an iOS version will be made
available in one month.

“It is our constant endeavour at BIAL to offer
innovative ways to simplify the passenger journey and make it as seamless as
possible. The Digi Yatra Central Ecosystem implementation is one more step
towards achieving this. We are glad to be part of the first phase rollout and
value the trust reposed in us by the Ministry of Civil Aviation, DGCA, and the
Government of India. As the new gateway to India, BLR Airport is keen to be at
the forefront of change and innovation,” said Hari Marar, MD & CEO
at Bangalore International Airport Ltd. (BIAL).

The DYCE is being built on the standards defined by
the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) which include Self Sovereign Identity (SSI)
with Verifiable Credentials (VCs), Decentralised Identifiers (DIDs) with a
trust layer of a Distributed Ledger and ensuring adoption of Privacy by Design
and Privacy by Default as the fundamental tenets. This ensures privacy issues
are taken care of and passengers will not have to worry about sharing their
data as it is secure and will be deleted after 24 hours following their travel.

DYCE is the initiative of the Digi Yatra Foundation
(DYF) which was set up as a joint venture company in 2019, and BIAL is one of
the key shareholders. The DigiYatra Foundation will be a pan-India entity and the
custodian of the Passenger ID validation process.