Review: UKPS Iris Recognition Immigration System
I found myself with some time to kill in London Heathrow's Terminal 2 departure lounge this week, when I stumbled across a small office discretely labelled 'IRIS'. My interest aroused, I stuck my head round the door to see what was in there, only to be welcomed in by a Home Office official.
This was one of the enrolment centres for the Iris Recognition Immigration System, a scheme of which I was previously unaware. The scheme comprises electronic gates at passport control, and is pitched as a way to avoid lengthy queues. I figured that I'll try anything once except for incest and morris dancing, so I decided to give it a go.
The officials took a mag-stripe and visual scan of my passport to confirm its validity. They then sat me in front of the enrolment scanner. This required about 5 attempts to capture an iris image, the key problem was getting my head the correct distance from the scanner (this isn't as easy as it looks). A photo was then taken, and I was issued with an instruction leaflet and a receipt for my data. That was it.
On my return to Heathrow, I made a bee-line for the Iris immigration gate, which allowed me to bypass the queue. Step through the barrier, and it closes behind you; look into the scanner and get your head the correct distance from it (this time round it seemed to be less sensitive); the green light lit up and through I went.
Now this is interesting: in the absence of presenting a passport, boarding pass or other ID, the system had to singulate my iris from its entire database. My user number suggests that they have in the region of 6,000 people enrolled in the scheme, and this should be well within the capabilities of the technology, but I'd be curious to know how far this could be scaled up.
What about privacy for this? Well, the accompanying blurb provides assurances that whilst data may be shared within government for operational purposes (theoretically no different from the current passport scan), but that the iris images and templates will NOT be disclosed. The data retention policy is one of six months, with assurance that data will be destroyed at that point if the user has not used the system or has notified UKPS of a change in immigration status.
I guess I'd prefer to see the iris image stored in a card held by the user, rather than a central database, but overall I'm comfortable with this as an immigration mechanism compared with the current controls. The card would also serve as a useful backup when the system is down: at present, I'm still going to have to carry my passport in case the trial is closed when I arrive at Heathrow next time and can't board the flight through lack of adequate ID. Let's see how the e-Borders programme addresses this one...
2:10:40 PM 
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