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You could soon have your passport on your smartphone

You could soon have your passport on your smartphone

8 months ago

You could soon have your passport on your smartphone

8 months ago


If you’ve ever got yourself into a panic thinking you’ve forgotten your passport on the way to the airport, then take a deep breath and read this.

De La Rue, the world’s biggest passport producer which also prints British banknotes, is working on technology to store passports on smartphones.

border control check passports
(Steve Parsons/PA)

The e-passports could be used in a similar way to mobile boarding cards which can be stored on a smartphone without the need for the printed paper version.

And since modern passports already have chips in them that digitally compare the carrier’s face to the one stored in the passport, a chip could be embedded inside a smartphone to continue to use this technology, instead of just representing a document on a screen.

people at the uk border in an airport
(Steve Parsons/PA)

However the security concerns – including the potential for forgery, issues at international barriers and the possibility of losing the mobile phone (let’s be honest, we’ve all been there) – leave some pretty big challenges up ahead.

De La Rue chief executive Martin Sutherland told The Times that it was already testing the concept of paperless passports.


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