IDEMIA Trials Biometric Verification Program with Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. and U.S. Customs and Border Protection

IDEMIA, the global leader in trusted identities for an increasingly digital world and the country’s preeminent identity-related service provider, and Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. (RCL) jointly announced today they have completed a trial with U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) using facial recognition to validate passengers’ identities for entry and re-entry of cruise ships to further secure and expedite passenger processing at U.S. sea-ports of entry.

A “Sea Re-entry” trial, conducted at Cape Liberty Cruise Port in New Jersey, utilized IDEMIA’s facial capture and recognition solution to confirm the facial identities of individuals disembarking Royal Caribbean ships with the facial identities of ticketed passengers who boarded the ship at the start of a cruise. The trial demonstrated high quality/high speed facial matching with large passenger populations, expedited Customs egress and confirmation that individuals embarking the ship are the same as those disembarking. Surveys of disembarking passengers showed high degrees of satisfaction regarding speed of clearing customs and intuitive engagement with the facial camera.

RCL, IDEMIA and CBP jointly viewed the Sea Re-entry trials as a strong example of public-private partnership.

IDEMIA is at the forefront of the ‘Passenger Transformation. Passengers need to move safely, but also fast and conveniently through the border processes. The biometric solutions we are testing with RCL and CBP allow us to demonstrate the important technology that can be used in border management applications today in an efficient and safe manner. Facial recognition in particular is a non-intrusive way to easily and securely facilitate U.S. and non-U.S. citizens entering and exiting the country, an initiative important to the Federal government.
Bob Eckel, President of IDEMIA North America

Royal Caribbean’s commitment to providing our guests a pleasurable experience includes making the final step of clearing customs fast, secure and frictionless. The trial exceeded our expectations in terms of being able to quickly process passengers re-entering the country while at the same time addressing key border management requirements.
Captain Thomas Hinderhofer of RCL and Director of Cape Liberty Port Operations