Dubai smart gate: breeze through border control in 20 seconds

Dubai: The General Directorate for Residency and Foreigners Affairs is to launch a ‘smart’ service to ease travellers’ entry and exit across the boarders of Dubai. Smart Passenger will allow them to sign in through an eGate without the need to show their passport or ID.

Travellers do not need to undergo prior registration with the Directorate as needed by the older e-gates. “This is one of the smart applications we are working on to transform Dubai into a smart city,” Major General Mohammad Ahmad Al Merri, director-general said.

“This will not only cope with the e-Transformation initiatives but meet requirements to increase the number of tourists to Dubai by up to 20 million in 2020. Dubai is transforming into a smart city and we have to cope with this by adopting smart ideas and applications.

The new service will be in trial mode for the first 12 months and fully in place after 18 months. Dubai has over 100 e-gates and last year the number of users reached 340,473.

A system upgrade will be installed into the e-gate that would allow the identification of passengers by getting their biometrical scan once they walk in.

The smart gate will work on e-passport, identity card, Emirates’ gate card or smart phone applications and take 20 seconds to proceed with the transaction.

Emaratech is helping with the deployment of the new project.