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AnonTechie [soylentnews.org] writes:

from the virtual-travellers-next dept.

Australia is looking at trialling passport-less travel in a move Foreign Affairs Minister Julie Bishop predicts will go global. The idea of cloud passports is the result of a hipster-style-hackathon held at the Department of Foreign Affairs [dfat.gov.au] (DFAT), which culminated in an X-Factor style audition before the secretary Peter Varghese, Foreign Affairs Minister Julie Bishop, Assistant Minister Steve Ciobo and Chris Vein from the World Bank.

Under a cloud passport, a traveller's identity and biometrics data would be stored in a cloud, so passengers would no longer need to carry their passports and risk having them lost or stolen. DFAT says 38,718 passports were registered as lost or stolen in 2014-15, consistent with the 38,689 reported missing the previous year.

Australia and New Zealand are now in discussions about trialling cloud passports. Ms Bishop acknowledged there were security requirements that would have to be met in order to store biometrics in the cloud, but told Fairfax Media: "We think it will go global."

http://www.theage.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/australia-to-trial-cloud-passports-in-worldfirst-move-20151028-gkkkr3.html [theage.com.au]

[Also Covered By]: Australia Is Testing Virtual Passports [schneier.com]

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