Electronic Boarding Passes "Print" To Wireless Devices

Passengers may soon no longer have to dig for a paper ticket, or worry about where they put their boarding passes before checking in for a flight. Continental Airlines and the Transportation Security Administration launched a program recently to test the use of electronic boarding passes on PDAs or cell phones.

The program -- the first-of-its-kind offered by a US airline -- is called, appropriately enough, the 'Paperless Boarding Pass.' The pilot program kicked off in Houston, TX, according to InformationWeek.

The program works like this. Passengers receive virtual "boarding passes" on their cell phone or PDA, which contain a two-dimensional bar code that identifies the passenger with their flight information. The code is then scanned by TSA security officers and check-in agents, similar to how paper tickets are now scanned.

In addition to eliminating the need for a paper boarding pass, officials say the technology will also cut down on passenger fraud, improve customer service and speed up the boarding process.

"The deployment of the paperless technology signifies the TSA's ongoing commitment to develop and execute new technologies within aviation while enhancing security," said Mel Carraway, TSA's general manager for field operations.

The airline and TSA worked together to develop the strategy to use the paperless process. TSA created the paperless scan process; Continental Airlines came up with a plan for encrypting the boarding passes on mobile devices.

It's not certain the program will be used elsewhere, but TSA has expressed interest to expand the use of encrypted bar codes.

In October, the International Air Transport Association introduced a global standard which lays the groundwork for a check-in procedure using cell phones, smartphones, or PDAs and two-dimensional bar codes.

The standard for a two-dimensional paper bar-coded pass was developed in 2005, and is currently used for web check-in. By 2010, all airlines must use bar coded boarding passes, removing the need for the magnetic strip technology saving the airlines $500 million a year.

FMI: www.tsa.gov, www.continental.com