EU gives thumbs-up to biometric passports

Ministers of European Union member states on Tuesday agreed to introduce biometric passports.

The first biometric passports are due to arrive in 18 months and will initially store facial characteristics of the bearer.

In three years Europeans will also have to provide a fingerprint. Both facial and fingerprint data will be stored on an embedded chip, along with a digital copy of the bearer's photo.

The decision, made at a meeting of interior ministers in Luxembourg, is not yet final. Austria, Finland and the Netherlands have voiced minor concerns about the current proposal but they will probably not turn out to be insurmountable obstacles.

The European push for biometrics is heavily influenced by a United States policy change for passports for people from 'visa waiver' countries after the 9/11 attacks. US plans to introduce a biometric passport requirement by this fall for these countries were widely seen as unrealistic.

However, by 26 October next year, all visitors from these countries will have to provide a machine-readable passport with biometric data.

Lars Pasveer writes for ZDNet Netherlands.