Belgian football fans ‘face’ shorter queues thanks to biometric entry gates trial

Season-ticket holders at Belgian football club, RWD Molenbeek, will soon find it easier to enter the stands at their stadium, thanks to facial recognition technology that is set to be introduced at the turnstiles.
Although the project is still in the test phase, fans ordering their season tickets online can upload an ID photo, which will be compared in real time with images taken by two cameras installed in the season-ticket holders’ queues at the stadium entrance, allowing supporters to enter much faster.
Spectators who have forgotten their paper ticket can still enter the stadium with no problem, while those who haven’t yet uploaded a photo or who have borrowed an entry ticket, will still have to pass through the conventional gates.
The system was installed by Zetes using Panasonic facial recognition technology and is designed to further benefit season-ticket holders.
Thierry Dailly, Chairman of RWDM, said: “The detection system, with its fast and reliable data processing facility, means we can install a system to speed up entry checks to the stadium.”
Alan Wirtz, CEO of Zetes, commented: “This project is a perfect example of how we can benefit from the innovative capabilities provided by the Panasonic group. Zetes specialises in this identification technology, which has many different applications.
“We hope this project can act as a shop window for our other products.”
Supporters’ photos are scanned and stored on an RWDM server, which is not connected to the internet or to any other system and is only accessible by RWDM-authorised personnel.
Data collected by the entrance gate cameras is not recorded, guaranteeing confidentiality for all supporters, with the installation of the automatic gate scheduled for 2019.
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