Paper passenger information cards on plane flights to go digital
Paper cards for passengers arriving in Australia will be ditched in favour of a digital system to speed up coronavirus contact tracing and help health authorities verify vaccine certificates.
NSW
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Paper cards for passengers arriving in Australia will be ditched in favour of a digital system to speed up coronavirus contact tracing and help health authorities verify vaccine certificates.
As international borders start to reopen, people travelling to Australia will be able to complete a new Digital Passenger Declaration on their mobile device or computer, making the process faster and more accurate.
The digital process will be easily integrated into COVID-19 contact tracing systems, and could also be used for people to upload a vaccine certificate in the future if they become available.
Currently passenger contact information is collected on paper cards, then scanned and processed manually.
The slow system has hampered contact tracing efforts, with basic issues such as illegible handwriting stopping health authorities from alerting passengers about potential COVID-19 exposure.
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The new digital system would be built as a reusable “permissions capability” that could one day be applied to multiple types of licences, registration, permits and accreditation.
The Department of Home Affairs will also develop a digital visa in the hopes Australia could progressively move away from paper visas.
Acting Immigration, Citizenship, Migrant Services and Multicultural Affairs Minister Alan Tudge said the new capability would help Australia “reopen to the world”.
“This capability will put us in a prime position to successfully reopen our borders in a COVID-safe way to help with the rebuilding of Australia’s economy,” he said.
“On top of that, it will significantly streamline our national response to COVID-19 and our contact tracing capabilities by speeding up information collection and processing.”
Mr Tudge said the new system would “strip away” the need to scan paper cards.
“It will facilitate data sharing between state and territory health departments and enable swift verification of information provided by passengers,” he said.
“In the future, collection and verification of information will assist in managing risk at the international border when international travel returns.”
Government Services Minister Stuart Robert said the digital system would be the foundation for many future uses.
“Our goal is for people and businesses to access government services as easily as they can and with as little intervention as possible, just like when you do online shopping or banking,” he said.
“The new Digital Passenger Declaration will do just that and help us re-open borders in a safe and responsible way.”
The digital passenger arrival system will be increasingly used as Australia opens up its borders to other countries, a process that began on Friday with the arrival of three planes from New Zealand in Sydney as part of the “trans-Tasman bubble”.