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Copenhagen Airport to Track Passengers Using Wi-Fi Data

by Amar Toor on March 22, 2011 at 03:30 PM

copenhagen airport
If you ever find yourself with some time to kill at Copenhagen International Airport, there's a good chance that a company in Switzerland will know exactly how you chose to spend it.

SITA, an aviation communications and technology company based in Geneva, recently created a new program capable of tracking passengers' movements, using the Wi-Fi signals emitted from their smartphones and laptops. Each passenger is represented by a single dot, with different colors distinguishing between arriving and departing travelers.

Copenhagen International Airport will implement the program within the next few weeks, in the hopes that the information on passenger flow will help officials to improve the airport's design and to make security checkpoints more efficient. Users who download the airport's official app can also receive information on the shortest security lines, as well as promotions from nearby stores or restaurants.

"All airports are struggling with the same question -- how to get the passenger to the boarding gate while having a pleasant journey," Dave Bakker, senior vice president of SITA Global Services, told the New York Times. Bakker was quick to point out, however, that SITA's system is only capable of tracking an individual's movement, and would not gather more sensitive personal information. "We do not know who is behind an individual dot other than that it is an inbound or an outbound passenger," he explained.

Because the system can determine a person's location within a ten-foot range, retailers could also use SITA's program to offer promotions to users who download the official app. Analysts estimate these promotions could increase spending by anywhere from $5 to $10 per passenger, which may provide an extra incentive for airports to invest in costly Wi-Fi network expansion projects.

According to SITA, about 100,000 people have already downloaded the iPhone app for the Copenhagen International Airport, and the company is looking to expand the program to other airports around the world. Airports Council International says many of its members have already expressed an interest in the service, and even ostensibly rival companies have acknowledged that SITA's tracking initiative could be a game-changer.

"All of a sudden a traveler knows, 'Is the time at security 10 minutes or 75 minutes?'" said Daniel Geller, chief executive of GateGuru, a social networking app for airport passengers. "To harness all that digital information within a single application is a huge improvement. Travelers finally have an intimate knowledge of their surroundings, which is a far different experience than it was even a year ago."

Tags: airport, airport security, AirportSecurity, apps, copenhagen, copenhagen international airport, CopenhagenInternationalAirport, offer, promotion, top, tracking, travel, wifi

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