Digi Yatra plans expansion to international travel with passport-based enrolment

The Digi Yatra Foundation is working on extending its decentralised digital identity platform to international air travel, with passport-based enrolment already tested and discussions under way with global aviation bodies, its Chief Executive Officer Suresh Khadakbhavi said at The Hindu Tech Summit 2026 on Thursday (February 12, 2026).

Speaking with L.V. Navaneeth, CEO, The Hindu Group, during a fireside chat on ‘Data Privacy & Security in Biometric Travel Platform’, Mr. Khadakbhavi said the planned feature would allow passengers to share verified digital credentials with both departure and destination airports, enabling seamless travel without repeated identity checks. “If you are travelling from Chennai to London, you can share credentials at Chennai, enjoy a seamless process, and when you reach London, you do not have to stand in two-hour queues again for immigration,” he said.

Explaining the origins of Digi Yatra, Mr. Khadakbhavi said he had earlier been part of an advisory group for One ID, a global seamless air travel initiative, where discussions focused on privacy-preserving technologies and self-sovereign identity. Self-sovereign identity, he said, meant that individuals remained in control of their identity data, which led to the decision to build a decentralised ecosystem rather than a centralised identity platform.

Under the Digi Yatra model, enrolment is a one-time process, using Aadhaar-based verification. Users authenticate via an OTP at the airport verifier, after which limited KYC data — name, date of birth, gender, photograph, and the last four digits of the Aadhaar number — is retrieved. Mr. Khadakbhavi said this was significantly less information than what is routinely shared in other settings, such as hotel check-ins.

To prevent misuse, the platform incorporates liveness detection and facial matching. A live selfie is captured and matched with the KYC photograph, after which the Aadhaar-linked image is discarded for privacy reasons and only the verified selfie is retained. Acknowledging the growing sophistication of deepfake technologies, he said multiple safeguards were built into the system.

Decentralised system

Addressing concerns around data security, Mr. Khadakbhavi said Digi Yatra follows a decentralised architecture in which credentials reside on users’ own devices rather than in a central database. As a result, any attempt to breach the system would require compromising individual devices rather than a single repository.

He said the platform has 21 million app users across Android and iOS, with the number of uses reaching nearly 85 million over a three-year period. On average, around 30-35% of domestic air passengers use Digi Yatra, while adoption has crossed 60% at some airports and terminals.

Data security measures include encryption of data in transit using TLS 1.3 and encryption at rest using AES-256. Session tokens generated during enrolment are stored locally and expire after 90 days of inactivity.

Mr. Khadakbhavi said the long-term objective was to eliminate the need for carrying physical identity documents and extend the identity ecosystem beyond airports to hotels, cab services, and other touchpoints.

Responding to a question from the audience on name mismatches, where Aadhaar permits initials while passports and airline tickets require fully expanded names, Mr. Khadakbhavi said this was a major operational challenge.

To address this, he said multiple alternatives were being enabled, some of which were already live. These include validation through driving licences and password-based enrolment that captures the full name. Support for PAN cards and other digital identity documents, he added, would be rolled out soon to ensure consistent name validation across platforms.