Identity document verification

A method of authorising a bearer of an identity document, comprising the steps of:

• providing a decentralised identity for the bearer;
• providing digitally signed biometric data relating to the identity document to the bearer, the biometric data being signed by a trust anchor and validated as being issued to the decentralised identity, the biometric data including an image of the bearer;
• prior to the bearer travelling, providing the bearer's decentralised identity and biometric data including the image to an authority responsible for admission of the bearer for verification and, on verification, the bearer receiving an authorisation from the authority;
• on arrival of the bearer, capturing an image of the bearer;
• forming a reduced set of authorised bearers from the plurality of bearers authorised by the authority;
• matching the image of the bearer with images of the reduced set of bearers authorised by the authority;
• and
• on successful matching, granting admission to the bearer.

A system authorising a bearer of an identity document, comprising:

• an identity provider for providing a decentralised identity for the bearer;
• means for providing digitally signed biometric data relating to the identity document to the bearer, the biometric data being signed by a trust anchor and validated as being issued to the decentralised identity, the biometric data including an image of the bearer;
• means for providing, prior to the bearer travelling, the bearer's decentralised identity and biometric data including the image to an authority responsible for admission of the bearer for verification and, on verification, the bearer receiving an authorisation from the authority;
• an image capture system for capturing an image of the bearer on arrival of the bearer;
• an image matching system for matching the image of the bearer with images of a plurality of bearers authorised by the authority, the image matching system configured to form a reduced set of authorised bearers from the plurality of bearers authorised by the authority and to match the image of the bearer with images of the reduced set of authorised bearers;
• and
• a control gate for granting admission to the bearer on successful matching.

A method of authorising a bearer of an identity document to pass through an immigration control, the bearer having a pre-authorisation based on biometric data and a decentralised identity verified by the immigration authority, the method comprising:

• capturing an image of the bearer;
• forming a reduced set of authorised bearers from a plurality of bearers authorised by the authority, the reduced set being formed by a machine learning engine, the machine learning engine continuously predicting when individual bearers will arrive at the point of image capture;
• matching the image of the bearer with images of the reduced set of authorised of bearers authorised by the authority;
• and
• on successful matching, granting admission to the bearer.