JetBlue has started using facial recognition instead of boarding passes

Arguably it's merely been taken from us. There are plenty of who object, and the TSA is wildly unpopular. That makes little difference to the fact that the pace continues ever further. I don't mean to be defeatist, but I don't think a sternly worded letter has ever made much of a difference, and probably won't in the future.

The only caveat is that when REAL ID takes effect and entire states full of people (e.g. Arizona) simply cannot fly, maybe enough complaints will be generated to come to some compromise. I'm not holding my breath, though.

Well guess what, now private global for-profit entities will trade databases with higher granularity and quality, around the world, in the most promiscuous ways imaginable.

Ever seen pricing for mailing list leads, password databases, user id and home address mappings? Now add IMEI/GSM cellular identifiers. Now add location.

Now add your face.

All in commercial for-profit packages. Which includes private armies, investigators, credit ratings, and governments in other countries that choose to buy it up.

And oh yeah, airlines certainly do business across borders.

So think about this for a minute, before you say "big deal."

I think at Gatwick in the UK they have a similar system where they take a photo of you as you enter security and it is then checked again at the gate. It does not work well if you are wearing glasses.

I wonder if some certain styles of eye wear would make facial recognition significantly ineffective? Highly unsymmetrical with lenses opaque to IR etc.

It doesn't seem all that scary if everyone's doing it. Just look at the use of facial recognition in the movie Coco. They could have made up any magic to stop Hector from leaving, but Disney decided to teach kids that having your faced scanned when going through security is totally normal.

https://youtu.be/t9Dn4YrJGak?t=92