Building a Covid Travel Passport Is a Serious Tech Challenge
Systems need to be secure, protect privacy, and be able to talk to each other.
When Philippe Srour and his wife, Laurence, took an Air France flight to Paris from San Francisco in mid-March, they were given a novel opportunity to escape some of the madness of pandemic-era travel. In exchange for the promise of less hassle at border and security checks, the couple agreed to use a mobile app to display their Covid-19 test results. The trial wasn’t a total success. Srour, an engineer by training, initially couldn’t get the app to work, because it wouldn’t accept his leap-year date of birth: Feb. 29. Although the airport verification steps ultimately went smoothly, the glitch showed that the AOKpass system from travel-security company International SOS “might need a little more attention,” Srour said after stepping off his flight in Paris.
While the Srours uncovered a relatively minor bug in the AOKpass, the incident highlights how the digital vaccination and testing apps being rushed to market remain works in progress. And new ones, from the European Union’s planned Digital Green Certificate to the International Air Transport Association’s Travel Pass or CommonPass, backed by the World Economic Forum, keep emerging.