Dubai’s General Directorate of Residency and Foreigners Affairs (GDRFA) has received the Dubai-IT Award (government projects category) for its ‘Red Carpet’ smart immigration corridor at Dubai International Airport. Announced on 22 October by Crown Prince Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed, the accolade recognises a contactless biometric lane that allows up to ten passengers to clear immigration in under five seconds without presenting passports or boarding passes. The corridor, located in DXB’s busiest transfer zone, uses high-resolution facial recognition and AI algorithms to match travellers against passport and watch-list databases as they walk. GDRFA says satisfaction scores exceed 99 per cent, thanks to queue-free processing and fewer manual interventions. The system complements Dubai’s existing Smart Gates and the new ‘Click & Travel’ mobile scanner, giving the emirate a multi-layered approach to frictionless border control. For global mobility teams the benefit is tangible: employees connecting through Dubai can now schedule tighter layovers, while assignees arriving to start new roles experience a smoother entry. Airlines have welcomed the corridor, noting that reduced dwell time at immigration eases inbound connection pressure during peak arrival waves. The corridor currently serves UAE nationals and most GCC residents holding biometric-enabled passports; GDRFA plans to add additional nationalities in phases once bilateral data-sharing agreements are in place. Travellers must register a facial biometric at a standard counter or Smart Gate once; subsequent trips are automatic. Executive travellers booked on Emirates Business or First classes can already request the service via the airline’s premium-services desk. Dubai Airports estimates that scaling Red Carpet lanes across Terminals 1, 2 and 3 could lift overall passenger-throughput capacity by 15 per cent – crucial headroom as DXB targets 100 million passengers in 2027.
Source: UAE Vartha
