At Cypher 2024, DigiYatra revealed its plans to launch a multilingual AI-based chatbot to enhance the passenger experience. “Our multilingual AI chatbot will have text, voice and video support for app users, besides query response and bot-guided enrollment,” said Ram Kunchur, former head of product innovation at DigiYatra Foundation.
As Kunchur pointed out, DigiYatra will provide voice and video support, besides text, in multiple languages, transforming user experience like never before. This upcoming chatbot will be LLM-based with defined boundaries around the data points, questions and topics for the bot to focus solely on relevant information.
By doing so, the company aims to become the “travel stack of India”, encompassing ID verification for travel, transportation, tourism and hospitality.
“It’s not the traditional FAQ. We feed the answers, and it gives you those answers. It won’t say, ‘Okay, please reach out to a human agent’,” Kunchur said.
But, DigiYatra Stores Personal Data
It has been two years since DigiYatra adopted the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) standard for self-sovereign identity, a technology that integrates verifiable credentials, decentralised identifiers, and a trust layer on a distributed ledger.
This framework forms the crux of its blockchain network, enabling the issuance of verifiable credentials that can be securely shared with airports. “So technically, even Digi Yatra doesn’t know who uses DigiYatra, because we don’t store your data. It’s stored only in your own wallet, and you’re in control,” explains Kunchur.
DigiYatra’s decentralised ID management has completely revolutionised and changed the way data is being stored. Kunchur said that facial recognition technology is the future of authentication and emphasised the need to spread awareness among citizens to combat cybercrime.
Keeping this in mind, DigiYatra is actively working towards a future that will use a verifiable credential system eliminating the risk of presenting Aadhaar or another form of ID—unmasked and unencrypted.
In a past interview with AIM, Pramod Verma, chief architect of Aadhaar, had said, “Ten years later, you will start seeing better quality cameras. You can tear your Aadhaar card away as there is nothing called original; your face will be your identity.”
DigiYatra’s Next Big Development
This brings us to the next phase of DigiYatra which will involve international travel, allowing passengers to use the same touchpoints for both domestic and international boarding passes before proceeding through immigration. It will also use electronic passports for international travel.
The team is currently aligning with IATA’s One ID for global interoperability, aiming to deliver a seamless process for international travel and working on implementing this system for international flights.
However, such an initiative requires significant technological scalability, including the integration of passport data, as the system does not store passports but relies on machine-readable zone (MRZ) data for facial comparison. It also involves extensive work and strategic thinking to ensure its smooth functioning.
Once operational, it is expected to be user-friendly, allowing travellers to enrol easily and use a passport-based verifiable credential. This credential can be used globally, so passengers landing in destinations like the UAE can use the same token for hassle-free processing through their touchpoints, and vice versa.
DigiYatra believes that the international ecosystem will function seamlessly with ID validation services leveraging DigiYatra’s identity credentials. Travellers have to simply scan a QR code and match their live face with the reference photo.
The company is optimistic about its future, offering a simple, safe, and secure experience. Incorporating an encrypted, time-based dynamic QR code will play a major role in constructing a truly decentralised solution. Kunchur promises that these advancements are in progress and should be available soon.
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