Eye-spy

We love new technology here at OT, but only if it actually works. Anyone old enough to remember Sean Connery’s ill-advised reprise as 007 in Never Say Never Again (co-starring a dodgy toupee and middle age spread) will probably recall poo-pooing the film’s use of iris-recognition technology. ‘Too far-fetched!’ we scoffed. ‘As ridiculous as an underwater car!’ said the cynics; and yet if you go down to the airport today you’ll see a dedicated lane at immigration control just for those clever clogs who’ve registered their irides (the medical plural for the iris, don’t you know). As us polloi are herded through the two available lanes (with a dozen others closed, naturally) we stare enviously as the smug iristocracy saunter into the see-through booth, the doors sliding closed behind them, before peering into the machine. And then it all goes horribly wrong. Invariably the machine fails to recognise the increasingly embarrassed person’s completely individual eye patterns, and they are trapped in the booth in full view of the chuckling crowds simply wallowing in schadenfreude. Call us vain, but until the technology is foolproof, we’d rather join a good British queue. TB