Thanks to a new partnership between Red Rocks and Amazon, we’re now a step closer to living in a real-life Black Mirror episode.
Fans entering concerts at the iconic Colorado open air venue can now scan their palm in lieu of tickets or digital barcodes using Amazon One, the company’s biometric technology. After purchasing a pass to any given show, ticket-holders will be able to gain entry simply by hovering their palm over a touchless Amazon One device at the amphitheatre’s gates.
An Amazon One palm reader.
Amazon
Prospective users must first enroll in the Amazon One program, which has to be done in person and takes less than a minute.
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“When a ticketholder is ready to enter the amphitheater using their palm, there is a designated entry line where Amazon One is enabled,” according to Amazon, who joined forces with ticketing giant AXS on the ambitious biometric venture. “When a fan hovers their palm over the Amazon One device, a unique palm signature is built by our computer vision technology. The service is designed to be highly secure and uses custom-built algorithms and hardware to create a person’s unique palm signature.”
Amazon One
Considering the notion that the technology is essentially just another data access point, Amazon One’s website also addresses privacy concerns. Amazon maintains that palm data is merely used to confirm identity by generating a “unique palm signature,” and the data gathered is not stored on Amazon One’s devices.
While Amazon One and its compatible devices are already in circulation at Amazon’s brick-and-mortar stores—as well as a number of Whole Foods locations—the Red Rocks partnership is the first of its kind in terms of the palm-reading technology’s intersection with the live music industry. It could ultimately prove to be a watershed moment for the entertainment industry at large, wherein myriad nightlife businesses are seeking new ways to adapt to a contactless way of life in the wake of the pandemic.
“You don’t have to fumble around with your phone,” Bryan Perez, CEO of AXS, told the Associated Press. “Your hand is always attached to your body.”
