Travelers holding electronic tickets perform most of the functions that used to be handled by the airlines, including in many cases booking their flights at a Web site, printing their itinerary, checking in for their flights online and printing a boarding pass from an airport kiosk.

Many people prefer it that way, but those who don't will still have the option of booking through a travel agent or airline sales representative.

Lorne Riley, an IATA spokesman, says electronic tickets are more secure than the paper variety, which can be easily forged. Mann notes that many foreign countries require travelers to present a ticket for either onward or return travel to gain entry. Riley said printed itineraries are accepted in most cases as proof of electronic ticket-based travel plans.

Most airlines have already mostly phased out paper tickets — AMR's Smith estimates that more than 98 percent of American's tickets are electronic — so the IATA move largely just codifies an industry shift that has already occurred.

Some smaller airlines will likely stick with paper ticketing, for now.

''It's ones for whom moving to a fully electronic system doesn't make economic sense,'' such as small regional carriers that fly a few thousand customers a year, who will keep issuing paper tickets, Mann said.

''Some carriers ... they'll just continue to provide their own solution,'' said Riley.

Indeed, the IATA's move applies only to the 70 to 75 percent of overall airline tickets. The IATA does not represent low-cost carriers such as Ryanair Holdings PLC and Southwest Airlines.

''We do not have any plans of eliminating paper stock,'' said Jeannine Rahe, a spokeswoman for the Airline Reporting Corp., or ARC, a separate organization that processes 169 million airline transactions, including tickets and exchanges, each year.

Still, Rahe said 96.8 percent of the tickets ARC processes are electronic.