60 million eIDs yet to be delivered in Indonesia

The Indonesian Home Ministry has said that the government is waiting for a contracted vendor to finish work on more than 60 million electronic identity cards for its massive national identity program, the Jakarta Post reports.

Home Minister Gamawan Fauzi said that the State Printing Consortium Company (PNRI) has yet to manufacture 12 million cards and has more than 48 million left for printing. In December, the PNRI had finished printing 175 million cards, indicating the consortium was still on schedule.

According to the Home Minister, the firm’s contract will now be extended to Oct. 31.

The government has obtained 110 million of the 175 million printed eID cards, and has distributed 90 million to Indonesian citizens and residents.

These cards, called Kartu Tanda Penduduk Elektronik, or e-KTP for short, will be used for voter registration, passport issuance, tax payments and to verify identity for social insurance in the country. Technology for this project was supplied and implemented by a wide range of firms including L-1 Identity Solutions, HP, Topaz Systems and Biomorf. Indonesia has committed USD$600 million to support this project.

According to a recent Biometric Research Note which identifies Indonesia as the most advanced adopter of eID credentials, this exercise requires an intensive operation involving nearly 20 card manufacturing and chip encoding machines running 24 hours a day, outputting close to 8,000 cards per day.

As reported previously in BiometricUpdate.com, Fauzi has also said thousands of polygamous men in Indonesia have compromised the country’s single identification system, as men with multiple wives have tried to register more than one electronic identification card for each of their marriages.

Article Topics

biometrics  |  e-ID  |  electronic identity cards  |  ePassports  |  financial services  |  government  |  healthcare  |  Indonesia  |  KTP  |  national ID  |  social security  |  voter registration