Thales awarded with £3.8m contract to secure UK biometric residence card data

Security technology firm Thales announced it has been awarded a new £3.8 million, two-year contract from the UK’s Home Office to provide it what it says is a new, fully-managed public key infrastructure shared service system (PKISS), according to a report by Government Computing.

The PKISS system effectively encrypts all biometric and biographic data received from the Home Office to generate the UK’s Biometric Residence Permit (BRP) cards, which are mandatory for all non-EU foreign nationals who want to live in the UK over a pre-determined period.

The BRP card serves as the owner’s all-encompassing proof of identification, immigration status and entitlements during his or her residence in the UK.

Thales is providing the Home Office with a solution that includes software application development and comprehensive support for all services, including service desk, event and incident management, change and release management, and an ongoing service improvement program.

The contract continues previous work the company performed on PKISS since 2008. With this most recent contract, Thales competed with several other companies to secure the bid from the Home Office’s Immigration Service.

“Winning this contract is a great result for Thales,” said Phil Naybour, vice president of secure communications and information systems at Thales UK. “We have been delivering the PKISS service to the Home Office since 2008 and this contract award clearly demonstrates the customer’s confidence in our solution and service support packages. This contract also shows Thales as a leading provider of PSN services where security is a critical element.”

Article Topics

biometric identification  |  biometrics  |  civil ID  |  immigration control  |  PKI  |  security  |  Thales  |  UK