UN recommends Nigeria combine its biometric platforms to improve efficiency
The UN recommended Nigeria to combine its multiple biometric platforms to improve the overall efficiency, according to a report by Daily Trust.
The UN Deputy Secretary-General, Amina Mohammed, made the recommendation Friday when she received Nigeria’s delegates to the 50th session of the UN Commission on Population and Development in New York.
Mohammed said that a central body for the biometrics would help reduce the costs of the current system and make it more manageable.
“I would raise one concern and that is that in Nigeria we have a multiplicity of platforms that are doing a biometrics on everything; that is not efficient,” Mohammed said. “It is not cost-effective and there should be a better way for us, to say that, you have the banks taking everybody’s biometrics, immigration is doing it. I mean everybody is doing.
“By the time we went through it, there must be some basis that we can take and centralize that in some way and give it the premise for everybody’s biometric. So may be in a sense, the argument should be who should hold that responsibility of having the main frame and everyone now comes on and takes off their data for their constituency or their purpose.”
Nigeria has launched biometric initiatives in recent years including an eID program, an electoral initiative and a bank verification number that aims to combat fraud and identity issues.
In September 2015, the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) began collaborating with other federal agencies to consolidate their biometric data storage to avoid any duplication.
Previously reported, Safran Identity & Security recently renewed its service and maintenance contract with the NIMC, which includes the upgrade of the existing automatic biometric identification system (ABIS).
This operation will help support the Commission’s overall objectives in its harmonization of existing databases of Nigeria’s federal agencies.
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