New National Bank of Ukraine UAPassportReader mobile app scans document biometrics

The National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) announced it has released a mobile application for reading information from biometric government credentials like identification cards and passports.

“We have a good news for banks and their customers,” NBU said in a statement, as translated by Google. “The National Bank has developed a mobile app, UAPassportReader, to read information from biometric documents.”

The UAPassportReader application should make life easier for banks and their customers, according to NBU, which said, “By downloading the application on a smartphone, you can contactlessly, quickly, and simply read all the information needed to identify a client from his ID-card or the biometric passport of a citizen of Ukraine.”

On April 17, Cabinet Ministers authorized the use of electronic passports for traveling abroad and ID cards and announced a mobile app and national online Diya platform application process from June 1 as an experiment until 2022.

“The Cabinet of Ministers adopted a resolution” on the implementation of a pilot project on the application of a passport of a citizen of Ukraine in the form of an electronic card and a passport of a citizen of Ukraine for traveling abroad in electronic form, according to a statement. The Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Digital Transformation Mikhail Fedorov Mikhail Fedorov noted that Ukraine was one of the first in the world to implement a digital passport in a smartphone.

President Vladimir Zelensky also pointed out that Ukraine is the fourth country in Europe which is doing something similar, and thanked Fedorov, who spearheaded the project.

Zelensky said the government’s goal is to have its citizenry be able to vote a smartphone.

“Our goal is to make it possible for a person to fulfill all relations with the state using an ordinary smartphone and using the Internet. Including voting, and this is our dream … This is a challenge. Ambitious, but achievable, ” he said.

Prime Minister Alexei Goncharuk added that it is the government’s intent within the next three years to have all public services digitized.

The use of UAPassportReader “in banking departments, and its integration with the bank’s computer systems, will ‘make life easier’ for banks and their customers,” NBU stated, adding, however, that banks will no longer need to buy expensive equipment to read biometric information from identification documents with RFID chips, and by integrating the app into its IT network, banks will immediately be able to receive and digitally store all the necessary information about their customers.

NBU said it expects the use of UAPassportReader in bank branches, and its integration with banks’ computer systems will reduce paperwork burdens, time, and costs for financial institutions and their customers.

Bank customers who have biometric documents will no longer need to carry a paper certificate of registration, as they will have access to their data in identification documents and in biometrically embedded ID document like passports, which they can download onto their smartphone for further transfer, such as in a PDF format, NBU said in a statement.

The pilot version of the app is available for free download on the Apple App Store. NBU said it also plans to develop a similar version for Google Play.

Article Topics

biometric passport  |  biometrics  |  credentials  |  digital government  |  digital identity  |  document reader  |  government services  |  identity document  |  mobile app  |  Ukraine