Thales inks contracts to provide IDs to District of Columbia DMV, Finland

Global biometrics and digital ID provider Thales says the District of Columbia’s Department of Motor Vehicles (DC DMV) will update its driver’s licenses and IDs with new security features from Thales. And in Finland, Thales was selected to supply government agencies with passports, ID cards, and residence permits that contain new security measures.

District of Columbia gets new driver’s licenses, IDs from Thales

Thales announced that it signed a seven-year contract with the DC DMV to offer a new line of laser-engraved driver’s licenses and ID cards that are more difficult to counterfeit.

Thales says the licenses and cards have laser-engraved photos within a polycarbonate card body called Multiple Laser Images, and Dynaprint, a Thales proprietary high-resolution, fine-line printing technique that generates security images. Thales adds that both of the security features are viewable when the card is tilted to different angles, and are favored by law enforcement and the TSA for being “easy to recognize yet extremely difficult to replicate.”

The company will also work to streamline DC DMV’s enrollment system for driver’s license and ID card applications.

Thales says that D.C. is now one of 12 jurisdictions in North America that use its laser-engraved polycarbonate cards, including U.S. states Alaska, Colorado, Georgia, Maryland, Texas, Wyoming, and the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and Quebec.

Finnish agencies contract Thales for IDs, biometric passports

The National Police Board of Finland says it signed a contract with Thales DIS Finland Oy to provide biometric passports, ID cards, and residence permits across multiple government agencies after a bidding round started in 2021.

The police board says the new documents were commissioned to prevent abuse and fraud, as they become more vulnerable without updates. It was also necessary as the current contract expires on 12 March, 2023. The new contract, which will be in force for five years, will include the design and implementation of new documents and their production and distribution.

The police board was the proxy for the Finnish Immigration Service, the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, and the Digital and Population Data Services Agency in the contract, which covers “Finnish passports and ID cards as well as residence cards and residence permit cards, and the verification of the correctness of the documents and their delivery.”

It is also said to cover services related to citizen certificates, temporary passport personalization devices, storage, invoicing and production reporting, and follow-up.

Article Topics

biometric data  |  biometric passport  |  biometrics  |  digital ID  |  digital ID cards  |  driver's license  |  Finland  |  identity document  |  Thales Digital Identity and Security