Pakistan launches bid process for 22M biometric national ID cards

Pakistan is running a tender to procure 22 million pre-personalized smart cards with fingerprint biometrics for its national digital ID program through the National Database and Registration Authority.

NADRA will accept sealed bids for the Computerized National Identity Cards (CNIC) contract up until October 10, and is holding a pre-bid meeting on September 17 at its headquarters in Islamabad.

Pakistan’s government has acknowledged the need to reduce wait times for CNICs, but a proposal to engage union councils for CNIC issuance and renewals was declared impractical due to resource constraints earlier this year.

The polycarbonate smart cards must store biometric templates for all ten of the bearer’s fingers to support matching on-card for both identity verification (1:1) and identification (I:N). The algorithms used must have passed NIST’s MINEX III interoperability tests and be compliant with Oracle Java Card Platform Biometric API specifications. The provider must also have ISO 27001, ISO 9001 and Visa or Mastercard certifications, and manufacturing cannot be subcontracted, the bid documents state.

After the cards are procured, they will be personalized with chip encoding and laser engraving using automatic modular personalization systems from Muhlbauer and Datacard.

Bidders are required to provide 500 sample cards, and the successful bidder will then be asked to produce 5,000 samples for testing. They are also asked to provide supporting documents for national ID card projects carried out within the last seven years.

An assistant director of NADRA was arrested just weeks ago for issuing fraudulent national ID cards to Afghan nationals.

Article Topics

biometric identification  |  biometrics  |  digital ID  |  fingerprint biometrics  |  identity document  |  NADRA  |  Pakistan  |  tender