Japan supporting identity system upgrades in Vietnam, Laos

Japan is providing funding and technical expertise to neighboring countries to help them upgrade their identity ecosystems, as its own digital identity program reaches an issuance milestone.

The Japanese government is supporting Vietnam with funding to the tune of JPY 500 million (US$3.2 million) for a project to upgrade the country’s dedicated data center for its civil registration database.

Japan’s Ambassador to Vietnam, Ito Naoki, and Vietnam’s deputy Minister of Public Security, Lt Gen Nguyen Van Long, recently signed a diplomatic note in this regard, as reported by Voice of Vietnam.

The funding is a grant which will enable Vietnam get new equipment for its “national population database center” with features including the possibility for interoperable population data and information sharing transactions among government ministries, agencies and departments which currently manage siloed databases.

The Japanese envoy said the donation is a “significant opportunity” for Vietnam to carry on with its digital transformation efforts and officials hope it will help the government cut down the cost of data management infrastructure.

“We believe that the donation of materials and equipment to the national population database center will provide a significant opportunity for Vietnam to reform and aim for development in this new era. We look forward to further strengthening our cooperation,” Ambassador Naoki is quoted as saying.

Vietnam’s government says the population center infrastructure upgrade is a crucial step in enhancing the effective management of citizen information.

The national population data center is part of a draft Data Law that was introduced by the government in March. It hopes to complete work on the project by 2025, with the data law itself expected to be operationalized a year later.

Vietnam considers digitization as one of the pillars of its journey toward a developed country by 2045. The country is in the process of streamlining government processes and facilitating access to public services through the integration of a biometrics-based digital ID whose legal framework went active on July 1.

Across the border, Laos is setting up a national digital identity, supported by funding from Japan’s Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications. The country will work with Japanese companies to do so, The Laotian Times reports.

Japan-based companies like NEC, Ryobi Systems and J&C are all involved in building the digital identity system, which is being managed by the Digital Government Center run by the Lao Ministry of Technology and Communications. NEC Asia-Pacific is also playing a major role in upgrading Vietnam’s national ID program under Project 06.

The two countries collaborated to hold a workshop presenting experiences and lessons from several countries that have stood up digital identity systems. These included insights into the importance of identity verification for public services, and discussions of the services needed by different sectors that can benefit from digital identity verification, according to the report.

Laos plans for its digital identity to be used by both the public and private sector, replacing ad-hoc verification systems based on email and social media accounts.

Registrations are already underway in the Laotian capital of Vientiane, which will continue through December.

Over 100M My Number cards issued in Japan

While Japan donates to support digital transformation projects in partner countries, it is also driving its own transformation back home.

The My Number digital ID card which the government is pushing as the primary tool to access digital government services is seeing increased issuance numbers.

So far, over 100 million of the digital IDs have been issued as a cumulative total from when it was launched in 2016, per a report.

Recently, a My Number digital ID authentication app was launched, and the government hopes it will facilitate ID authentication and enhance access in healthcare, insurance, pharmaceutical and other sectors.

The Japanese government has been making efforts to popularize My Number card as a replacement for health insurance cards, but there has been a pushback from some citizens. In response, the government has had to use incentives to drive card acquisition and expand its use cases.

Article Topics

biometrics  |  digital identity  |  identity management  |  Japan  |  Laos  |  Laos digital ID card  |  My Number  |  NEC  |  NEC Asia Pacific  |  Vietnam  |  VNeID