Government is accelerating the processing and issuing of identity smartcards to replace the green identity document booklets and believes it can replace all identity documents within five to seven years, says Department of Home Affairs (DHA) deputy director-general for information security Sello Mmakau.

More than 450 000 identity smartcards have been processed since July last year. The three printing machines at the Government Printing Works are each able to print 1 500 cards an hour, which means that more than 60 000 identity smartcards can be printed each month.

To capture individuals’ details, government will increase the number of offices currently equipped to process smartcard applications from 70 to more than 100 by the end of the year.

These provincial offices are connected to the DHA’s central core back-end system, which allows for details to be captured and sent to the DHA’s head office for printing. Additional details can also be added to the cards at a later stage for additional applications.

“We have upgraded and automated many of our offices to capture and process biometric details, replacing the paper-based systems for passport and identity documents. We will also be working with the post office to capture identity smartcard details, owing to its national footprint, but this initiative is still in the early discussion phases.

Live Capture and Mobile Branches
“We have also gained the support of South African banks, with First National Bank being the first, that will enable their clients to submit their biometric details and smartcard applications through live capture systems at their branches. This information will then be sent to the DHA to print the cards,” notes Mmakau.

The DHA has worked closely with the South African Banking Risk Information Centre to enable this development, he notes.

The department also has 117 trucks that function as mobile branches to collect the details of people in rural and remote communities for the printing of identity booklets. The trucks are yet to be equipped to capture bio- metric signatures, which is part of the next phase of the department’s mobile branches project, he adds.

Another project in the pilot phase is an online Web-based application through which people can submit their personal details to the department. Applicants can then have their biometric signature, their fingerprints, captured at a DHA branch to enable it to print their cards.

The drivers for the roll-out of these identity smartcards are improved security of identity documents and fraud prevention. Therefore, the DHA is printing all the identity smart- cards at the Government Printing Works and then distributing the cards to the offices for collection.

“Our main aim is to ensure that the card is secure and that it can be used in myriad ways by all government departments and the private sector. Banks and municipalities already accept these identity smartcards as proof of identity, but they can also be used for healthcare programmes, social grants and housing programmes. The card has the capability to have information for other organisations added at a later stage.”

The cards have multiple security features, including markings that show up under ultra- violet light, optically variable images, fine-line background designs, an identity photograph of the individual laser-engraved onto the card and layered image printing of a security code.

“There are other security features that I cannot reveal, but our goal is to eliminate any potential security flaws or gaps that were prevalent with the old green identity booklets,” emphasises Mmakau.

In addition, the cards contain contactless microchips, which contain biometric security information, individual information and other biodata information. The cards also have two different bar codes that verify the individual’s details with the DHA’s databases.

The first bar code is similar to the bar code currently printed on green identity booklets and will work with existing identity bar code reading systems, while the second bar code is a two-dimensional image (which means the code uses horizontal and vertical lines to encode more information) which contains some of the individual’s biodata information verified with the DHA’s database.

Biometric Verification
Further, if the cards are stolen or lost, the information they contain cannot be altered or falsified, helping to reduce identity fraud because a biometric fingerprint is required to authenticate the identity of the person.

“Verification of a person’s details relies on multiple levels of security, including the image of the individual on the card, the information on the chip, the bar codes that are linked to the individual’s information held by the DHA and the biometric signature verified on site, which includes the person’s fingerprint. We designed the cards so that other information can be added for official use at a later stage.”

This broad functionality of the card, as well as its significantly higher security, compared with the green identity booklet, is one of the main benefits of using the card, avers Mmakau.

The cards are ready to be used in government initiatives, such as the South African Social Security Agency grant payment system and municipal projects, such as housing schemes. They are ready to be used for the National Health Insurance pilot programme. However, the sites that the cards are used at would require connectivity to be able to verify certain details with the DHA. The cards serve as proof of identity even without connectivity through scanners that can read barcodes.

“We invite other government departments to consider how they can use the capabilities of these cards, as well as the information that needs to be linked to these cards for new uses, such as monitoring the distribution of medicine and social grants, for multimodal public transport initiatives and for identity verification in many other applications,” he explains.

The cards were accepted as proof of identity during the past elections. Police have indicated that individuals’ gun licence information should be added to the individual’s information on the card, which was designed to enable information to be added when needed, he emphasises.

While only fingerprints are currently captured as individuals’ biometric security signatures, the DHA will also implement facial recognition and iris mapping as two additional biometric signatures in future, once the back-end capacity has been developed and the relevant equipment deployed.

“Engineers are working on the systems to add facial recognition biometric signatures as part of the National Identification System (NIS) project. Once we are comfortable with the performance and robustness of these systems, we will add them as additional signatures to the fingerprint biometric.

“We are also working with security experts at the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research to ensure that their research and development on security measures and vulnerabilities are addressed by the cards,” emphasises Mmakau.

The DHA is working on the NIS and is focusing on developing its core back-end systems that will result in improving the security of all documents at all borders, airports, harbours, banks, munici- palities, hospitals and clinics, besides others, as a robust proof of identity, he concludes.