Too much information?

The UAE national ID card is already being issued to UAE nationals. Expatriates and residents will be able to register and receive their cards from January of next year," says Liaquat Parkar, lead consultant at LogicaCMG Middle East.

The ID card Parkar is talking about, however, does not contain that regular set of information we're all familiar with such as one's nationality, date of birth, mother's maiden name, and others. This card has much more specific data about you than you've ever dreamed of carrying around in your wallet. Such cards might include up to 10 fingerprints, a digitised facial and iris scan, current and past places of residence throughout one's life, and much more, possibly reaching up to 50 categories of personal identification.

As announced by the Emirates Identity Authority (EIDA) early last month, ID cards are being issued only to Emirati government employees, starting with military staff at the Ministry of Defence, while citizens will be granted cards at a later stage. In early 2008, every expatriate in the UAE will be obliged to take an eye scan for the new ID card, which is expected to replace the driving licence, labour, residency and health cards.

The card could also be used as an e-gate card, ATM card and an e-passport when commuting between various GCC countries. Numerous governments worldwide already have national ID cards on the way to implementation, according to Parkar. This, however, is only the first step.

"A national ID card is the first step to enabling a smart society and its citizens to use their national ID cards on a daily basis to carry out daily transactions. Those daily transactions could be, for example, opening a bank account, applying for a credit card, paying for books and services over the internet, and paying for your parking - rather than putting a coin into the machine you top up the chip on your ID card and put your ID card into the machine," he says. Whereas many GCC governments have shown interest in issuing identity cards for their citizens, Parkar explains, the next challenge they face is the adoption and usage of those ID cards. LogicaCMG, covering the entire Middle East region from Dubai, says it is currently implementing one of the biggest national ID card projects for a GCC country - though, due to the sensitivity surrounding a country's implementation of biometrics, Parkar declines disclosing the identity of his client. The company is also in talks with a number of other governments in the region on helping them realise business benefits and implement processes and procedures which will enable their citizens to use ID cards on a daily basis as well as reduce the total number of cards they carry around.

With over 20 years' presence in the Middle East, LogicaCMG has only just begun to focus on biometrics in the region over the last four to five years. An international company with 40,000 staff worldwide and operating out of 41 countries, LogicaCMG's first major biometrics implementation was back in 2000 in the Netherlands, where it implemented the e-gate system for an airport in the country.

In the region, the company is mainly targeting government organisations.

"There are many ministries out there that have issues with regards to identity. What we are looking into are electronic passports, national ID cards, and border control and electronic gates. These are the three main propositions that we have for the government sectors. Propositions include electronic passports and electronic gates and they are all underpinned by biometrics, whether facial biometrics, fingerprints or irises," says Parkar.

When it comes to the private sector, LogicaCMG has more than a thing or two to offer in terms of identification systems. Having handled a number of projects outside the region before, the company is now hoping to introduce these to private corporations in the Middle East and has prepared a set of propositions around the use of biometrics.

"Some private companies might want to implement facial recognition software. For example, in a shopping mall in the Netherlands we've implemented a system where shoplifters are identified by cameras that are streaming video to our software and we're comparing photos of known shoplifters against the live screening. Then we can quickly alert security officers if known shoplifters are in that area," he says. Parkar points out that with incidents such as the Wafi Mall robbery this year, which saw a professional raid on a jewellery shop, a growing country like the UAE could make use of the benefits of this type of software.

"The software is a good means to make sure that you don't have any people that you do not want in a particular area," he says with confidence.

He adds: "The other area is with banks, we're starting now to speak to a lot of financial institutions. Just a couple of days ago there was an announcement by Barclays Bank and MCR that Barclays is going to be one of the first banks in the region to implement biometrics-enabled ATMs."