HP Indonesia aims to help governments check IDs

Elisa Lumbantoruan smiled while holding a cafe latte.

“Of course, it’s not a new concept. People from Hewlett Packard, have explained this many times in workshops for journalists here,” said the Director of Hewlett-Packard Indonesia in response to my question.

He is convinced that a country like Indonesia needs a national identity system (NIS).
Meeting him at a cafe in Jakarta Convention Center recently, he tirelessly explained how significant this system is for Indonesia.

“Nowadays, NIS has become the key word for citizen information development,” he stated.

That’s why HP, the world’s leading IT services provider, introduced the National Identity System, which was launched globally last year, in a three-day Indonesia Infrastructure Conference and Exhibition 2006 in Jakarta recently.

“The National Identity System from HP enables the government to develop and apply a complete ICT (Information and Communication Technology) infrastructure,” said Lumbantoruan.

The HP system allows governments to build and quickly deploy a complete, standards-based and technologically agile infrastructure that meets their changing needs for security and identity management, at an affordable price.

He added that HP offers an identification device, which authenticates inhabitants’ data. It also serves as a modern system that the public can use to access government services and make secure transactions with a computer.

Recent figures from industry analyst firm, Morgan Keegan, show that the worldwide identity management market is approximately $4.8 billion and is estimated to grow to approximately $10.7 billion in 2007.

HP NIS supports both legacy and smart documents. These include passports (including e-passport or upgradeable passports), as well as smart cards (contact, contact-less or hybrid optical cards in multiple forms).

It is designed to automate processes like enrollment, validation, registration, personalization and verification.

The NIS encompasses all the essential national identification system attributes and functions, including: on-line and off-line addition of demographic and biometric data through live capture; local request, as well as regional/central verification and registration; multi-tier architecture; secure management of the document life-cycle; biometric and personalization subsystem integration; on-line and off-line identity verification; fault tolerance and disaster recovery through design.

Indeed, the need to securely identify people moving across national and international borders has never been more important than it is today.

This system could be used with an e-Passport module — a method of information management for immigration for every citizen who holds a passport.

With this system, national and non-national citizens could be differentiated; illegal immigrants could be detected; refugees and immigrants could also be monitored.

“Thus, there will be no more double-passport holders,” he explained.

HP has drawn from accumulated experiences in national identity projects around the world, including Italy, Poland, Bulgaria and New Zealand. They also, in collaboration with Microsoft, developed an adaptive NIS based on the .NET platform.

As part of working with such a wide range of customers, HP identity management solutions have spanned HP-UX, open source and Microsoft platforms, as well as HP OpenView Identity Management software and services.

“Since ICT is considered as the same as all other infrastructure areas, preparing a national identity system is just like building a road or an airport for transportation and logistics purposes. NIS could be a toll road for almost 39 government institutions in the country, which deal with the citizen database,” Lumbantoruan said.

“In Indonesia’s case, NIS is not a matter of technology anymore but a matter of regulation. For instance, if the regulation allows it, we can even do it manually,” he laughed.

When this system is applied, he explained, everyone will have a unique number, which links to their private information, such as an identity number (ID), drivers license, bank account, immigration data, insurance, and so forth.

Moreover, “this system puts Indonesia on the same level as other countries by adopting an identification standard used worldwide”, he added.

Besides, it will also support the attempts of the UN to combat post-9-11 terrorism.

The NIS allows numerous demographic information systems, such as biometrics (individual information taken from physical characteristics, such as fingerprints) to be integrated easily, so that governments can add new components effortlessly.

He added that this system also supports open and fair democracy through providing an accurate record of eligible voters.

Besides, this solution could also facilitate the services given by the government to Indonesian citizens, in order to increase income from taxes and boost business attitudes.

Lumbantoruan said, implementing a Single Identity system as soon as possible will result in the increase of public service based on the public interest to achieve people’s prosperity.

“We believe that this system can open the way for a more realistic e-Government and assist central and local governments to compete for foreign and/or domestic investors,” he said.

The national single identity concept requires the government to put the socialization of such a method at the first priority.

Therefore, it is hoped that citizens all over the country-even in the remotest areas-are well-informed with the concept and practice of the solution so that the result of such implementation could reach the preferred target of a better and improved public service.

Another solution, related to the NIS solution, introduced by HP in the event, is Radio Frequency Identification (RFID)-a device to identify an object using radio frequency.

This system is needed for various objectives, such as NIS and e-passport to support the National Identity System platform and maintain individual immigration data.

The same technology could also be applied on electronic payment systems, such as toll roads, parking, bus way ticket, train, monorail, and so on.

RFID utility was used for all participants of the Indonesia Infrastructure conference on each of their ID cards, the first time in Indonesia that this technology has been implemented in an exhibition and seminar.

Upon entering the venue, each participant could be automatically identified, from the time of arrival to personal information such as name, company and position.

Firmansyah, HP Public Sector Segment Technology Solution Group Director, told me that with Single Identity System there will be a uniform identity format in different regions.

“That is an important thing which needs to be done, so that uniformity occurs when this solution applied. Thus, different formats from different areas could be prevented,” he added.

Budi Putra (The Jakarta Post)

The writer is a journalist and author. He can be reached at his blogs, among others, http://theasiatech.com and http://3gweek.net

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