Expats to be issued new photo IDs next year

April 27, 2008

Expats to be issued new photo IDs next year

Card may also bear their fingerprint to boost national security

By Goh Chin Lian

Foreign professionals working here will get new identification cards (IDs) next year.

They will come with enhanced security features that will include their photograph and possibly their fingerprint.

Family members of these employment pass holders will also get the new IDs in a move by Singapore to further improve national security.

Another group of foreigners to be given the IDs are entrepreneurs keen to start a business here, university students on vacation work and trainees on attachment.

In all, more than 99,000 foreigners will be issued with the new IDs from next April, according to a government tender document obtained by The Sunday Times.

Their fingerprint images will be scanned and stored, but the Manpower Ministry has yet to decide if they are to appear on the IDs, said its spokesman.

Currently, these foreigners carry an employment pass - a laminated piece of paper - which bears only their personal particulars.

With the change, their IDs will be similar to the plastic cards now issued to low- or mid-level skilled workers on work permits and S-passes.

The Manpower Ministry has been issuing these IDs since 1999 to foreign workers such as maids and construction workers. The move was to arrest a spike in work permit forgeries and illegal employment, especially in the construction industry.

In future, other groups of foreigners may also be given passes with fingerprint and photo images.

The Immigration and Checkpoints Authority is also studying the possibility of introducing these features to student and social visit passes, its spokesman said.

In a statement to The Sunday Times, the two organisations said: 'As biometric technology provides a safe and secure means to identify individuals and facilitates travel, there are plans to introduce biometric identifiers for foreigners residing in Singapore on a long-term basis.'

Employment pass holders are typically high-skilled people earning at least $2,500 a month. Their family members, including parents, are given dependant or long-term social visit passes.

When contacted, some expatriates said they had no problems with being fingerprinted if that meant boosting Singapore's security.

MrIan Bain, 57, a senior librarian from Scotland, said: 'As long as I don't do anything nasty and twisted, it doesn't really matter.'

The move was welcomed by Dr Teo Ho Pin, chairman of the Government Parliamentary Committee for Home Affairs and Law.

He noted how the British authorities have arrested doctors, engineers and IT specialists for suspected militant activities.

Dr John Harrison, an expert on terrorism and homeland security at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, said fingerprinting will allow Singapore to make background checks on potential terrorists and fugitives.

However, the checks would be effective only if fingerprint databases in other countries are updated, he added.

Several nations such as the United States, Japan and Britain have started collecting fingerprints and photo images of foreigners.

Britain, for instance, will issue secure IDs with digitised photographs and fingerprints to foreigners from November.

In Singapore, foreigners like Yelisetty Venkata Kalyanna Kumar are looking forward to the new ID.

The 29-year-old IT consultant from India said it will spare him the bother of fishing out his passport to confirm his identity.

'When I buy a SIM card or apply for a credit card, they ask for my passport because my employment pass has no photo,' he said.

chinlian@sph.com.sg


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