The World Bank is providing support for the Bangladesh government in issuing 90 million digitised identity cards with robust security features through the National Identification System for Enhanced Access to Services (IDEA) project.
Establishing a secure, accurate and reliable national ID system will help provide more efficient and transparent services to the people of Bangladesh, said a World Bank press release.
The release said the Election Commission Bangladesh (EC) is implementing the project to strengthen the national identification (NID) system based on the existing internationally-accredited Voter ID database.
The World Bank is providing US$ 195 million concessional IDA credit for the project.
The project aims to strengthen the NID system to upgrade data quality, replace the existing paper ID cards with more robust national ID cards to protect the citizens from fraud and forgery and support the strengthening of an autonomous and highly efficient department to administer the NID system.
The EC is working on finalisation of a strong regulatory framework for the NID registration and verification system, which will help citizens’ access to important services in Bangladesh.
The EC will soon organise a consultation meeting to discuss the proposed amendment to the National Identity Registry Act 2010 with the key stakeholders. The EC and the Bangladesh Computer Council (BCC) have signed a memorandum of understanding on operating the NID Data Centre. UNB
