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Russian Passports to Bear 3D Photos
// And fingerprints
Informational Security
Russian foreign-travel passports and visas for foreigners will include biometric information beginning in 2007. This will be the largest IT project ever undertaken in Russia, with a budget, announced Friday on the interagency level, of 14 billion rubles, that is, $500 million. Information security specialists say the expense is justified. Otherwise, within a few years, Russians will be unable to fly on international airlines or enter a number of countries.
A biometric document is one that confirms the holder's identity with his of her unique physiological characteristics. That is a two- or three-dimensional photograph, fingerprints, and retinal information. The administration's order approving “The Conception for the Establishment of a State System for Preparing, Creating and Controlling Passport and Visa Documents of a New Generation” was published on March 17, 2005. Under the conception, everyone crossing the border of the Russian Federation should have documents with biometric information by 2007.
The $500-million system is to be a unified network of 8000 passport and visa offices, border crossing points and Foreign Ministry consular offices (under the administration's order, visas issued to foreigners are also to bead biometric information). One of the most important elements in the system will be the personalization center, where all the biometric data will be stored and recorded onto chips to be mounted in the new passports. It is assumed that those wishing to obtain the new passport can apply for it at the passport and visa service at local police stations. There, the citizen will be photographed with a digital camera, and the photo and necessary information will be sent to the personalization center. There, the information will be recorded onto a chip in the passport and the finished document will be mailed back to the police. “By our calculations, such a process will not slow down, but, on the contrary, speed up the issuing of passports because of its automation,” Alexander Pankratov, deputy head of the Federal Service for Informational Technology, said.
This week, representatives of the Information Ministry, Interior Ministry, Federal Migration Service, FSB, Transportation Ministry, Defense Ministry, Ministry of Industry and Energy, Economics Industry and others (14 state agencies in all) examined the financial underpinnings of the program. Pankratov told Kommersant that the drafters of the plan foresee spending about 14 billion rubles to have things ready by 2007. “Funding will begin in June of this year. The reconciled financial information will be submitted to the administration in May,” he said, adding that the first competition for contractors will take place this summer, after the technical aspects of the project have been finalized.
The drafters suggest that a large part of those 14 billion rubles should go to the Federal Border Service and Federal Migration Service. The funds will go to buy components for the computer system, digital cameras, biometric information readers and communications channels. The Ministry of Information and Communications will be in charge of creating the telecommunications infrastructure. The Transportation and Agriculture Ministries will get come of the money because those ministries also issue international documents, the sailor's passport in particular.
It has been noted that the project is being carried out on a scale unprecedented for the Russian government IT project. Only the “Electronic Russia” project, as part of which the state is to spend $2.4 billion on its hi-tech infrastructure, can be compared with it. That program is ongoing until 2010 and consists of many sub-programs, none of which have a budget as large as that of the biometric control program.
Information security and systems experts say that the scale of the Russian project is in keeping with world practice. “The Russian biometric project is comparable in its budget to programs in the world's most developed countries. For comparison, the United States budgeted $400 million for a system to fingerprint foreigners and create biometric passports,” said Sergey Sopelnikov, vice president for development of the Kvazar-Mikro Co. “The project is unavoidable. In a few years, they won't let Russians into many countries without biometric passports.”
The U.S. and Russia are not the only countries with such projects. In 2006 or 2007, biometric passport control will appear in the European Union and the EU is also planning to provide its citizens with biometric passports. The budget for that project will be $5-10 billion. Moreover, the International Civil Aviation Organization is insisting that all air passengers, without exception, have biometric passports. The lack of an international standard for these passports is slowing work on them down, however. That standard is to be adopted in June at a meeting of the International Organization for Standardization.
Specialists have pointed out other possible problems ahead. “I am concerned that the exchange of passports will turn into the latest national campaign,” Sopelnikov said, “with lines at the passport services and other inconveniences. That should be avoided.” The Ministry of Information and Communications claims there will be no problems receiving the new passport. “The documents will be exchanged when they expire. Citizens will be able to leave Russia as usual with a biometric passport. It will only be necessary to get a new document when visiting a country that requires biometric control for entrants,” an official there said.
Valery Kodachigov
All the Article in Russian as of Apr. 22, 2005
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