We recently wrote about Nigeria's efforts to go cashless. To do this they are monetizing their biometric identity system. They are registering the SIM cards of those with smart phones who can use their phone as their identification device. Recently it was announced that they had also teamed with Mastercard to produce a card that will act as both an biometric identity card and a payment card. Their goal is that nothing will be bought or sold unless a person has a biometric ID and some sort of registered payment vehicle.
From the Financial Times:
From the Financial Times:
Nigeria signs up MasterCard to make dual-purpose identity card
MasterCard is teaming up with the
Nigerian authorities to launch identity cards that will double up as
electronic payment cards.
The credit card provider said it was
rolling out a pilot scheme that will initially target 13m people. The
project ties in with the Nigerian government’s plans to introduce
identity cards and reduce Nigerians’ reliance on cash transactions.
The dual-purpose identity and payment
card could initially be used for recipients of Nigerian state
pensions. But it is hoped it could ultimately be broadened to include
public sector salaries and other payments such as agricultural
subsidies.
Nigeria is Africa’s most populous
nation and leading oil producer with 160m people and one of the
continent’s fastest growing economies. But it has trailed Kenya, in
east Africa, in introducing a mobile banking system.
Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Nigeria’s
finance minister, said at the World Economic Forum in Cape Town that
the initiative with MasterCard would help boost financial inclusion
by bringing more people without bank accounts into the formal economy
where the vast majority of transactions are still conducted in cash.
Now the owners of the largest biometric database in the world, the Emirate Identity Authority in the United Arab Emirates, is monetizing their biometric ID card. Ali Mohamed Al Khouri, the director
general of the Emirates Identity Authority is quoted as saying "The trends show that the cards
and payment industry is going more towards convergence,
interoperability and integration." There is definitely a worldwide trend toward biometric identities. With all of the biometric IDs and databases being established, it is no longer hard to imagine a time when "no man might buy or sell" without a biometric ID. Do you believe it yet?
From The National:
Payments via Emirates ID card could be on the way
The Emirates Identity Authority (EIA)
is in talks with the Central Bank to enable financial transactions on
the ID card by 2015.
Beyond using the card as a form of
authentication and identification, the EIA is keen to give it more
functionality. It is working with both public and private sector
entities including banks and telecoms companies to make use of the
chip to enable their own services directly on to the card.
"The trends show that the cards
and payment industry is going more towards convergence,
interoperability and integration," said Ali Mohamed Al Khouri,
the director general of the EIA at the Cards Middle East exhibition
in Dubai.
"That is staggering news ... and
is prompting more integrated electronics services, which is not
limited to the internet but also to mobile and fixed phones, kiosk
machines, besides the traditional service delivery channels."
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