National Database and Registration Authority

National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA)
Agency overview

Formed	March 10, 2000 (2000-03-10)
Type	Government database
Jurisdiction	Constitution of Pakistan
Headquarters	Islamabad, Islamabad Capital Venue
Motto	Empowerment through Identity
Employees	17,000
Agency executive	Usman Mobin, Chairman
Parent department	Ministry of Interior
Website	www.nadra.gov.pk

The National Database and Registration Authority, Pakistan (Urdu:نادرا; reporting name: NADRA), is an independent and autonomous agency under Ministry of Interior and Narcotics Control, Government of Pakistan that regulates government databases and statistically manages the sensitive registration database of all the national citizens of Pakistan.^[1]

It is responsible for issuing the computerized national identity cards to the citizens of Pakistan, maintaining their sensitive informational upgraded in the government databases, and securing national identities of the citizens of Pakistan from being stolen and theft.^[2] It is one of the largest government database institution, employing more than 11,000 people in more than 800 domestic offices and five international offices.^[2] It also claims to hold the record for maintaining the largest biometric database of citizens in the world.^[1]

Codified by the Second Amendment, §30 of the Constitution of Pakistan in 2000, the constitution grants powers to NADRA to enact civil registration and sensitive databases of Pakistan's citizens; all databases are kept in extreme secrecy and security to ensure the safety of its citizen's databases. As of present, it is currently directed and headed by Usman Yousaf Mobin who was Chief Technology Officer of NADRA and now appointed as the Chairman.^[3]^[4]

History

After the independence of Pakistan, Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan launched the Personal Identity System (PIS) program to register, manage and issue national identification cards to all the citizens of Pakistan and Muslim refugees settling in Pakistan. Changes were carried out by Election Commission of Pakistan in 1965 for the process of the voter's registration to hold the nationwide 1965 presidential election. In 1969–70, the amendments in the PIS program continue by the Election commission until the election commission supervised the 1970 general elections.

After the 1971 war resulted in East-Pakistan gaining independence as Bangladesh, a new statistical database system was needed to ensure the safety of Pakistan's citizens as well as the national security of the country.^[5] In 1973, a new database system was codified under the Second Amendment, §30, of the Constitution of Pakistan to perform and contain the statistical database of the citizens of Pakistan. Registration of Pakistan's citizens and statistic database in government's computer accounts was started in 1973, with the promulgation of the constitution of the country. This new program was visioned and started by then-Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.^[5]

In 1973, in a parliamentary session, Bhutto stated in parliament to the people of Pakistan, "due to the absence of full statistical database of the people of this country, this country is operating in utter darkness".^[5] The government started issuing the National Identity Card (NIC) numbers to its citizens and started to establish government databases of the people in the government computers.^[6]

National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) was established on March 10, 2000, by merging Directorate General of Registration Pakistan, a department created under the 1973 constitution, with the National Database Organization (NDO), an attached department under the Ministry of Interior, Government of Pakistan created for the 1998 census. NADRA is an autonomous body to operate independently with the mandate to replace the old directorate general of Registration with a computrised system of registering 150 million citizens, NADRA launched the Multi-Biometric National Identity Card project developed in conformance with international security documentation issuance practices in the year 2000. The program replaced the paper based Personal Identity System of Pakistan that had been in use since 1973. To date, over 96 million citizens in Pakistan and abroad have utilized the system and its allied services to receive tamper-resistant ISO standard Identification Documents.

Since 2004, NADRA has maintained its position among the top 50 companies of the world in the field of secure document solution integration.. NADRA not only takes pride in producing the Computerised National ID Card of Pakistan but also in producing the world’s first Machine Readable Multi-Biometric Electronic Passport.

Computerised National Identity Card

Main article: Computerized National Identity Card

CNIC

The Computerised National Identity Card (CNIC) is a computerised national identity card issued by NADRA to Pakistani citizens. The CNIC was introduced in 2000 and, by 2012, over 89.5 million CNICs had been issued.^[7]

The CNIC is issued first at the age of 18. Under Pakistani law, it is not compulsory to carry one. However, for Pakistani citizens, the CNIC is mandatory for

Voting
Opening and operating bank accounts
Obtaining a passport
Purchasing vehicles and land
Obtaining a driver licence
Purchasing a plane or train ticket
Obtaining a mobile phone SIM card
Obtaining electricity, gas, and water
Securing admission to college and other post-graduate institutes
Conducting major financial transactions

Thus, it can be seen as a de facto necessity for meaningful civic life in Pakistan.

Requirements

In Pakistan, all adult citizens must register for the Computerised National Identity Card (CNIC) with a unique number upon reaching the age of 18. It serves as an identification document to authenticate an individual's identity as the citizen of Pakistan. Before introduction of the CNIC, manual National Identity Cards (NICs) were issued to citizens of Pakistan. Today, the Government has shifted all its existing records of National Identity Cards (NIC) to the central computerised database managed by NADRA. New CNIC's are machine-readable and carry facial and fingerprint information.

Every citizen is required to have a NIC number, and the number is required for many activities such as getting a driver licence or passport, registering a vehicle, receiving social insurance/Zakat funding, enrolling in school, college or technical institute, filing a legal affidavit, wiring funds, paying taxes, opening a bank account, getting a utility connection (electricity, phone, mobile phone, water and sewer, natural gas), etc. However, since some births in the country are not registered, and some Pakistanis do not conduct any of the activities described above, a few do not have ID cards. Obtaining an CNIC also costs PKR 100 (USD 0.98), and this inevitably reduces the number of people who can afford it. In 2007, NADRA announced that it had issued 60 million CNIC (the C standing for computerised) numbers, which is approximately one-third of the population. The authority had issued the 10 millionth CNIC on February 11, 2002; 20 millionth on June 18, 2002; 30 millionth on December 22, 2003; 40 millionth on October 1, 2004; and 50 millionth CNIC on February 14, 2006.^[8]

Features

A unique 13-digit number are assigned at birth when the parents complete the child's birth registration form (Form RG-2, commonly known as B-Form), and then a National Identity Card (NIC) with the same number is issued at the age of 18. Until 2001, NIC numbers were 11 digits long. In 2001-2002, the authority started issuing 13-digit NIC numbers along with their new biometric ID cards. The first 5 digits are based on the applicant's locality, the next 7 are serial numbers, and the last digit is a check digit. The old manual NIC numbers are invalid as of 1 January 2004.

The ID card has the following information on it: Legal Name, Gender (male, female, or transgender), Father's name (Husband's name for married females), Identification Mark, Date of Birth, National Identity Card Number, Family Tree ID Number, Current Address, Permanent Address, Date of Issue, Date of Expiry, Signature, Photo, and Fingerprint (Thumbprint) NADRA also records the applicant's religion, but this is not noted on the CNIC itself. NADRA has registered over 90% of women in the Pakistani nation.

Smart National Identity Card

SNIC

NADRA introduced the Smart National Identity Card (SNIC), Pakistan's first national electronic identity card, in October 2012. Pakistan's SNIC contains a data chip and 36 security features. The SNIC complies with ICAO standard 9303 and ISO standard 7816-4. The SNIC can be used for both offline and online identification, voting, pension disbursement, social and financial inclusion programmes and other services.^[9]^[10] NADRA aims to replace all 89.5 million CNICs with SNICs by 2020.

Security features

In order to address the security concerns, NADRA have incorporated 36 security features in the physical design of the card, making it one of the securest cards in the world. The card is printed in multiple layers and each layer has its own security features. The chip is encrypted by extremely competent software developers at NADRA and secure communication protocols have been determined for being read by remote devices.

To enable remote verification of citizens a match-on-card applet has been designed by NADRA. When a citizen places their card into a card reader, the reader will first authenticate itself to the card. In return the card will verify its authenticity to the reader. If both the verifications are successful, the device will ask for a finger lpc nadra on the card. This will enable verifications of individuals in the remotest parts of Pakistan. So say in a decade when an individual casts vote, the government may ascertain that the person casting the vote is indeed the same as the one on the electoral roll. This is only one of the thousands of scenarios of identity fraud prevention that the card empowers.

A majority of the space in the chip has been made available for the private sector to use for their products and services. It might appear expensive for the private sector to use this card initially but once the number of citizens having critical mass is reached, it will be more profitable for the private sector to use this secure and universal platform.^[11]

Pak Identity

NADRA has started its service of online application for the NICOP, COP and CRC.^[12] Online data is collected e.g. fingerprints, thumb impressions and signatures. Online fee is submitted through debit or credit card. New CNIC can not be obtained yet.

Achievements

Top 50 e-Passport Technology Suppliers for 9 consecutive years in ID World Magazine, for 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009,2010,2011,2012 and 2013.
“Outstanding Achievement Award” at CARDEX Middle East in Cairo, Egypt in May, 2007.
The Merit Exporter Award by Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce & Industry (FPCCI) in 2006.
NADRA’s Chief Technology Officer, Mr. Usman Y. Mobin was awarded the “ID Talent Award” in November 2007 at the ID World International Congress held in Milan, Italy. He was recently awarded Tamgah-e-Imtiaz in 2009 for his services rendered to the state.
Successfully achieved Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) from Software Engineering Institute (SEI) Carnegie Mellon, USA.
NADRA Quality Management and CNIC Production departments are also ISO 9001:2000 Certified.
Deputy Chairman NADRA, Tariq Malik was awarded ID Outstanding Achievement Award on November 3, 2009, in Milan at an exclusive ceremony during the eighth ID WORLD International Congress, the Global Summit on Automatic Identification.