Indonesia tightens border control with SITA’s extensive biometric system

SITA today announced that its biometric border management solution, BioThenticate is being used to tighten security at Indonesia’s international borders. The system, which can match and manage up to 20 million unique biometric identities, is being rolled out at nine airports and one seaport in Indonesia by the Directorate General of Immigration at the Ministry of Law and Human Rights in Indonesia, locally known as Imigrasi, and will provide real-time matching against a biometric watch-list.

SITA’s solution is a comprehensive matching and management biometric system that allows Indonesia’s government entities to co-ordinate their border control activities across multiple departments. BioThenticate captures face and fingerprint data of arriving travellers and manages it in a person-centric database of identities. Duplicate identities are consolidated into a single person record allowing people who are claiming multiple identities to be easily tracked. This data is used by all departments to prevent identity fraud, including controlling the issue of stay permits, and managing primary line operations and illegal migrant activity.

Rudhy Chaidir, Director of Immigration Information Systems, Imigrasi, said: “In just six months, SITA has implemented this sophisticated biometrics system which allows the various departments in Indonesia to have a single, shared view of identities.

“We began at Soekarno-Hatta International Airport, Jakarta, which handles 10 million international passengers a year, and are now adding nine additional ports of entry. We have successfully worked with SITA for many years and now we have the SITA end-to-end solution which covers border management from the primary line, to passport, visa and stay permit and uses large scale, comprehensive biometric identity management. We are confident we will achieve a significant reduction in identify fraud and enable tighter security at Indonesia’s international borders.”

Dan Ebbinghaus, Vice President, SITA Government and Security Solutions, said: “Indonesia is really leading the world with the adoption of SITA BioThenticate. With our system all sets of identity data are resolved down to a unique person using biometric data and each of the Indonesian government agencies can correctly identify individuals no matter who they claim to be.

“We are confident that many countries will follow Indonesia’s lead and will realise that biometric and biographic data can be converged and used effectively across several agencies to improve border security.“

Imigrasi has used SITA solutions throughout its border management operations since 2007 including the primary immigration inspection line system at 30 ports of entry, and supporting systems to manage the Indonesian watch list. In 2010, SITA added ten-print fingerprint and face biometric capture for visitors to the primary line system, with Indonesian firm, Sigma Cipta Caraka, helping to deploy the system at ports of entry. Now with the full deployment of BioThenticate, Imigrasi has added a comprehensive capability for large scale matching and management of biometric identities.

SITA partnered with NEC Asia Pacific to deliver a highly accurate and advanced matching engine for fingerprint and facial biometric data to minimize the time required for passenger processing at Indonesia’s borders. NEC’s fingerprint and facial recognition technologies are among the world’s best in biometrics authentication, as demonstrated through independent testing carried out by the US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST).

Indonesia, the world’s fifth most populous nation, is among more than 15 countries that benefit from SITA’s advanced border management solutions including Australia, Bahrain, Canada, Kuwait, New Zealand, Spain, South Africa and the United States of America.

SITA was the first IT solutions provider to deliver border management solutions to strengthen borders at airports and is the only one that serves airlines and governments on every continent. Today more than 200 airlines use SITA to submit millions of records every week to governments around the world to meet a variety of legal requirements, making SITA the leading provider of border management solutions for both government and airlines.