Republic Act No. 11055, otherwise known as the Philippine Identification System Act, signed into law in August 2018, established the PhilSys as a foundational identification system for all citizens and resident aliens of the Republic of the Philippines. The valid proof of identity provided by the PhilSys shall be a means of simplifying public and private transactions, eliminating the need to present other forms of identification during transactions with both the government and the private sector. Further, the system shall be a social and economic platform through which all transactions including public and private services could be availed of and shall serve as the link in the promotion of seamless social service delivery and strengthening of financial inclusion. It also aims to contribute in enhancing administrative governance, reducing corruption, and promoting ease of doing business.
In its approved Implementation Plan dated 06 March 2019, the project framework has brought forward four (4) outcomes to contribute in achieving the abovementioned impact. This framework was anchored to the Ten Principles on Identification for Sustainable Development Towards the Digital Age1, zeroing in inclusion through universal coverage and accessibility, design that is robust, secure, responsive and sustainable, and governance that builds end-user trust by protecting privacy and user rights.
The project aims to provide inclusive coverage as it intends to register 112 million2 Filipino citizens and 10 million overseas Filipinos, with particular focus in enabling access to the most vulnerable groups such as the poor, people living in geographically isolated and disadvantaged areas, indigenous peoples, and persons with disabilities. In order to achieve this, fixed registration centers will be established in strategic locations nationwide, complemented by the deployment of mobile registration teams in far-flung and hard-to-reach areas. The registration policies have also allowed for special arrangements among people without any documentary requirements to support their identity, removing barriers in accessing registration services brought about by the lack of identification documents.
As the foundational identification system of the Philippines, the project seeks to build end-user trust into its systems and processes and ensure that the data and rights of all citizens and resident aliens are protected from any means of exploitation. Strict data privacy policies and mechanism will be in place, including the establishment of a data governance framework to ensure accuracy and integrity of personal data throughout its life cycle within the PhilSys database. Registrant’s ownership of their personal data is a key feature of the system, with their ability to manage the use of their credentials and access their PhilSys transaction history through the web portal. Trust will further be built by implementing a wide-reaching and intensive information awareness campaign and placing effective feedback and grievance redressal mechanisms that will cater to any concerns of the public.
The PhilSys also aims to offer reliable, secure, efficient, and enabling identity authentication services through a wide array of public and private transactions within a digital ecosystem. This will utilize the PhilSys Number (PSN) as the primary credential, a unique number issued to all successfully registered individuals, to be complemented by the PhilSys ID (PhilID) with a corresponding PhilID Card Number (PCN) that can also be used in transactions. Multiple methods of authentication (i.e., Yes/No authentication, e-KYC, and OTP) and modes to promote convenience such as the introduction of virtual ID will be enabled at launch. As a way to ensure data privacy and protection within the digital ecosystem, backend PSN tokenization will also be enabled to hide the PSN as information from the authentication transaction is seeded to the databases of relying parties. Furthermore, a transition plan to shift the physical PhilID in favor of digital forms (i.e., virtual ID and mobile ID) will be developed and implemented as the system reaches its steady state.
A robust and sustainable PhilSys will be established by maintaining a strong governance of PhilSys and continuing strong cooperation and coordination among stakeholders in implementing the project through a whole-of-government approach. As a matter of priority, development of organizational structure and back-office business processes for the PhilSys that are fit-for-purpose will be quickly pursued, and that necessary technical and professional capacities of PSA staff are immediately built to enable the establishment of a strong and secured system and operations for PhilSys. The foundation for Philsys is MOSIP (which is a fully vetted DPG)
MOSIP is a modular and open source identity platform that helps user organisations such as Governments implement a digital, foundational ID in a cost effective way, while embracing the best practices of scalability, security and privacy harnessing the power of open source.
Being modular in its architecture, MOSIP provides lot of flexibility in how they implement and configure their foundation ID system. It is a unique, universal, and progressive digital identity system which is also an open source platform that nations can reuse freely and build their own identity systems.
<aside> 📌 Philsys is already deployed nationally. A community of practice is being developed. Partnership with academe is also being pushed.
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