News and insight into biometric identification and authentication

BioLink to provide security to Republic of Maldives passport

Wednesday, September 19, 2007

BioLink will integrate its fingerprint biometrics into the new e-passport issued by the Republic of Maldives. Maldives began issuing the new document in July of this year which features fingerprint and face image templates digitized and embedded into a microchip stored in the back cover. BioLink’s advanced development toolkit (BSDK) was chosen to enhance the security of the document and to follow global standards set by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).


BioLink announces integration of its innovative fingerprint biometrics in the key travel document of the Republic of the Maldives – the passport

The immigration department of the country has preferred the BioLink solution to enhance the citizens’ security following the globally accepted standards, in particular, the standard for machine-readable travel documents introduced by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).

The new passport introduced in Male on July 26, Maldives’ Independence Day, implements fingerprint and face image templates digitized and embedded into the microchip contained in its back cover and provides for quick and fool-proof identification of the citizens.

In cooperation with IRIS Corporation Berhad, our key strategic partner for civil identification projects, BioLink supplied its advanced development toolkit (BSDK) being the core of the identification component of the passport creation and issuance system. BioLink SDK, which is a smart way of building state-of-the-art security subsystems, is mostly advantageous for its compliance with major international and industry standards, namely, ISO/IEC 19794-4 Finger Image Data, ISO/IEC 19794-2 Finger Minutiae Data, WSQ, ANSI/NIST-ITL-1-2000 and ANSI INCITS 378-2004. It supports a wide range of programming languages and fingerprint scanning devices produced by various global manufacturers, thus providing flexibility and adaptability of systems based on BSDK.

Piotr Pertsov, Director of Business Development in BioLink, says: “Our accumulated experience and expertise in similar nationwide identification projects allowing building collaboration with government customers in the most convenient and smooth way. We are grateful to IRIS supplying inlays for the microchips contained in the new Maldivian passport for introducing our biometrics to another nation striving to follow the most innovative identification trends worldwide”.

About BioLink BioLink, a leading provider of biometric identification solutions, develops, manufactures, and markets advanced fingerprint biometric products. The Company’s products and services form the core of biometric identification and authentication solutions for all scale civil identification, access control and information security applications. BioLink’s solutions provide the optimal total cost of ownership in the industry and are being implemented by corporate and government entities worldwide.

About IRIS IRIS Corporation Berhad is a global security solution provider with core expertise in the area of securing government security documents i.e. National ID and Passport. IRIS pioneered the world’s first electronic passport and national multi-application smart card with the implementation of the Malaysian Electronic Passport in March 1998 and MyKAD - the Malaysian Government Multi Purpose Card in April 2001. These technologies are deployed in many countries across the Asia, Middle East and Africa regions. IRIS also provides a full range of smart cards readers, integrated terminals, card personalization equipment and biometrics scanner to complement the application of its smart card solutions. [end] 

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