Pakistan Fighting Fraud Using Viisage Solution in Country's Electronic Passport and National ID Program

BILLERICA, Mass. -- Viisage, a leading provider of advanced technology identity solutions, said today that the Government of Pakistan is successfully using Viisage's face recognition technology and a leading finger print technology to fight identify theft and fraud.

The National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA), an independent corporate organization on contract to the Pakistani Government to run the country's smart passport and national ID program, has uncovered multiple instances of fraud to date. NADRA subsequently issued a country-wide alert in July 2005 through The News, Pakistan's leading English newspaper, notifying those holding fraudulent identity documents that they had been caught and will be pursued if they do not turn in their identity cards.

"Viisage's FaceTOOLS(R) and FaceEXPLORER(R) products are powerful investigative tools for exposing fraud in our national ID and passport programs," said Brigadier (Retd.) Saleem Ahmad Moeen, chairman of NADRA. "In less than a year, this solution has helped us define the extent of the identity fraud problem in Pakistan and increase security for the country."

Using the Viisage solution, NADRA was able to enroll 34 million existing images and scan them for duplicates, all in the space of three months. Pakistan's database is expected to grow to 50 million records when the enrollment phase is completed. This approach has helped Pakistan uncover existing identity fraud in the country's passport and national ID program and to head off future instances. NADRA uses the face recognition technology to compare 21,000 new applicant images a day to the entire database and thus prevent fraud before it occurs. NADRA is catching up to 109 fraudulent records daily, thereby blocking the processing of these fraudulent records.

"Pakistan is a leader in implementing a countrywide electronic passport and national ID program," said Bernard Bailey, president and CEO of Viisage. "Its use of face recognition shows the technology's true power in fighting the growing problem of identity fraud and securing critical identity documents."

Mr. Nasser Jaffer, CEO of Jaffer Brothers, which represents Viisage in Pakistan, stated that "We are privileged to be instrumental in helping to implement the world's largest face recognition solution."

Based on the success of the joint NADRA-Viisage solution in Pakistan, Viisage and NADRA have signed an agreement to actively pursue opportunities to help Middle Eastern, South American and Asian countries manage their large national ID programs and databases.

(c)2005 Business Wire