Gemalto, a member of Thales Group, the contract to supply 15 million e-passports to its citizens over the next seven years
Thai citizens to receive 15M e-passports. Source: shutterstock.com
In 2018, the Thai Government launched ‘Thailand 4.0’ with a vision to develop Thailand into an innovative, dynamic and value-driven economy. With this in mind, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) of Thailand will provide 15 million technically-advanced, high-security e-passports to Thai citizens thanks to the DGM Consortium, which includes Gemalto, a Thales Company, Data Products Toppan Forms Ltd., and MultiCert. The Thai E-passport project is the largest passport project contracted for the Group in 2019.
Thai citizens will receive a newly-designed 64-page biometric travel document which includes an e-Cover with a thin, flexible datapage made of polycarbonate as well as a window containing a second image of the citizen and a true color UV photo. These security features ensure that the document complies with the highest standards of security recommended by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO). Thai citizens will benefit from the highest level of performance of the secure embedded software for fast border crossing. Furthermore, the DGM Consortium will also implement a highly secure end-to-end electronic passport system that will also strictly comply to the Personal Data Protection Act of Thailand.
The current passport production capacity will increase significantly, as two active high-security production sites – a Remote and a Main facility – will be established as part of the project to ensure business continuity and security for passport issuance.
Beyond a newly-designed passport, Thai citizens will benefit from greater efficiency in registering for their passports as the project will upgrade citizen-facing enrolment operations in 22 existing managed sites throughout Thailand, as well as include an expansion plan to establish 15 new sites throughout the country, offering more service points for Thai citizens to obtain their travel documents.
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