500,000 Pinoy to receive national ID cards

MANILA, Philippines — Some 500,000 national ID cards have been printed and are ready to be shipped to registrants nationwide.

National statistician Dennis Mapa said around 500,000 national ID cards were printed by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas and are set for delivery by PhlPost, the official delivery partner of the Philippine Identification System (PhilSys).

Project implementer Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) continues to roll out the third and final step of the national ID program, which includes the issuance of the PhilSys number and delivery of physical ID cards.

The PSA started delivery of the ID cards on May 1.

“Our national ID distribution is continuous especially to those who registered since last year,” Mapa said.

He added that PhlPost delivers the national ID cards on a daily basis and so far, nearly 100,000 registrants have received their IDs.

Registrants are advised to safekeep the letter enclosed with the ID upon receipt as it contains confidential information.

To protect the permanent PhilSys number when transacting, registrants are encouraged to use the PhilSys Card Number, the public version of the PhilSys number which is printed in front of the ID card.

The PSA also called on other government agencies and private establishments to recognize and acknowledge the national ID as valid proof of identity in various transactions.

Meanwhile, some 12.1 million have advanced to the second step which involves the capture of a registrant’s biometric data such as iris scans, fingerprint scans and front-facing photographs.

“By end-June, operation for step two will be nationwide,” Mapa said. “Our registration process is stable. We have more than 200,000 registrants per day nationwide.”

At least 70 million Filipinos are expected to be registered by the end of the year. By end-2022, 92 million Filipinos are targeted to be registered with PhilSys.