Secure Identity Alliance Announces First African Mobile Identity Ecosystem, leverages OSIA to verify identities against National Identity Registry

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11 May, 2021, 08:29 GMT

- Nigeria NIMC¹ is pioneering Africa-first Mobile Identity Ecosystem leveraging OSIA² open standard interfaces to verify unique identities (NIN³) against National Identity Registry

PARIS, May 11, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Secure Identity Alliance (SIA), the global identity and secure digital services advisory body, today announces that Nigeria NIMC is pioneering Africa-first Mobile Identity Ecosystem leveraging OSIA open standard interfaces to verify unique identities against National Identity Registry.

President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria Muhammadu Buhari is showing the NIMC (National Identity Management Commission) NIN (National Identity Number) slip - that can be verified against the central national ID database leveraging OSIA interface

A digital public good supported by a growing community of 35+ members of industry and government organizations, the OSIA initiative is building a global interoperability framework that features open standard interfaces (APIs) to connect all key building blocks of the identity management ecosystem.

In short, OSIA open standard interfaces ensure governments are able to select the building blocks they need from the suppliers they choose, and to easily connect these to build their national identity ecosystem.

As a result, OSIA eliminates proprietary barriers, breaks down information silos, drives innovation and maximizes investment in existing digital infrastructures.

Developed by CommonIdentity, an African software company part of the OSIA Initiative, the Nigeria NIMC Mobile ID Ecosystem allows the citizen to have his/her Unique ID be verified against National Identity Registry near-instantly and securely via an OSIA interface. Launched in December 2020, the App has been downloaded 3,3 million times in 90 days. The daily rate is now 180 000.

Philippe Barreau, Chairman of the Board, Security Identity Alliance, said: "The OSIA initiative represents a new era of openness and collaboration between industry and governments across the world to resolve the interoperability and data sharing challenges. The Nigeria NIMC pioneering Africa-first Mobile ID Ecosystem implementation proves once again that OSIA has successfully moved from the drawing board to the real world."

Debora Comparin, Chair of the OSIA Workgroup, added "Harnessing the power of APIs, OSIA is an efficient and cost-effective way of leveraging industry expertise while pushing continuous innovation and remaining confident that there will be no need to discard existing legacy ID investments."

OSIA unleashes market innovation, facilitates the implementation of multi-vendor programs and enables identity as a service.

The OSIA functional and technical specifications are freely available on the GitHub collaboration platform: https://github.com/SecureIdentityAlliance/osia

For more information on OSIA, join us on 15^th June 2021 at 15.30 GMT for a webinar: https://app.livestorm.co/science-media-partners/osia-gets-real-its-time-to-unlock-the-identity-ecosystem?type=detailed

¹ NIMC : National Identity Management Commission
² OSIA : Open Standards Identity APIs
³ NIN : National Identification Number

About the Secure Identity Alliance

Secure Identity Alliance is dedicated to supporting the provision of legal, trusted identity for all, and to drive the development of inclusive digital services necessary for sustainable, worldwide economic growth and prosperity.

We believe legal, trusted identity is the cornerstone of rights protection, social inclusion and digital economic development - and the access point to a wide range of essential public and private services.

We bring together public, private and non-government organizations to foster international collaboration on the issues of legal identity, to help shaping policy and to provide technical and implementation guidance for national and international ID systems.

Its Board Members are Idemia, IN Groupe, Thales and Veridos.

For more information on the Secure Identity Alliance, visit: www.secureidentityalliance.org .

Follow the Secure Identity Alliance at @secureidentity1

Press Contact: Stéphanie de Labriolle stephanie.delabriolle@secureidentityalliance.org

Photo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1507583/Muhammadu_Buhari_President_Nigeria.jpg