New smart identity card to be introduced from June

By Martin Hellicar

A NEW identity card containing a computer chip is to be introduced as part of a government plan electronically to record the island’s population.

The new ID card, or Smart Card as it is to be named, will be issued from June and will contain the holder’s personal details, just like the current ID card does. The information on the Smart Card’s computer chip will be read by a computers at all ministries and local authority buildings.

In the future, the card could also contain additional information, such as the holder’s family tree, driving licence, passport details, etc.

George Theodorou, of the Interior Ministry’s election service, said the card would not replace the current ID card, at least not for the time being.

“We cannot force people to hand in their old ID cards,” Theodorou told the Cyprus Mail, adding that instigating such a handover for the whole population would be an organisational nightmare.

The new electronic Smart Cards will, as a first stage, be issued for newborns and to replace lost “old” ID cards.

The smart card is part of a long-term state plan to computerise information on the local population and create information banks, which a Smart Card holder will be able to access.

Measures are promised to ensure that people’s personal details held on the government computers cannot be accessed without authorisation.

The government line is that the Smart Cards will change peoples’ lives for the better.

Theodorou noted that no one would be issued with a card including the number 666, because of the “demonic” associations of this number sequence.

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.