NEW ZEALAND UPDATE ON E-PASSPORT AND VWP QUESTIONS

UNCLAS WELLINGTON 000130

SIPDIS

DEPT FOR EAP/ANP, CA

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: CMGT PREL NZ
SUBJECT: NEW ZEALAND UPDATE ON E-PASSPORT AND VWP QUESTIONS

REF: STATE 23029


1. (U) Post passed information contained reftel to David
Philp, Manager, Passports, New Zealand Department of Internal
Affairs (DIA.) Philp reported that while he is the Project
Sponsor, the e-Passport Project Manager is Brian Greenough,
DIA. He added that the project steering committee is in
place, but the time line is still being negotiated with the
U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS.) He noted that
the GoNZ is provisionally considering a live trial at LAX
using Air Crew in June 2005.


2. (U) Philp provided the following detailed answers to
reftel questions:

Begin text.


1. "The process for awarding contracts and dates certain to
produce ICAO compliant passports as well as date for full
production";

DIA Response: New Zealand has completed all contract
negotiations and has entered into supply contracts for the
enhancement to existing passport issuance systems to
incorporate functions required to support e-Passport
personalisation. Hewlett-Packard have been selected as the
lead contractor of a consortium including Entrust (PKI) and
Iris Malaysia (RF Readers/chip encoding) to carry out this
work. Canadian Bank Note has been awarded the contract for
the supply of the e-Passport book.

New Zealand will begin a phased roll-out of the e-Passport
from early in the 3rd quarter of 2005 calendar year subject
to US Department of Homeland Security acceptance and
certification of the NZ e-Passport, and a suitable point of
entry trial with the NZ e-Passport at a US border. Full
production will be achieved prior to October 2005 however the
exact date will be determined by the level of application
demand coupled with our desire the minimise wastage of
existing passport book stock.


2. "any possible legal obstacles to manufacturing ICAO
compliant passports";

DIA Response: We are not aware of any legal issues specific
to New Zealand constraining the New Zealand implementation of
an ICAO compliant e-Passport e-Passports will be issued to
all applicants regardless of age. We currently have
legislation before Parliament that reduces the maximum
validity of a passport from ten to five years and removes the
provision to allow name endorsements in passports. (Note:
Legal name changes would now require a new passport.) This
is expected to come into force prior to the first issuance of
e-Passports however it would have little material impact if
it did not.


3. "any technical obstacles to manufacturing ICAO compliant
passports";

DIA Response: NZ has undergone a lengthy e-Passport
development process. Although technical issues have arisen,
these have been resolved and we are not aware of any further
issues constraining the New Zealand implementation of an ICAO
compliant e-Passport


4. "a description of how the proposed passport process meets
the security standards recommended by ICAO";

DIA Response: The New Zealand e-Passport will meet the
mandatory security requirements for Passive Authentication
required by ICAO as detailed in the PKI Technical Report.
This is in order to:

-- Facilitate passenger processing by providing for a closed
book read approach with minimum chip processing time,
-- Ensure interoperability with other nations wishing to read
the NZ e-Passport,
-- Minimise the complexity of the technology used to issue an
e-Passport.

The New Zealand e-Passport PKI deployment will utilise
SHA-256 hashing algorithm and a 2048kb signing key size.


5. "a certification that the chips meet the ISO 14443
communications standard for interoperability";

DIA Response: The New Zealand e-Passport will contain a 72kb
Philips SmartMX Type A chip. The chip is manufactured to the
ISO 14443-A standard, which was defined by Philips.

End text.
Swindells