BIOMETRIC PASSPORTS IN IRELAND - STATUS REPORT

UNCLAS DUBLIN 000066 SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: CVIS CMGT PGOV PREL KFRD EI SUBJECT: BIOMETRIC PASSPORTS IN IRELAND - STATUS REPORT SENSITIVE 1.(SBU) Summary. Cons Chief met with Deirdre Fannin, the new project manager for Biometrics in the Passport Office of the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs to discuss progress on the development of the e-passport in Ireland. Ms. Fannin stated that Ireland should make the October 26th deadline and foresaw no political difficulties with e-passport production in its current form. She did say that if Ireland were to eventually incorporate fingerprints into the biometric chip, this could raise all sorts of political controversy. End Summary. ¶2. (U) On January 19th, Cons Chief met with Irish Passport Biometrics Project Manager Deirdre Fannin. Ms. Fannin took over the position of Project Manager from James O'Connell on January 4th of this year. Ireland seems to be well on the way to compliance with the October 26th deadline for biometric passport production. The request for tender for the incorporation of biometrics in Irish passports was released on January 10th, and there have been nineteen companies that have responded thus far, with eight of them (four Irish and four non-Irish European) short-listed as likely candidates. All responses are due by February 20th, and the GOI hopes to have evaluations done by the St. Patrick's Day weekend (March 17). This would put them in a position to begin testing the product by mid-May. ¶3. (U) Ms. Fannin said that the process has built in extra time for unforeseen delays, so she is confident that the October 26th deadline will be met, stating that if it is somehow missed, it would be a question of weeks and not months. The only difficulty envisioned at this point will be the timing of the conversion of the passport producing lines (located in Dublin and Cork),as the period in which transition would take place would coincide with the summer travel season, and demand for passports is at an all-time high (at the Balbriggan production facility outside Dublin, they have so far seen their highest ever figure for January passport production). ¶4. (SBU) While the first-generation of e-passports will rely on facial recognition technology, the request for tender specifies that chips developed for the passport must also have the capability of being used for the storage of fingerprint information (two-prints). Fingerprinting, however, is a sensitive topic in Ireland, and the GOI is wary of putting any kind of commitment to eventual fingerprinting of passport holders in print for fear that opposition parties would use it to score political points. Any decisions about fingerprinting would likely be delayed, therefore, until after the next elections, which are expected to be in the spring of 2007. KENNY