Accenture has announced that the company is working with Microsoft to develop a digital network based on blockchain technology that will be used to identify refugees and others who do not have official identification papers.
Microsoft and Accenture announced the news Monday at US headquarters in New York, during an ID2020 conference. ID2020 is a public-private partnership that also includes Cisco Systems and PricewaterhouseCoopers, for example. The organization aims to achieve the UN goal of having a system in place by 2030 that enables a legally sustainable form of identification for every person in the world.
During this conference, the two companies showed a prototype. The aim is for refugees without identity papers to be able to identify themselves through the system so that they can access basic services such as education and health care. The system can quickly create and record a personal identity for someone without an identity, for example a refugee who was unable to bring identity papers. The prototype has been set up in such a way that refugees themselves must give permission for who can and cannot access their personal information.
The system will run on Microsoft Azure service and will interface with existing public and private identity systems and use a blockchain protocol from the Enterprise Ethereum Alliance. For identification, the system uses Accenture’s Unique Identity Service Platform, whereby an advanced biometric system can help someone with identification via fingerprints and iris scans, for example.
The new system will be based on an existing Accenture system, the Biometric Identity Management System. This system is already being used by the UN and is expected to support seven million refugees from 75 different countries by 2020. Ultimately, the new system should help some 1.1 billion people for whom it is challenging to identify themselves.