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Ministry unveils electronic passports

Minister of Foreign Affairs Fransisco Ou demonstrates how to use an electronic passport at a press conference in Taipei yesterday. Taiwan will start issuing chip-embedded passports on Dec. 29. PHOTO: CHU PEI-HSIUNG, TAIPEI TIMES

To make identification documents more secure using better anti-counterfeit designs, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday unveiled a new electronic passport [ePassport], which will be available to Taiwanese starting at the end of next month.

The ministry added that with higher security travel documents, Taiwan would be in a better position to seek visa-free entry privileges to other countries that already employ this kind of identification technology.

The ePassport, or biometric passport, would look no different from current passports except that ePassports sport a contactless chip and antenna embedded within the pages of the booklet that can be read by radio frequency identification (RFID) technology, Minister of Foreign Affairs Francisco Ou (歐鴻鍊) said.

“An immigration officer would be able to identify ePassports [from chipless versions] by the gold stamped chip logo printed on the cover, and pull up the traveler’s data as well as [his or her] photo in a matter of seconds,” Ou said.

Not only would the switch to ePassport be in compliance with international trends — Taiwan would be the 60th country to offer ePassports — MOFA’s bureau of consular affairs director Lo Yu-chung (羅由中) said that “seeking visa-free privileges from countries such as those in the EU and the US has always been a goal of MOFA, and issuing ePassports is a necessary step ... It would be beneficial to this pursuit.”

The anti-counterfeiting features of ePassports partly comes from the fact that once information is written in a chip, it cannot be altered, deleted or added to “so that the ePassport has a more widely trusted validity,” Lo said.

Though Taiwanese immigration is not currently equipped with chip readers, “meaning the difference between using a biometric versus electronic passport would not be readily apparent now,” Lo said.

The equipment would be in place by 2010 and passing immigration with an ePassport would be much more speedy than using a normal passport, Lo added.

“From now until the end of 2009, the passport fee would remain NT$1,200 without reflecting the increased costs ... After 2009, MOFA may adjust the cost to NT$1,600,” Lo said.

People applying for new or renewal passports will automatically receive the new ePassport, Lo said, adding that those whose passports are not expired yet but wish to switch over to ePassports now are also encouraged to do so.

For more information, visit www.epassport.com.tw.
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