PSA will still provide hard ID copies

The Philippine Statistics Authority still wants to provide all the hard copies of Philippine Identification Cards by September 2024 amid challenges in producing physical identification cards, as not all Filipinos have smartphones.

PSA Undersecretary and National Statistician Claire Dennis Mapa said this in a meeting with the Senate Committee on Finance on Monday as several senators mentioned that shifting to digital PhilIDs would "save the government a lot of time" and "save the government from logistics issues."

"The digital (ID) is the way to go. But right now, if you look at statistics, not all Filipinos 15 years old and above will have a smartphone," Mapa told the senators.

"There are also areas where we need more (Internet) connectivity. These are areas (where) we are doing some priority deliveries because they need physical cards," Mapa added.

Data from PSA showed that there are 81 million Filipinos who have registered with PhilSys. That's 81 percent of the population aged five and up, 85 percent of the population aged 15 and up, and 65 percent of the population aged five to 14.

Less than half of those who registered — 39.7 million — have gotten their physical ID cards. The other 41.2 million have only received printed ID cards or the ePhilID.