De La Rue Smurfit supplied around 700,000 Irish passports last year. The new document is fully compliant with the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) 9303 standard.
The ePassport features a contactless 72kB chip which stores the bearer’s biographical details, as they appear on the details page of the passport, and a digital image of the bearer.
De La Rue produces 34- and 66-page books for the Irish government. The confidentiality and integrity of the documents are secured during the Department of Foreign Affairs’ personalization process. Layered technologies including digital signatures, basic access control to protect against electronic eavesdropping and data ‘skimming’ of the chip, and active authentication to prevent cloning are employed in the ePassport.
De La Rue is also responsible for producing the Irish emergency passport issued by the government to citizens who have urgent travel requirements but do not have time to receive a standard passport through the usual application process. De La Rue says that the data page is secured by its MLIS system, which is used by some 25 issuing authorities worldwide and is fully compliant with ICAO 9303.
