Review of Acra NRIC incident likely to end in Feb; findings to be made public

Head of Civil Service Leo Yip is leading a review to get to the bottom of how full NRIC numbers came to be revealed by the Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority (Acra) on its recently launched business portal.

- Lee Li Ying

It is reviewing the Government's policy on the responsible use of NRIC numbers, as well as the disclosure of full NRIC numbers on a search function of Acra's portal in December.

The panel is expected to complete its work in February, and the findings will be made public.

"For both matters, the panel will study what happened, how the decisions were made, the implementation and communication processes, the coordination across public sector agencies, and where the Government should have done and can do better," said Second Minister for Finance Indranee Rajah in a ministerial statement in Parliament on Jan 8.

Acra had made available full NRIC numbers in its free People Search function on its new Bizfile portal launched on Dec 9, sparking public backlash. The function was eventually disabled on Dec 13.

Between Dec 9 and 13, the People Search function on the portal saw some 500,000 searches, much higher than the usual daily traffic of 2,000 to 3,000 queries.

The Government had said in December that it intended to change the practice of masking NRIC numbers, but the new portal was launched before the plans were announced to the public. It apologised for the anxiety caused, and explained that the error had occurred due to Acra's misunderstanding of an internal government circular.

MPs filed more than 50 questions relating to the NRIC incident, including on accountability for the incident, the additional risks of identity theft and scams on Singaporeans, and how the Government will carry out public education on NRIC data practices.

In her ministerial statement on Jan 8, Ms Indranee said the panel, which will report to Senior Minister Teo Chee Hean, will include permanent secretaries whose ministries are not involved in the NRIC policy or in the incident.

It also includes the permanent secretaries of the Ministry of Digital Development and Information (MDDI) and the Ministry of Finance, which oversees Acra.