Good news about South Africa’s green ID books

Home affairs minister Leon Schreiber has announced an inter-departmental agreement to speed up the rollout of smart IDs so South Africa can phase out the old green ID book.

In the meantime, people’s green ID books remain valid. Schreiber recently said government can only invalidate the green ID book once all South Africans have access to smart ID cards.

Home Affairs signed the agreement with the Border Management Agency (BMA), the South African Revenue Service (SARS), and Government Printing Works (GPW) last week. It said the compact would digitally transform and revolutionise government services.

Schreiber said a direct result of the agreement was that Home Affairs could integrate its services with banking platforms, expanding access to smart ID and passport services to hundreds of bank branches and banking apps.

It will also enable the introduction of Smart IDs for naturalised citizens and permanent residents.

This is a critical component of South Africa’s migration from the green ID book to a smart ID card. Until recently, permanent residents and naturalised citizens have been completely excluded from the smart ID programme.

Schreiber explained that this was due to issues with the Home Affairs IT environment.

Invalidating the green ID book is a priority because it has become a popular vector for fraudsters and identity thieves to perpetrate crime.

Identity verification and fraud detection company Smile ID reported last year that the green ID book had the highest fraud rate in Africa.

Smile ID’s 2025 Digital Identity Fraud in Africa report revealed that fraud rates for the country’s green ID book in March 2024 were 500% higher than for smart IDs.

The company said national IDs are regularly targeted as they are the most common form of government identification and are mandatory for most adults.

“The green ID book is insecure and a risk to South Africa. We need to get rid of it,” Schreiber said.

“However, we can only do away with it if everyone has access to the alternative smart ID.”

Schreiber said there were still around 18 million South Africans who needed a smart ID card.

Some good news was that production of smart IDs was accelerating. Schreiber reported that while Home Affairs aimed to produce 2.5 million smart IDs this year, they were on track to deliver 3.6 million.

Home Affairs partnership with banks

Schreiber said it was critical that the DHA massively expands its collaboration with South African banks.

“In the past, Home Affairs had its own computer, fingerprint scanner, camera, and an official sitting in a corner of the bank. That makes no sense. We must integrate with the bank’s technology,” he said.

Schreiber said at the Independent Electoral Commission’s e-Voting Conference in early March 2025 that he wanted to expand smart ID access to all South Africans before the national and provincial elections in 2029.

However, the department will have to hasten its smart ID production if it wants to hit that target.

“We are moving determinedly to expand access to smart IDs to a scale never seen before,” he said.

Regarding the agreement Home Affairs signed with the BMA, SARS, and GPW, he said it marks a new era that will fundamentally reform and improve the way that government works.

“In terms of the agreement, the service ecosystem composed of Home Affairs, the BMA, and GPW will leverage world-class technology capacity within SARS to revolutionise all civics and immigration services,” the department said.

“Work to roll out these revolutionary improvements is now in full swing, and the department will announce their activation on an ongoing basis.

In addition to expanding smart ID and passport access via banks, Home Affair said the agreement also enables the launch of a world-class electronic travel authorisation system to digitise and automate immigration procedures, eliminating inefficiency and fraud.

Residents will also have the option to select courier delivery of documents, eliminating the requirement of collecting documents only at Home Affairs offices.

Government will also be able to upgrade its movement control system at all ports of entry thanks to the agreement, Home Affairs said.