How certification processes in the asylum procedure can be digitalised , Date: 2021.04.30, format: Report, area: Authority , BAMF carries out a feasibility study

Asylum seekers and applicants are issued with various certificates in paper form in the asylum procedure, including a certificate directing them to the nearest reception facility (Anlaufbescheinigung), proof of arrival, a residence permit, or permission to travel. The BAMF used a feasibility study to try out the potentials of digital certification processes and digital identity management.

Größer darstellen The players and activities in the blockchain solution for digital certificates in the asylum procedure Source: BAMF

The Project Group made up from the Business & Information Systems Engineering area of the Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Information Technology (FIT), the Interdisciplinary Centre for Security, Reliability and Trust of the University of Luxembourg, as well as the BAMF, developed a prototype for this, and implemented blockchain technology. The digital procedure for issuing and verifying certificates aims to increase efficiency and security. The prototype that the BAMF has developed can be used by staff at a variety of public authorities which are involved in the asylum process, to issue relevant certificates to asylum seekers in digital form, to verify their authenticity, and to process their validity status. Asylum seekers may carry the certificates with them as a QR code, either in a smartphone app or as a paper printout. The blockchain technology used permits the issuing authority and the validity of a certificate to be verified.

Information on the digital solution gained via the prototype

• The effort necessary for the authorities involved in verifying the integrity of certificates is reduced.
• This approach uses the advantages offered by a decentralised infrastructure which makes independent data storage for the verification of certificates of asylum seekers or applicants obsolete.
• Novel identity management concepts and technologies are made use of which could also be used in other procedures.
• The law needs to be changed in order to permit the digital solution to be used since according to current law certificates must be created in physical form.

The whitepaper entitled "Digitization of certification processes in the asylum procedure by means of digital identities", and the prototype that has been developed, form part of a feasibility study, and hence a first step towards finding an answer to the question of whether certification processes and identities for asylum seekers can be fully digitalised.