7 million+ transactions use PKI in H1 of 2019

THE NUMBER OF TRANSACTIONS REACHED 1,983,290 IN THE FIRST HALF OF 2019 WITH A SIGNIFICANT INCREASE FROM THE SAME PERIOD IN 2018 WHICH WITNESSED 1,014,492 TRANSACTIONS

The Ministry of Technology and Communications (MTC) has reported a significant increase in the number of transactions that use Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) services on mobile.

The number of transactions reached 1,983,290 in the first half of 2019 with a significant increase from the same period in 2018 which witnessed 1,014,492 transactions.

In the first half of 2018, the number of transactions which used PKI services in ID card reached 4,370,062. In the first half of 2019, this number increased to 5,535,800. The total number of transactions that used PKI services reached 7,519,090 with a 28 per cent increase from 2018, according to the data recorded by the ministry through the National Certification Centre.

The National Digital Certification Centre was established in 2013 by the Ministry of Technology and Communications (MTC) as a part of an effort to move towards better eservices. It allows using PKI services to complete etransactions with full confidentiality, reliability and efficiency while fully protecting the personal information of the users.

Moreover, users can use their ID card enabled with PKI services to get services and complete transactions without the need to go to the service provider personally. PKI services also allows signing any official document online, where every online signature is treated as a traditional signature.

The National Digital Certification Centre produced more than 8.7 digital certificates to citizens ID cards and expats since its establishment in 2013. These IDS were used for more than 19.5 million etransactions. On the other hand, the centre recorded more than 2.8 million transactions using mobile PKI during the same period from 20132019. Statistics show that 80 per cent of private and government entities adopted digital certification as a prerequisite to using some of their services. So far 36 government entities were integrated with the PKI system.

Some entities topped the list of entities that use PKI services through ID cards to complete provided services in the first half of 2019. The Ministry of Manpower came at the top of that list in providing services for job seekers, citizens, business owners and manpower, in addition to receiving complaints and reports. They reached a number of 2,150,355 transactions.

Then came Al Raffd Fund’s “System used for Sanad Offices”, that represents government services that can be provided through Sanad Offices. They reached a number of 868,996 transactions. In third place came the Directorate General of Customs from the Royal Oman Police represented by the “Bayan” system which conducted 760,056 transactions.

Following that came the Ministry of Commerce and Industry represented by “Invest Easy” which covers business start-up services, business management, business information, closing businesses, complementary services and license application to recruit expats. The number of transactions they completed using PKI is 654,536. Next on the list is the Ministry of Regional Municipalities and Water Resources, which is represented by “Enjaz” Portal. “Enjaz” covers technical services, water services and health services, and they reached 176,716 transactions.