Currently, the authorities of many countries issue simple visas that do not contain biometric data (photo, fingerprints). There are two ways to obtain a visa. This is an appeal to the consulates abroad or at the airport, seaport upon arrival and migration offices at the border.
To apply for an entry visa, the consular department usually needs to provide the following documents:
- a passport, the validity of which exceeds the period of stay in the country;
- a copy of the first page of the passport with the applicant’s personal data;
- a number questionnaires completed in the language of the country;
- recent identical photographs 3 x 4 cm (color or black and white);
- the original of the invitation, certified by the official seals of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the country.
Depending on the location of the diplomatic mission, the requirements of the consulates vary. For example, when obtaining a visa to the country at the country’s consulate general, an invitation is not required.
In the case of a visa, upon arrival at the airport or the port, you must provide a passport, a completed migration card in the language of the country and return tickets or tickets to a third country. An international certificate of vaccination against yellow fever is also may be required.
ELECTRONIC VISAS
The introduction of an e-visa involves the creation of an Internet portal where applicants can remotely apply for a visa, attach skins of all necessary documents, and pay the visa fee by credit card or other payment instrument. The essential data required to verify the applicant according to the scheme established by the competent authorities, the applicant enters into the electronic questionnaire. This allows you to automate the processing of your visa application. Failure to provide all the required documents and data will lead to an automatic refusal to consider the application. The application will not be processed without paying the visa fee. In case of refusal to issue a visa, the visa fee is not refundable.
The system automatically initiates verification of the applicant against all databases that the authorities deem necessary, for example, the Interpol database, the local stop list and others.
The results of the check with all other mandatory documents are submitted for consideration by the migration service employee, who decides on the issuance of a visa. In fact, the employee’s role is reduced to confirming all visas that do not deviate from the conditions for issuing a visa. In case of deviations (for example, there is negative information on the results of a database check), the employee rejects the issuance of a visa or sends it to the supervisor for review. It all depends on the procedures established in the migration service.
In case of a positive decision on issuing a visa, the system automatically generates an e-mail for the applicant with an attachment containing the visa number, date of issue, as well as a unique QR code with visa data for automatic reading at the airport, sea port or other migration point at the border and its automatic printing on a specialized printer and pasting on the spot in the passport. The applicant must have this code printed or stored on a smartphone or laptop.
ELECTRONIC VISAS WITHOUT GLUING INTO THE PASSPORT
You can do without printing a visa and pasting it into your passport. In this case, all the procedures described above for the interaction between the applicant and the authorities on the Internet portal, as well as the methods of data processing, remain the same, with the exception of printing a visa on a specialized printer. If the decision is positive, it will be enough for the applicant to print a document with a QR code and the rest of the visa data on a sheet of A4 paper. Actually, this will be the visa on which the border guards will put their entry / exit stamps. At the entrance, the border guard will also put a stamp in the passport and enter the visa number.
This practice exists. For example, India provides an e-visa, which the applicant himself prints and presents at the border control. He must keep this document as a passport during his stay in the country.
This solution allows you to save sufficient funds on specialized equipment, consumables, staff time.
PASSPORT CONTROL AT THE BORDER
Issuing an e-visa and checking at passport control should be an end-to-end solution. Without this, an e-visa has significantly limited functionality. For online passport control our solution SM 3000 EPS will be used. Passport control points will be equipped with terminals for reading a QR code. To increase the level of applicant’s authentication, you can use the PIN-code, which the applicant will enter on the PIN-keyboard at passport control. The applicant will receive the PIN in a safe way during the visa application process on the Internet portal.
BIOMETRIC VISA
In our proposal, a biometric visa is considered an option, since it does not currently exist in the country. However, if the customer is interested in this solution, this issue can be worked out, including cost. At the same time, changes will be required in the algorithm for issuing and processing an electronic visa. This solution will be more complex and not as easy as, for example, the solution implemented by India.
SM3000 BASED SOLUTION
Based on our own experience, we propose to host the system in the AWS Amazon.com cloud. This will significantly reduce the cost of purchasing equipment, supporting operating systems and DBMS. This will be especially noticeable at the initial stage, when the volumes will still be small. Using the AWS Amazon.com cloud will also shorten your implementation time. The load on the customer associated with the server room equipment, the need to maintain software versioning and all kinds of upgrades will be removed. And this is the logical and physical security of systems.
We also propose to use blockchain technology, which is a modern and reliable means of storing and processing data in an environment protected by crypto keys. It will be an innovative solution for this field of activity.
