Securing Our Borders

The Immigration Act (IA) serves to regulate the entry, stay and exit of foreigners. It provides a practical legal framework to facilitate the movement of people, while keeping criminals and undesirable elements at bay.

The Act was last amended in 2018 to enhance the Home Team’s operational effectiveness at the checkpoints and strengthen border security. Key amendments included:

• Expanding the range of powers of ICA officers at the checkpoints, including powers relating to search, seizure and arrest
• Empowering ICA to collect personal information from travellers transiting through Singapore for more effective screening

The National Registration Act (NRA) regulates the registration of persons in Singapore for the issuance of identity cards and its related purposes.

The NRA was last amended in 2016, to allow the ICA to:

• Collect more forms of personal identifiers
  
• Refuse the registration of certain types of names
  
• Appoint non-ICA employees as registration officers
  
• Give registration officers the powers to conduct searches

The amendments were aimed at strengthening the operational effectiveness and efficiency of ICA officers, and allows ICA to provide more convenient registration services to the public, while enhancing security in Singapore.

The Registration of Birth and Deaths Act (RBDA) regulates the registration of births and deaths in Singapore.

The Passports Act (PA) provides for the issuance of Singapore passports and other travel documents to be used as evidence of identity and citizenship by citizens of Singapore who are travelling internationally. It regulates the use of the Singapore passport and its related matters.

The PA was last amended in 2007 to:

• Introduce measures against the abuse and misuse of Singapore passports and travel documents, as well as foreign travel documents
• Set out a comprehensive regime for the issuance and handling of our passports and travel documents
• Allow ICA to adopt new technologies to enhance the security of Singapore passports and travel documents

 Part X of the Constitution sets out the requirements for the grant, renunciation and deprivation of Singapore citizenship.

Today, eligible travellers can use the Multi-Modal Biometric System (MMBS) to clear immigration by scanning their face and iris. This is more secure than fingerprint clearance and is also contactless. Since July 2020, all travellers who have already enrolled their iris and facial biometrics with ICA are eligible for this new mode of clearance.

The traditional paper-based disembarkation and embarkation card has been replaced with the SG Arrival Card e-service and mobile app since 27 March 2020. This enhances the advance screening of passenger information and facilitates smoother immigration clearance.

By 2020, ICA had already implemented 15 e-Services that cover 99% of public transactions, reducing the need for members of the public to make physical trips to the ICA Building. One of the more recent initiatives, implemented on 1 October 2020, is the e-Service to allow Identity Card (IC) holders to report online a change of their residential address, rather than having to go down physically to a Police station or ICA Building.

To further encourage online transactions, ICA is progressively introducing push notifications via the SingPass mobile application or SMS to proactively inform or remind our customers of the transactions they may need to undertake. For example, ICA implemented on 1 September 2020, a digital notification service to notify members of the public who need to renew their Identity Card or Passport.

 ICA is also working to digitalise ICA-issued documents so that residents will be able to access and retrieve them, as and when needed, via a secure digital platform, for example if they need the documents for identification or verification purposes. The first in line will be birth and death certificates, followed by long-term passes. 

 The SCNG vision of 'No Waiting' is embodied in the operations concept of the new ICA Services Centre, on which we started construction in October 2020. The new building is expected to be operational by 2023, providing a seamless, one-stop service to members of the public. It will have self-service kiosks for customers to collect ICA-issued documents at their convenience. Using these self-service kiosks, customers can look forward to longer opening hours, shorter transaction times and transact without needing to make prior appointment.