The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) has proposed requiring banks and other supervised financial institutions to integrate with the Philippine Statistics Authority’s National ID Authentication Services (NIDAS) to strengthen customer identity verification.
Under a draft circular, covered BSP-supervised institutions (BSIs) would use NIDAS for customer due diligence, allowing them to verify customers through biometric and demographic authentication based on risk-appropriate verification tiers.
The proposal adopts a phased implementation, beginning with institutions that have significant retail banking operations and digital onboarding activities.
Within three months of the issuance of an implementing memorandum, universal and commercial banks with retail banking services, digital banks, electronic money issuers, and virtual asset service providers would be required to comply under the first phase.
The second phase, to be completed within six months of the memorandum, would cover other universal and commercial banks, thrift, rural and cooperative banks, operators of payment systems with know-your-customer (KYC) or know-your-merchant functions, and all remaining BSP-supervised institutions.
The draft circular also sets minimum supervisory requirements for NIDAS integration, including onboarding procedures, authentication standards, governance and control measures, and compliance monitoring.
The BSP said the proposal aims to support wider adoption of the National ID across the financial sector while strengthening digital customer verification. It also supports the implementation of Republic Act No. 11055, or the Philippine Identification System Act, which designates the National ID as the country’s primary proof of identity, subject to authentication.
