Online passport renewal service falls far short of target: Official

Taipei, June 17 (CNA) Only around 26,000 people have made use of an online passport renewal service since it was first introduced in September 2024, far short of the number originally projected by the government, a diplomat in charge of passport affairs said Tuesday.

Chen Shang-yu (陳尚友), acting head of the Bureau of Consular Affairs (BOCA) under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said the number of people using the service was still very low compared to those who use the traditional in-person passport renewal process, without providing specific numbers.

Chen's agency was also not able to provide an estimate of the percentage or the total number of passport renewal applicants from September 2024 to the present.

The service was launched to make it easier to renew a passport, with BOCA estimating that it could benefit 200,000 to 300,000 passport renewal applicants each year once it officially rolled out in 2025. In 2024, BOCA issued 2.86 million passports in total.

But the need to have a government-issued citizen digital certificate number to apply was one of the barriers limiting the new initiative's popularity, Chen said at a weekly press briefing.

Only around 4 million of Taiwan's roughly 23 million citizens have the government-issued certificate, which is used in Taiwan as an official form of online identification.

To encourage more people to use the online service, Chen said BOCA has decided to relax some of the restrictions, including allowing Taiwanese nationals whose passports are set to expire within six months to apply for a new passport through the service starting in July.

Previously, only those whose passports had already expired could make use of the online service, he said.

Chen said BOCA is also in talks with other government agencies to see if they can come up with more convenient ways to apply to renew passports online while protecting citizens' privacy.

BOCA initiated a trial run for the service on Sept. 3, 2024. It allowed applicants to apply online and collect their new passport 14 days later at a designated BOCA office by showing their national identification card and online application receipt.

After some previously imposed restrictions were scrapped, the service, officially launched in January, has shortened the waiting time to 10 days from the previous 14.