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Central Government, Digital Inclusion

Mobile govt uptake in Singapore

By Robin Hicks | 4 October 2010

Singapore’s Central Provident Fund Board, the first agency to try out the government’s new mobile phone application for citizen services, has revealed early results from the trial.

The Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA) launched the application, which allows users to access the national authentication system, or SingPass, on their mobile phones, in March this year.

Currently, 58 agencies provide online access to 260 services via SingPass, which has seen transaction volume increase from 4.5 million in 2003 - the year of launch - to 34.4 million in 2009.

The mobile service is available for all Singapore government agencies, and CPF, a social security saving scheme for retirees, was the first agency to use it with mPAL – my cpf.

Through mPAL – my cpf, Singaporean savers can access their CPF account balance, contribution history, plus get information on property, investments and Medisave, a national medical savings scheme.

Users log in using an account number and an eight-digit PIN. The web site features a list of the mobile phone models that support the SingPass login and instructions for how to download information.

SingPass is secured with end-to-end encryption between the mobile device and the authentication server, and is regularly audited by an independent third party, according to an IDA spokesperson.

Uptake so far…

Between September 2009 and April 2010, the service was downloaded 900 times, and the download prompt page received 1715 hits. Between March 2009 and August 2010, the average transaction count of mobile SingPass reached 370 per month.

An online survey on the CPF web site, which ran from 5th to 30th August 2010, found that 83 per cent would be interested to try mPAL – my cpf. Of those already using the service, 71 per cent said they like it, and 72 per cent said they would use it in the future.

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