Thailand’s Ministry of Public Health has rolled out a new biometric system aimed at identifying more than one million migrant workers and displaced persons without official documentation.
Public Health Minister Somsak Thepsutin presided over the signing of a memorandum of understanding on Thursday (September 4), confirming cooperation in applying biometric technology for health and humanitarian purposes.
The initiative promotes the use of iris and facial recognition to verify the identities of migrant workers, ethnic minorities, and people fleeing conflict along the border. Officials say the system will help strengthen disease surveillance, prevention, and control.
Somsak stressed that undocumented individuals often fall outside government health databases, leaving them unable to receive vaccines, medical care, or disaster relief.
To address this, the Thai Red Cross Biometric Authentication System (TRCBAS) was developed in partnership with the Thai Red Cross Society and the National Science and Technology Development Agency (NSTDA).
According to the Foreign Workers Administration Office, Thailand had 2.22 million migrant workers as of July 2025, with more than one million lacking proper documents.
Authorities believe the adoption of biometric identification will benefit both individual health and national public health, while ensuring data governance is properly managed.
NSTDA President Sukit Limpijumnong explained that TRCBAS was built by researchers from the National Electronics and Computer Technology Centre (NECTEC) and the Thai Red Cross.
He noted that iris data in particular provides a unique, durable, and hard-to-forge identifier, making it highly reliable for health and humanitarian verification.
The system will be expanded to disease control offices in urban areas, public hospitals in provinces such as Samut Sakhon, Tak, and Mae Hong Son, and private hospitals authorised to conduct health checks for migrant workers.
So far, more than 200,000 migrant workers have been registered under the system, with a processing accuracy rate of 99.75 percent, Sukit said.
