Confusion, discrepancies in four public registers to end

The inconvenience to citizens from differences in their registration data in the four different active public registers is expected to end with the completion at the beginning of 2024 of the identification process currently under way.

The identification program has already contributed to better interoperability between public sector bodies and has highlighted the huge problems caused by the operation of the four individual registers.

The four registers are: a) Tax, b) Insurance, c) Citizen Protection, which has to do with identity cards, and d) the General Register of Citizens.

An indication of the confusion caused until now is that each of these four registers is under a different ministry. The Tax Register is under the Finance Ministry, the Insurance Register is under the Labor Ministry, ID cards are under the Citizen Protection Ministry, and the Citizens’ Register is under the Interior Ministry. As a result, different information in each of the registries has become the norm rather than the exception. Even if the information is correct, digital systems may fail to identify it since millions of citizens are registered elsewhere with some letters in the Greek alphabet and others in Latin, posing further recognition and identification challenges.

The registration problem was exacerbated during the pandemic, when parents were unable to schedule vaccination sessions for their children due to the inability to identify their relationship. 

Since 2020, a colossal project has been under way under the responsibility of the general secretary of the Ministry of Information Systems and Digital Governance, Dimosthenis Anagnostopoulos, who, under the supervision of, initially, the former minister Kyriakos Pierrakakis and now Dimitris Papastergiou, is attempting to identify and eventually unify millions of registers.

The ongoing program has already made a significant contribution.

Indicatively, more than 20,000 personal codes, to which multiple social security numbers have been assigned, have been deactivated so far. In addition, 99% of vaccinated minors have been linked to their parents’ VAT and social security numbers. Moreover, 400,000 social security identification numbers (AMKA) have been updated in the Social Security Number Register, while 3.2 million workers have confirmed or corrected their AMKA.

Incorrect death notifications have been restored in at least 180 cases – i.e. people who are alive, but for the state had died. Far more common of course is the reverse – i.e. people who have passed away but have not gone through all the registers.