Obtaining an NBI clearance may be needed for many things in the Philippines, among them renewing your passport or owning a firearm. The process however, can be incredibly long and tedious. Having a red flag or a hit, as how the bureau calls it, can lead to severe delays and difficulties. In most cases, the hit is caused by a system error, wherein another profile exists with the same name and a previous criminal record. This leads to days of added work as an agent is onboarded to verify your true profile. This, and many other similar processes in the Philippines are inefficiencies much often overlooked that directly lead to a loss in productivity of the average Filipino. Ultimately, such affects the domestic GDP (gross domestic product).
For nearly two decades, the government of the Philippines has attempted to establish a national ID system. Attempts have faced opposition on constitutional and privacy grounds. Former President Fidel Ramos first attempted in 1996 with Administrative Order No.308 to establish a National Computerized Identification System but was stopped by the Supreme Court on the ground that legislative approval was required. Executive Order No. 420 followed in 2005 and required all government-related entities to combine their ID systems. While privacy concerns remained, the order eventually gave rise to what we know today now as UMID.