Earlier ID cards

During the Second World War, the authorities issued a mandatory identity card. This card was abandoned after the end of the war, as it was strongly associated with the occupation force and its control regime.

Norway Post started issuing a photo identity card on 1 March 1957, initially free for all residents over 15 years old. These were intended for use at the post offices, but were quickly adopted by other public and private instances as a valid photo ID. For several decades these were along with passports and driver's licenses the only widely recognized ID in Norwegian society. During the 1970s the postal ID cards were the only valid IDs for proving age on public transport.^[12]

Bank cards were launched in 1977, originally only serving as an ID card. These were intended for a clerk to be able to verify the identity of the person writing the check. By the 1980s the cards were used as debit cards, and even after checks were phased out of common use in the early 1990s, the bank cards retained a photo ID, including the national identity number of the person. The widespread use of bank cards as ID gradually led to the termination of postal ID cards.^[12] Legally, bank cards are a customer card which serves no particular legal purpose. However, because of the stringent requirements needed to verify one's identity to the bank in order to open an account and be issued a bank card, bank cards became widely accepted as ID cards, even at public institutions.^[13]

The banking sector was strongly in favor of replacing bank card-based IDs with government-issued IDs. Banks had no obligation to issue IDs. One issue was that the banks bore the cost of issuing the IDs. The other was that the banks did not have the same ability to authenticate people with confidence as government authorities, increasing the risk of fake IDs being issued. With the announcement of the National ID Card plans, a number of banks stopped issuing ID fields on their bank cards.^[14]

Need for a new ID card system

By the mid-2000s the situation had become untenable, with no generic, government-issued ID card available. Postal ID cards were phased out, banks were wanting to rid themselves of their obligation, passports could only be issued to Norwegian citizens and driver's licenses were restricted to those with the right to drive motor vehicles. Some people were left using their passports as their only valid ID.^[15][16] Certain group of immigrants were not able to acquire IDs altogether. Non-Norwegian citizens could not be issued passports, and without a government-issued ID card which showed their national identity number, they were unable to open a bank account. This further hindered them from getting jobs, as Norwegian anti-money laundering laws require wages to be paid to a bank account.^[13] The situation was exacerbated by Norway at the time not allowing multiple citizenship, which discouraged many foreigners who were long-term residents to apply for Norwegian citizenship.

Another issue was the lack of a government-issued eID. Banking, most private and eGovernment services relied heavily on private eID services, the most common being the bank-issued BankID. NorSIS stated that this was problematic because the government had no way of directly issuing eID with sufficiently high security levels. This largely effected the same people as were not able to open bank accounts, since holding a valid bank account had become the de facto means of acquiring an eID.^[13] NorSIS was also concerned that the quality of authentication issued by banks was inferior to that carried out by the police, which could lead to more fake IDs. Additionally, it was possible for a impostor to receive an eID for another person, without the victim having knowledge of the eID being issued. NorSIS recommended that all residents and other people in the National Population Register be issued a root eID from the government, as part of an ID card, and that other eID use these root eIDs as the basis for their verification.^[17]

Development and introduction

Norway decided in 2007 to introduce a voluntary national identity card, to be usable for travel to EEA countries. They were since delayed^[18][19][20] until introduced on 30 November 2020.^[21] The reason for the delay was that the responsible authorities required absolute security on both the cards and the validation of the identity at issuance, issuing new security requirements repeatedly.

The entire implementation cost, including development and upgrades to the passport offices, for the combined ID card and passport project, had reached 596 million Norwegian krone by 2018.^[22] 120 million of this was the cost of rebuilding the passport offices.^[15]

The Ministry of Justice and Public Security will send out a hearing, about making it possible for all people that have a national identity number, to get a national identity card. The card will not state nationality and therefore it cannot be used for travel.^[23] Until then, resident non-Norwegian citizens are not able to get ID cards, and for such people without a driver's license many still have no way of getting and ID card with their personal identity number.

From 2 August 2021, the European identity card^[24][25] is intended to replace and standardise the various identity card styles currently in use in the EU/EEA.^{[lower-alpha 1][27][28]} It will not mean so much change for the Norwegian identity card, as most required features, like a chip, is already there. A significant change is that the chip shall contain information about fingerprints. This means fingerprints must be read at application if not already stored by the authority, but this is already done when applying for passport.

With the introduction of the National ID Card, a number of major banks announced that they would be discontinuing the ID section on bank cards. Some stated that bank card ID would be an opt-in for their customers, while others stopped offering IDs entirely. An all-out retirement of bank card IDs may happen at a future date, once the National ID Cards have been fully implemented.^[13]

By February 2024 around 1.2 million Norwegian ID cards had been issued since their introduction in November 2020.^[29]

Printed data

The descriptions of the fields are printed in Bokmål, Nynorsk, Northern Sámi and English.

• Surname
• Given names
• Sex
• Date of birth
• Height
• Document number
• Date of expiry
• Nationality (only on card with travel rights, on the green version without travel rights the words "Not Valid as a Travel Document" is printed instead)
• Signature
• CAN

Chip

The chip is compatible with ICAO 9303, 7th edition. All mandatory data groups according to ICOAO 9303 have information. The information can be retrieved from the CAN number on the front side or the MRZ zone on the reverse-side. The photo of the card holder is in colour, size 446x580px and coded in JPEG 2000.^[50]

On the new version issued since 29 July 2021, the following optional fields are in use:^[47]

Data group 11:

• 01: The card holders full name has been coded as Surname<<Firstname<Middlename. Norwegian letters (ÆØÅ) are used, corresponding to the information in the Norwegian population register (Folkeregisteret).
• 03: Norwegian national identification number

Data group 12:

• 02: Date of issue (YYYYMMDD)
• 04: Only in cards not valid for travel "Not valid for travel"
• 08: Time of production (YYYYMMDDHHMMSS)
• 09: Identificator

On cards issued until 29 July 2021, the following optional fields are in use:^[50]

Data group 11:

• 01: The card holders full name has been coded as Surname<<Firstname<Middlename. Norwegian letters (ÆØÅ) are used, corresponding to the information in the Norwegian population register (Folkeregisteret).
• 03: Norwegian national identification number
• 04: Date of birth (YYMMDD)

Data group 12:

• 04: Only in cards not valid for travel "Not valid for travel"
• 08: Time of production (YYYMMDDHHMMSS)
• 09: Identificator