and private sector services. A biometric ID is an identity card containing biometric information, such as fingerprints, irises, and facial images, which can be easily and quickly authenticated online. Biometric IDs provide women with a unique identity that is not tied to their spouse or another head of household. When these IDs are part of a digital ID system,109 they can be used to access digital ID-enabled services, such as opening a bank account, accessing loans, registering for a SIM card, and voting. When digital ID systems are made available to providers of social programs to support enrollment and authentication, they can become a catalyst for lifting gender-based barriers to enrollment in these social programs. In Pakistan, for example, linking the new biometric computerized national identity card (CNIC) to the enrollment in the Benazir Income Support Program (BISP), a cash transfer program for the poor, caused a surge in CNIC enrollment of women, since cash transfers could be given only to the female head of the eligible household (box 3). Evidence is emerging that digital ID systems, in addition to closing gaps in ID access, can increase women’s agency and open up economic opportunities. In India, the Aadhaar scheme110 has helped narrow the gender gap in mobile money account ownership. Between 2014 and 2017, account ownership in India rose by more than 30 percentage points. In 2014, men were 20 percentage points more likely than women to have a bank account. Owing to a strong government push to increase account ownership through biometric identification cards, the gender gap in account ownership has shrunk to 6 percentage points in 2017. Box 5. Digital biometric IDs can increase women’s agency Linking the new biometric CNIC to the enrollment in the BISP, a cash transfer program for the poor launched in 2008, was a deliberate move by the government to provide women with legal identification and to promote women’s empowerment. Indeed, through point-of-sale and automatedteller machines, the BISP has introduced a biometrically authenticated delivery mechanism matching with their ID database to ensure a verified delivery of cash transfers to the women beneficiaries, rather than through their husbands or brothers, as had previously occurred. In Pakistan, within four years of the launch of the BISP, there was an overall increase of 72 percent in the issuance of CNICs to the adult population in the country and a 94 percent increase in women enrollment. CNICs have played a crucial role in empowering Pakistani women. Women with CNICs felt a stronger sense of identity than they ever had before. Their families respected them more, which increased their self-confidence in sharing their opinions on household matters. Recipients of the BISP cash transfers said they felt financially empowered for the first time in their lives. Surveys conducted by the Oxford Management Group in 2014, 2015, and 2016 also show that the BISP has had a positive and statistically significant impact on the proportion of women who can access cash in an emergency, on the proportion of women who would always vote in local and national elections, and on the ability of women to travel alone within their communities. Female beneficiaries are also found to play a more active role in decision making within the household, including managing money and controlling how the cash transfer was spent—which was increasingly on nutrition and health. Sources: Cheema et al. 2014, 2015, 2016; Demirgüç-Kunt et al. 2018; World Bank 2018a, 2018c 18 ACHIEVING UNIVERSAL ACCESS TO ID: GENDER-BASED LEGAL BARRIERS AGAINST WOMEN AND GOOD PRACTICE REFORMS