Civil Registry and Identification Service of Chile

The Civil Registry and Identification Service (SRCEI), sometimes simply referred to as the Civil Registry, is a decentralized public service in Chile, with its own legal personality and assets, under the supervision of the President of the Republic through the Ministry of Justice and Human Rights. It is responsible for maintaining records related to the civil status of individuals and other duties assigned by law. Since December 2022, the organization has been headed by Omar Morales Márquez, under the government of President Gabriel Boric.

Its tasks include issuing birth certificates, marriage and civil union certificates, death certificates, criminal records, identity cards, passports, Unique Key, vehicle registrations, and inheritance probate for intestate succession.

To carry out its duties, the Civil Registry and Identification Service operates 16 regional offices, 476 offices and sub-offices, 300 self-service kiosks, 95 mobile service units, and a maritime office, known as Civilsur. It employs approximately 3,100 staff members.

Since the Colonial Chile era, personal identification was carried out through ecclesiastical records (such as baptismal, marriage, and death certificates) of the Catholic Church, which remained the state religion until 1925. On July 17, 1884, President of the Republic Domingo Santa María enacted the Civil Registry Law, as part of the secular laws, establishing a Civil Registry official responsible for maintaining duplicate records of births, marriages, and deaths.

With the evolving role of the State in economic, social, political, and cultural matters, the Civil Registry had to assume new functions of great importance to society. An example of this is the creation of the "General Registry of Convictions" in 1925, which was linked to identification, to establish the legal individuality of people and record their criminal history.

Decree Law 26, published on November 18, 1924, established the mandatory personal identification service, creating the identity card, which became mandatory for all citizens.

On August 28, 1930, the "Civil Registry Service" was organized, absorbing the tasks of the "Identification and Passport Service" in 1943, which until then had been under the responsibility of the Investigations Police (PDI).

Starting in 1980, the use of computer equipment was introduced, and later, in the 1990s, the incorporation of technology, process redesign, and the acceleration of procedures were promoted, resulting in reduced processing times and a clear orientation towards user satisfaction.