Japan's My Number (マイナンバー) system has been in force since 2016, assigning a 12-digit ID to citizens and residents. My Number cards are issued alongside.
Uses
- Tax (annual return, withholding, payment statements) - Social insurance (health, pension, employment) - Welfare (child allowance, livelihood protection) - Disaster response
Collection/storage rules
- Purpose disclosure required (statutory tasks only) - Encrypted storage - Restricted access + logs - Destruction after retention period - Penalties for tampering or leaks
HR SaaS
- **SmartHR**: Built-in My Number collection, encryption, storage; employee self-register portal - **freee HR**: Integrated with freee accounting - **jinjer, HRMOS, Kaonavi**: Managed within each HR module
Pitfalls
- Plaintext Excel storage: legal violation - Retaining ex-employee My Numbers indefinitely: illegal - Tossing paper printouts without shredding/log: non-compliant
Operating without My Number-capable HR SaaS creates serious legal risk — even solo corporations almost always need to adopt HR SaaS.