A system and method for validating adherence of an UII identifier code to one of several prescribed DOD codes by means of a programmed series of tests. First the code is tested for a prescribed header and a last character message. If one or the other is not found, the process stops and an error message is displayed. Field separator characters are identified that divide the message into fields. If the header, end of message character, and field separator are found and tested successfully, the program proceeds, and searches for an identifier of one of the DOD prescribed semantic formats. The semantic format identifier is extracted and tested. If valid, the process proceeds. If not, an error message is displayed. In proceeding, each field is stored, and the data from each field is extracted in accordance with the format identifier that had been extracted.