[privacy] U.S. Senators Propose Repeal of National ID

[David Lodge]

On Tue, 19 Dec 2006 05:01:20 -0000, Dennis Henderson  
<hendomatic at gmail.com> wrote:
> Well after you're all done awarding each other honorary degrees, it  
> would be
> good to hear about a solution, not just lament the issues..

*sigh* did you actually read my email? I mentioned a solution in the  
second paragraph.

The problem is that governments seem to believe an ID card will stop  
terrorism, stop fraud, stop illegal immigration, stop underage  
drinking/smoking/sex, cure aids, make cold fusion work and cause world  
peace. They won't do any of the above, in fact, with some (e.g. fraud)  
they have the potential to make them worse.

So, there's several solutions:
1. Introduce an ID card, watch lots of commercial companies abuse it;  
watch lots of government employees abuse it; because the back end will be  
made to a tight deadline by the cheapest bidder, watch hackers and culture  
jammers abuse it; watch the secret services abuse it; watch the whole  
relationship 'twixt state and citizen change around.
2. Don't bother, carry on with the current system, though flawed is  
working.
3. Use an independently secured, openly verified with key (i.e. public)  
auditability of design backend to allow the distribution of identification  
tickets for the required service.
4. Move away from the ID culture, only require ID for essential services.

To solve it properly you need a combination of 4 and 3. In some cases,  
e.g. opening a bank account, ID shouldn't be required (the money  
laundering excuse is a load of bollocks) so we chose 4. In others, e.g.  
buying restricted items, a token part of identification is required (hence  
not all items should be viewed), so we chose 3.

In simple terms an ID solution needs to be designed according to current  
and future need, following the principles of privacy (for the citizen) and  
security (e.g. least amount of information presented, high auditability,  
open design) and quality (not to the lowest bidder). This is not what the  
UK or US governments are doing - they're starting from a position of "we'd  
like an ID card and a national database of all our citizens" and then  
trying to justify it, design it, then look at the requirement.

dave