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White House Frowns on National ID Card
sonic writes "'One security measure that [Homeland Defense Chief] Clarke didn't put much store in, however, was a proposal by some industry leaders, including Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, to create a national ID card.
Clarke said he could not name one official who supports the idea as proposed, though he said the administration does not yet have a formal position on the concept.
"Everyone I've talked to doesn't think it's a good idea," Clarke said. "
The Homeland Security Chief is not Richard Clarke. It is Tom Ridge. Do people even read the articles they submit? It plainly says " President Bush's special adviser on cyberspace security said". I love to bitch about the editorial control of this site, but this is obvious.
Reports in The Observer reported on 30 September that an ID card will be introduced, which will be mandatory "to use public services, including schools and hospitals, under plans being drawn up by the Home Office" however Home Secretary David Blunkett and Lord Rooker said on 1 October that there are no plans to introduce legislation on ID cards this year or early next year. Surely this is going to create more questions that it raises? Good article about it over at Privacy International too
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...unless you, the people, fight like grim death against it.
Here in Australia we had a proposal for the `Australia Card' -- basically the same as this proposal, only not as technologically sophisticated. It was put to the people's vote (referendum or an election issue? I don't remember) and the people's response was to tell the proposers how to fold it into sharp corners, and where to stick it afterwards. That's Ok, though, because then they introduced the Tax File Number, which is a wannabe SSN -- you need it to earn an income (failure to provide a TFN is not illegal, but automatically results in you being taxed at 49.5%), to open a bank account, or just about anywhere else where you are using money in a non-trivial way.
The TFN was possible because we (the Australian population) had just fought furiously and won against a more draconian scheme, and were tired. Also, this almost slipped under the radar without comment, as the parliament rushed it through with very little debate, in the house or in public.
This may turn out to be another High Aim Tactic. Ask for something which is absolutely ridiculous, and let yourself be beaten back to what you wanted in the first place. Even if Ellison is serious (surely not...?) his overtures can -- and probably will -- be used by others with the same barrow to push.
The question is where to draw the line. How much freedom from surveillance do you want? Once you have figured that out, don't settle for one jot less! As soon as you rationalise that `I don't really need to be able to X' and bargain away the right to be able to do so, then you have just lost something precious which you will never get back.
Of course, things are rarely that simple, and some things are obviously stupid. (Such as, eg, `I demand the right to stockpile Anthrax spores'.) But the apparatchiks will use these examples to persuade you that the right to freely assemble, for example, is just too dangerous for you to have. It will not be put to you like that. It will be that some travel may have to be restricted, or that restrictions based on profiling [Hmm, you have travelled in the middle east, your family name is arabic, and you talk funny...] will be instituted `for the time being'.
If history teaches us anything, it is that `for the time being' can be translated `for the foreseeable future', and that just means `until it is no longer profitable to do so'.
Wasn't it a Founding Father who said `the Price of Liberty is Eternal Vigilance'?
What about the SSS? Does that qualify as mandatory? The penalties for not registering can be severe, even though you may not be jailed for it.
dtach - A tiny program that emulates the detach feat
...all I'm saying is that it's human nature to get over things in about 3-6 months, of course, not including the people who were directly affected by it.
While it's true that the effect of the attacks will diminish in our collective consciousness, don't forget that all kinds of laws are on the books because some mother of a victim (real mother, not like the "mother of all victims") wouldn't go away until somebody ramrodded a law through that could make her feel that her loss was not in vain.
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As a matter of fact, I am a lawyer. But I play an actor on TV.
First of all, Selective Service (AKA the draft) does not include women. So its only manditory for half the population.
And secondly, it isn't an ID. People don't ask for selective service ID numbers when you board planes or whatever.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Anyway, the only data they have to work on are just that: data. Every incident, every occurrence, is fed into the database and correlated with as many factors as possible and realistic. There is a problem when the insurance benefit is high dollar (as æroplane insurance must be) and there is relatively little data to collect. On 11 Septemeber we had four commercial plane crashes. That's probably more than in the continental US in the previous dozen years, and certainly more than in the past half-dozen. Suddenly their actuarial tables were thrown all out of whack. So they corrected them.
The intelligent corporation self-insures as much as possible. When large enough, one may collect one's actuarial data, and put aside as much as one would have put into insurance premiums, and come out ahead of the game. Insurance is a sucker's bet, in the real world as much as in Vegas. Anyone who takes it deserves the reaming he will most certainly receive.
Some experiences with ID cards in my country (Germany, that is):
We have ID cards since WWI (as far as I know). They are issued by the local authorities where you must register your residence.
Back in the seventies the ID was a little grey book with many pages. Every 10 years you had to renew it. If you moved, you had to walk to the town hall to have your new address manually entered. People in the crime business could do this by themselves with a potatoe and blue ink.
Blank IDs were kept in store at local authorities, whose remises where usually poorly protected against theft. This applied also to blank passports. Because this was how our local terrorists supposedly obtained forged IDs, it was decided at the beginning of the 80s to change procedures. Since then, ID and passport blanks are printed at the Federal Printery. The local autorities pass your personal data to the printery, and they send back the ID card with your photo and name on it.
They are made of bank note paper welded into plastic. It was stated that the new IDs are machine-readable, while the old ones were not.
I did not like the new cards so I did not apply for one. So I had none for 10 years or so. I did not run in any trouble. Now I have one because it is easier to open a bank account etc.
There remained one problem: the address. ID cards can not be reprinted every time you move. So your address is applied on the outside of the ID card with an adhesive sticker, which always goes off (at least in my wallet). This sticker is produced by the local autority. So when you have moved, you walk to the town hall and get a new sticker. Or, you get adhesive paper and a laser printer to forge one (for criminals only).
Local terrorism has ceased to exist, for various reasons, but not because of security measures of any sort. Our police autorities so far failed to intrude into terrorist networks of the seventies and eighties. Crime rate is still on the increase (although on a much lower level than in the US). The new IDs did not help a thing. Police have still no ID reading machines. Like in the old days with the little grey book, they use their radio equipment to communicate your name to somebody in headquarters, who checks if you are on the wanted list. This takes several minutes. The original idea was that one police officer could check the IDs of, for example, 100 train passengers in half an hour.
Did the IDs reduce civil liberties? I think not. I hardly ever have one with me. On average, I am asked to identify myself every 3 or 4 years (I live in a big city, white male with local accent). The police officer then tells me that I have to have my ID card with me. I tell him that this is wrong, the law only says that you have to identify yourself, by whatever means. So I display my gym member card, or something with my name on it. Either s/he believes me or not; but this applies also if I had the ID card, because they can be forged. So far I was always believed.
Years ago I had two appartments. One was my main residence, the other one for weekends. Then I gave up the main and moved into the other. I had to have it registered at town hall. I got a new sticker but they failed to enter me into the resident list: too complicated. This was revealed at the next election when they refused to allow me to vote: I were no resident of the area. I said I would object to the election result if I was not allowed to vote, and prevailed. Indeed there are estimates that up to 20% of citizen registry entries (which are kept by local authorities, there is no central [federal] citizen list) are outdated or wrong. Many people are registered where they do not live or vice versa.
When you move and trot obediently to town hall for your new sticker, they want a confirmation of your landlord (they have forms for that). Once I had a landlord who was not willing to give me one, so they refused to register me. Unfortunately I needed my passport renewed. So I insisted and argued that my relationship to the landlord was none of their business. The law actually says you are obliged to register where you live. Nothing is said about landlords. They refused nevertheless, and I went to a court and got a court order. I was back after 2 hours and got my registration and my passport renewed. That was cool.
Now they are about to introduce new ID cards with a finger print on it. The fed gvt says this would link the ID to its owner better than a portrait. One of the WTC terrorists lived in Hamburg and had several IDs. Ok, in the future he would have several IDs with his thumb print. - I wonder what they will do when I will refuse to have my prints taken.
Conclusion:
- ID cards do not increase security. The whole system of IDs and registration is full of flaws, one can easily overcome it.
- ID cards do not put civil liberties at risk. The whole system of IDs and registration is full of flaws, one can easily overcome it.