Slashdot Mirror
Silicon Valley vs. Your Privacy
TreeRat submits word of an article in the New York Times' magazine section, including mention of the proposed national database which has been talked about on Slashdot before. "The story goes into great detail with Larry Ellison, who is still pushing hard to bring 'Big Brother' to life. When asked if this database will be created, and run on Oracle, Larry's response was 'I do think it will exist, and I think it is going to be an Oracle database. ...And we're going to track everything.' There's a lot more than Ellison in this piece, though, and much of it is scary.
A national ID card and centralized database won't lose you any of your privacy. All it will do is take away the illusion of privacy. You think the government can't track you now? Show ID at the airport, use a bank card or CC when you land to get some cash, activate your cellphone while you're in the taxi, and they can track you if they want to. They can do all this stuff already.
All an ID card will do is make it slightly easier for them to do it, and much harder for terrorists to use forged documentation to travel, make it easier to prove you are who you say you are.
Many European countries have national ID cards, but The Man isn't keeping them down. UK has cameras all over the place, but they're still not being taught Newspeak. The problem is not in the cards, it's in how they're used. If you don't trust your government, elect a new one. If that's not feasible, move to another country. Yeah Ellison's a nutjob, but so what? Leave the country and don't go back.
--Dan