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Governmental ID System in Japan
Kaan writes: "Japan just launched a mandatory, nationwide ID system whereby every citizen is assigned an 11-digit identification number. The database stores personal data (name, address, date of birth, gender, possibly more data) for each person. At least five municipalities are refusing to join the system, which accounts for ~4 million of the 127 million total. While some Japanese folks are refusing to cooperate, most are going along with it. Is this the beginning of the end of privacy in Japan? How much longer until we see something like that in the U.S.?"
Ahhh, don't we have something like that already known as a social security number?
This sort of thing has been in place in many countries for quite some time. In Sweden, for example, every resident has a "personnummer" (personal number) that you use for identification purposes. It consists of your birthdate followed by another four-digit number. And the US has their Social Security number.
So what I'm interested in is, what's the problem?
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When the pin is pulled, Mr. Grenade is no longer our friend.
Cool, Ashcroft got Japan to run his Beta Testing for him.
...and see what a dictature they live in ! Now not only does the state know people's gender, they know people's AGE too ! This is ludacris ! Before you'll know, they will keep people's ADRESS too ! Ludacris !
I know that it sounds like a troll, but seriously this is the kind of thing that made me a Libertarian. My towns congressmen , both Dem. and Rep, have all pledged to fight government invasion of privacy, but they keep voteing us closer to this kind of thing.
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Our CPR (Central Person Registry) stores your CPR-number. Mine looks like this:
130477-1235 (no, this is not my real CPR-number)
This indicates that my birthdate is the 13th day of the 04th month of the 77th year.
1235 is the "checksum" and gender-marker; even numbers for women, uneven for men. I think they use X for women and Y for men without a permanet citizen ship (refugees and the like).
Also, the entire number has to pass some kind of test, but I can't remember how it's used.
The CPR also has the current address of each person along with an opt out feature for commercial mail targeted at you, which is nice, because all companies in Denmark have to comply by that setting, but they only have access to the address through CPR.
You can read a lot more about the system here.
I am a proponent of personal privacy, and I don't have a problem with this system - probably because I can't think of a single intrusion into my privacy caused by it.
I think it comes down to "trust", and so far I haven't had a reason not to trust the CPR.
We do not live in the 21st century. We live in the 20 second century.
Denmark has had this since the 1970's, which is also the reason why the Danish population is very popular amongst researchers. All health care information is available through this central computer system, and this makes researchers able to find correlations quickly. All tax information is provided this way, too. You cannot open a bank account without telling your 10-digit identification number, which the bank will use to report to the state.
It is extremely convenient - when moving, you only have to tell it once, and then all banks, insurance companies, the army (if you are reserve), your doctor etc. know your new address.
There are some security concerns and there is a very strict legislation about how to handle this system, but the economical benefits are huge and it does benefit society a lot.
Having lived in both in Denmark where everybody has an ID-number (but no ID-cards), and in Germany, where everybody has an ID-card (but no ID-number), I clearly prefer the Danish system.
Dybdahl.
From the article:
"the new ID numbers -- for each of Japan's 126 million citizens...."
Three paragraphs later:
"About four million of Japan's 127 million people...."
At that rate of population explosion, how long till they run out of number combos?
I actually think this is a good idea.
People in the U.S. gripe about identity theft left and right. Part of the reason it's so easy to perform identity theft is that while a social security number is tied to a person, it's only tied by the fact it was assigned. Remember, we recycle these stupid numbers.
I have a Finnish ID number as well, since I lived there for quite some time. That one actually makes sense. It's my birthday in DDMMYY form, plus three digits and a letter. That identifies where I was born, when I was born, and my gender. It's not exactly easy to steal from people, since it really is tied to the person, not simply assigned.
Technically in Finland, you don't have to give out the number, but in reality you use it for a number of things. The cool part is that they write down the last part (the three digits and letter) when checking credit cards, lessening credit card fraud. Anyone remember when they used to check stuff here in the U.S.?
<example_id>040463-395F</example_id>
The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it. - G.B. Shaw
As a belgian citizen, I've been living with a mandatory national ID card for all my life (well, from age 12 anyway). This card holds my names, adress, name of wife and kids, a national ID number (birth date + some digits) and a picture. Is that national ID card an infringement on my privacy? NO!
I use the card to identify with state services such as when I want a copy of an official document, when I go vote, etc.; when requested by the police, for banking purposes: I have to show my ID card before doing a withdrawal at the bank, to create a new bank account, ... But NOTHING besides that.
Does my governement keep all this data in a database. Sure they do. What do they do with that? Most certainly nothing.
I fail to understand how you all people see this as an end to privacy. It's your government after all, they're supposed to know who's living where, who voted (voting is mandatory here). There's no pretending you're someone else than you, because that ID card is mandatory and there's a picture of you on it. So you can't pose as someone else (and someone can't pose as you).
Do you remember the story of that wife who kept being arrested because she shared the same name as a wanted criminal? That could never happen with a national ID card, because all she'd have to do was present it and be left alone.
National ID cards are GOOD, not bad.
One shall speak only if what one has to say is more beautiful than silence
Portuguese laws forbid different entities from cross-referencing their databases, without explicit approval of the citizens. The way it is written, it even affects different departments of the state -- leading to a social security number, a tax ID number, etc.
I think it is a lot worse the way its done in the US, where everyone and their dog knows your SS#. It is very easy to cross-reference the DBs. At least here, they'd need to do some data mining...
If at first you don't succeed, skydiving is not for you
In a country where video rental stores routinely demand your social security number before they allow you to rent tapes (and it takes a minimum 30-minute argument with 3 managers to convince them that's an illegal requirement), most or all of the harms of universal ID number are already here. Let's get some of the benefits. With a national ID number and national ID card,
1. Voter registration can be eliminated: Along with all the civil rights battles that entails. Anyone old enough can simply show up at a polling place on election day and vote. This eliminates a whole level of exclusionism.
2. Driver's Licenses can be just for drivers: So, so many Americans who can't drive (for reasons including age, disability, etc.) fight to maintain their driver's licenses because it's HARD to participate in society and commerce without one. A national ID card would provide all persons with an ID that merchants wouldn't question -- and no need for a driving test. Furthermore, people who know that they're unsafe, incapable drivers would have an alternative to keeping their licenses. This would allow them to avoid the temptation to drive.
"We reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals." --The American President (20.1.2009)
If the Government chooses to keep such information about you, that's fine. I for one would find life much easier if my health records were accessible to every doctor's surgery - when I come home from uni, I have to re-register if I want a doctor's appointment.
Far, far more important that the storage of such data is who is allowed to retrieve it. For example, if there were to be a medical study, you might expect that your health records (relevant parts thereof), gender, age, region and the kind of conurbation you live in (village/town/city etc) were made available, but no personal identifiers.
I find it far more of an invasion of privacy that my telephone and e-mail contacts are abused by people or companies wanting to sell their wares for me. The only reason we might be afraid of a centralised data repository is that it could be hacked. I would contend that, providing appropriate measures are taken, and that photographs are not stored on the database, there is nothing to be afraid of.
Like car accidents, most hardware problems are due to driver error.
[...]
Now this is the beginning of activation for Japan's national ID systems: 11
digit number national ID, networked resident record system based on the ID
numbers, and national ID card that based on contactless radio transaction
smartcard, with 32 bit CPU and co-processor supposed to handle crypto and
digital signature, which will be issued from 2003.
This status makes computer security specialists worried. If organized
crimes or foreign spy agents get access to one of these, that could be a
disaster. Clear and present danger is here now. World class crackers might
be difficult to ignore temptations to try their penetration skills on this
network because it is built on Windows NT/2000 servers and possibly MS SQL.
You got the idea?
[...]
my bold emphasis (as if you needed it)
Taken from Politech.
Amazing ay?
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Every time someone mentions identity numbers, the YRO group gets up and slits their wrists. Why? Like it or not, you are identified every day but several numbers that you don't argue about, and probably have less control over.
Let's start with the basics. Every country needs a central population register. If it doesn't have one, it can't recognise its citizens and afford them their rights; or take action to protect itself against illegal immigrants; or issue you with a passport. At the very least that system has your legal name (at birth) and your date of birth. Without an entry in that system you can't prove your age or citizenship.
Now, as every database expert should know, full name and birth date do not have to be unique within a population. Therefore this "database" will include a unique number for every person. Even if its not given to you or used somewhere, you still have an identity number.
Now let's look at the implications of using that number outside the system. First, you have a card which can be used for identification purposes. This has good and bad points. It can be used to secure your transactions (prevent fraud against you), but also to link you with a transaction (reducing privacy). The better the security system of the card, the more difficult it is to forge, and the better the trade-off.
The ID card also serves to verify age. This is pretty important. How do you *know* she is 16? How does a bank know you are old enough to have a credit card? Many establishments that require age verification use a credit card or driver's license, but just because you are of the legal age to obtain one of these doesn't mean you actually have one. Not to mention that the legal age for driving is different in various parts of the world, and in many places you can get a credit card at any age if your parents sign surety.
What about SSNs? They are commonly used for a variety of identification purposes, but are a very poor choice for this! Knowing an SSN is a direct route to being able to abuse an SSN (in most countries) -- it is a number you NEED to keep private, but the lack of a unified identification system often prevents that from happening.
The lack of an ID card doesn't prevent the linking up of various disparate systems. In fact, most of these systems have poor design from a privacy standpoint, as they never had it in mind. You bank WILL know your SSN, drivers license, name, home address, and preferred make of condoms if it wants to. An ID system does not make this any more or less difficult.
So what's the BAD part about mandatory ID cards? The government and/or industry may enact policies that require positive identification at a time when such identification should not be needed. And that is what privacy legislation is there to ensure does not happen.
I, for one, like the fact that I have an identity card which is REQUIRED (by law) to be produced in any interactions with the government for the purposes obtaining passports, etc, or when opening accounts with a bank. It requires a fair amount of effort to fraudulently open an account in my name or otherwise impersonate me, and electronically secured (i.e. digitally signed) ID cards will make that more difficult in the future.
On the other hand, I don't give my ID number out to people or institutions who don't require it. I am aware of the privacy implications of having that number, even if there is no publically accessible means of misusing it.
i-name =twylite [http://public.xdi.org/=twylite], see idcommons.net
What's important to Americans isn't privacy.
It's the illusion of privacy.
It doesn't take a rocket scientist to know that between names, addresses, social security numbers, credit cards, drivers licenses, and hosts of other identification methods, tracking someone isn't very difficult. You match up the information on their tax forms with the information from their credit card purchases with the information at various country offices and you're pretty much good to go.
It's like the lock on your car door. People lock their car doors because it makes them feel secure. But if they lock the keys in their car, they know they can call a locksmith and he'll have that door open in 60 seconds. What they don't think about (and what they don't want to think about) is that if a locksmith can open it up in 60 seconds then a good theif can do it in half the time, especially as the code required to make a new key is right there in plain sight.
For now Americans have the illusion of privacy. It makes them happy and it makes the job of those people who would gather information about them easier.
No Zen is good zen
One out of 2000 people are born with ambiguious genitalia, either through misdevelopment or chromosome ambiguity. About one in 200 people psychologically dont agree with their physical gender.
The growing consensus is to let the ambiguous child select their own gender as they grow older, rather than to assign one at birth. Assignment fails in half of the cases.