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UK MPs Approve Compulsory ID Cards
Idimmu Xul writes "BBC News is reporting that the UK House of Commons has approved legislation making identity cards compulsory." From the article: "The plans, rejected by peers last month, will now go back before the House of Lords. Tories warned of "creeping compulsion" and Lib Dems said the "fight against compulsory ID cards" would go on."
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> "And with the real problems people have today with identity fraud, which is a major, major issue; illegal immigration; organised crime: it's just the sensible thing to do."
Because having an identity card - that you have to carry with you at all times - is the sensible solution to the problem of identity theft. Because we all know that nothing you carry with you 24/7/365 can ever be stolen.
To be fair, in order for them to become compulsory, they'll have to go back and get legislation passed through both houses. Of course, anyone who gets their passport renewed will be required to get an ID card anyway (which in the UK is a large percentage of the population) so they'll be compulsory in everything but name.
Either way, it's a massive blow for civil rights in this country - they'll be storing obscene amounts of personal information, including the buzz-word of the moment, 'biometrics' in a central database that will need to be accessable by essentially every government department. Given this government's record for IT projects, I'm almost looking forward to the ID cards being introduced just to see how spectacularly the whole system fails.
"Sir, may I please see your ID?"
-Umm, I forgot it at home.
"Did you forget it at home or are you an illegal immigrant?"
-No, seriously, I forgot it at home!
"Right."
Officers club down suspect and drag him to jail.
I can only assume this is to counter illegal immigrants- and homeless people? Any regular citizen cannot not have an ID (job, bank transfers, rent etc).
Three rings for the Elven-kings in the sky
What the hell is wrong with England?!? You people invented modern democratic society and civil rights, and you've been happily flushing it down the drain, piece by piece, ever since the end of WWII. (Would you really be any worse off at this point if the Nazis had won?) Gun control, CCTV, now ID cards--every time I look at America's problems, I can always cheer myself up by remembering that whatever we're doing wrong, you're guaranteed to do something worse.
And what kind of politics have you got going now where the Conservatives are for civil liberties and Labour are the fascists? That's just bizarre.
Media that can be recorded and distributed can be recorded and distributed.
-kfg
I don't get it. Did the British learn nothing from World War II?!
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
I'd rather rephrase it like this "Actually it is only compulsory when applying for a passport. It will not be compulsory otherwise for now". Once the system is in place, its only a matter of time when it becomes common place. All they have to do is prove to public that they either caught a terrorist or prevented a subway bomb somehow. Fear is the easiest thing to sell to public.
ID Cards for the Brits, wait, here's why they can get angry!
From the Association of British Drivers press release: "The EU is already planning to use Galileo to enforce continental-wide road tolling, and the car-hating British government wants to be first. You won't be able to drive anywhere without the EU knowing where you are going, who you are travelling with, and what speed you are travelling at."
Animoog.org
I'm all for anything that will stop terrorism.
Anything? How about summary executions or travel document requirements for movement between cities? Maybe you would prefer racial profiling and detention camps? Drastic enough measures will stop terrorism, but at what price?
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What the hell do US and UK people have against a national ID card? It's just a mean of proving your identity, here in France we've had it for well, decades before I were born. A driver license can be equally used. At least, unlike in the US, people without driver license have papers.
So, in other words, it's compulsory.
ID cards? How pleasantly old fashioned. Wouldn't compulsory RFID implants make so much more sence?
That's about 100,000 card updates per working day.
Does anybody think that there will be any kind of real checks performed on those updates?
"What's changed?"
American Express don't throw you into jail if you cut up their card and throw it away.
An ID card has nothing in common with a credit card. They just happen to be the same size.
So if you disagree with the idea, you can't even leave the country. Nice.
Exigo spamos et dona ferentes
I live in the UK and my major worry is that when I get an ID card it could easily end up getting lost or stolen.
These cards aren't like credit cards where you can phone up you bank and get it canceled making the card useless, once it is stolen some crook will have all the information that they could possibly want about you. While it is easy to change the pin number for a debit or credit card you can't go and change your biometrics everytime your card is stolen.
"Hello, I would like to report my ID card as stolen."
"That is fine sir. Can we arrange a time to burn off you finger prints and laser you eyes?"
Anything? How about summary executions or travel document requirements for movement between cities? Maybe you would prefer racial profiling and detention camps? Drastic enough measures will stop terrorism, but at what price?
Actually, I think "drastic enough" measures will increase terrorism. The harder a government clamps down, e.g. subjecting individuals to racial profiling, etc. the greater the pool of discontented and potential terrorists become. Its a positive feedback loop. The harsher they are the worse it will become.
Service guarantees Citizenship! Questions Guarantee GITMO.... Amerika Uber Alles!
Today, but if you dont believe that will be expanded into 'everyday life', then you are either a fool or blind.
Once you accept this, its a small step to the next level.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
We have had compulsory ID cards for years and frankly, I find it rather artificial that such a fuss is made about the principle of introduction in the UK. In reality people already need to carry some document that allows them to identify themselves, if only to their banker, even in the UK and USA. The practical difference with having an official "identify card" is minute.
This is all about symbolic value. Both the US and UK government have summarily granted themselves the power to lock people in jail without any form of trial, or at least restrict their movements; to snoop in people's communications and to fill the streets with security cameras. These are far more outrageous attacks on civil liberty than a compulsory ID card. The reason civil liberty groups focus on ID cards is simply that they are both universal and material and therefore have the potential to concern everybody; not that they are enormously problematic.
But this focus on matters of principle and symbolism is highly counterproductive. While libertarians are wasting their time fighting a lost battle, the British government is quietly getting away with storing vast amounts of information on the chip in the identity card -- no less than 49 different types of information, and vastly more than is necessary just to ascertain someone's identity; the UK legislation opens the possibility to store a lengthy record of all interactions someone has had with the government on the card, from work permits to health insurance. It even includes, lugubriously, "date of death" -- apparently even the corpses will have to carry an identity card!
It is there that the real matter for concern rests.
My card carries my family name, first names, gender, nationality, date and place of birth, address, photograph and signature, identity card number and date of expiry. That is really all such a card should be allowed to hold. When I get a digital card this will include an electronic signature, the government having had the idea -- on which diverse views are possible -- to issue every citizen with an electronic signature for computer transactions.
Actually, because of its insistence on machine-readable codes, arrival and departure records, pictures, fingerprints, and in the future biometric data as well, the US government probably holds a far more intrusive dossier on me than my own government, and without any opportunity for me to have a say in this.
At this point in the US, ID cards are mandatory if:
1. You want to drive.
2. You want to travel on an airplane (and most inter-city bus systems say you have to show one when asked, though they don't usually check).
3. You want to buy a firearm or ammunition (in most states).
4. You want to cash a check (read: get paid).
5. You want to pay for anything with a check or credit card (and places that sell expensive items don't always accept cash!).
6. You want to enroll in school.
7. You want to buy cigarettes or alcohol.
8. You want to get an ID (Yes, really, even if this isn't exactly what the law says. I've been through this).
I'd say that's pretty damn compulsory.
Article clearly states, right of the bat, that it's when you apply for a passport. So that's a point against hysterics.
:D.
However, it also states "...and will be put on a registry," so might as well leave the 1984 alarm running. Let's see:
Some random thoughts, concerns, questions for the crowd and more than a bit of polemic inspired by this latest tidbit in the Tony Loves George show:
This is effing ridiculous. Why not just rebuild the Berlin Wall, only turn the gun towers around t'other way? As Carmichael says in the linked article, "the only way to opt of the system is to give up your right to travel abroad."
Here's another amusing bit:
"Tony Blair was not able to attend the debate after his plane was grounded by engine troubles in South Africa."
Is this "engine trouble, wink wink nudge nudge"? He still found the time to utter that gem about it being "just sensible," and never mind all this Liberty rubbish... but maybe they felt it'd be easier to pass along without him there for opposition to focus against... or maybe he just didn't feel like getting yelled at today
(Before you object to any of the above speculation, please convince me that at any given moment, a plane actually cannot be found for the Prime Minister of Anywhere, and it is more secure to be a known grounded sitting duck? Right. If so, fire your entire staff now please, your life is in grave danger...)
Anyway. Interesting that the US and the UK are making two halves of the citizen lockdown; we talk about a US ID card, but first went ahead with the RFID passports. The UK looks like it stands a good chance of having the ID cards first. From there, it's pretty easy for each to point to the "success" of the other, and respectively pass their missing halves. Yum, compulsory RFID Citizen Cards.
Do you have a reason for crossing the border, Comrade? Why did you spend 3 hours at that truck stop, Comrade? Did you know you've been travelling with an Enemy of the State, Comrade? Please step out of the car now, Comrade.
Think that's BS? I wish. Sadly, only when more and more people who consider themselves the "normal" folks are being stopped and searched will they start to realize that maybe this isn't Liberty after all - if, of course, they haven't completed their indoctrinations into thinking it is.
As long as it looks like just black-wearing tattoed freaks and foreginers are being harassed, that's still Liberty, right?
Final, desperate plea/question to those who still doubt how this is going: Since when, in the history of Ever, has information been collected and compiled - and not used? Since when has power been sought and gained - and not abused? Explain to me how, exactly, you can collect and correlate so much data on so many private citizens with increasingly efficient and effective means of making it meaningful, finally - but when it comes to suspect uses of that information, oh don't worry, just trust them with no accountability or oversight.
"They wouldn't do that! They're the good guys!"
someone kindly wake up the great sleeping mass in the center of the country - they're used up all their Snooze button hits already.
That which does not kill us makes us... st
What I really don't understand about people who say "government idea X, which is a threat to my rights and freedoms, is a good thing in my mind because they tell me it will stop terrorism." On what basis are they measuring these trade-offs? Most of these government schemes (on both sides of the pond) offer very few, and vague at that, promises for reducing terrorism, and in the past have rarely shown any hard-evidence results. At best you'll get a canned response like "Oh program XYZ has thwarted numerous terrorist plots but I can't provide any references, accounts, or proof since it's all in the name of national security." And yet the populace still gives up freedoms knowlingly as long as they get these empty promises and examples. Unless the ruling powers can offer some program with a thorough breakdown of how that program is worth the rights it infringes - and later provides specific examples of program successes, or else shut it down - then no citizen of any country should feel in any way obligated, safe, or well-represented in giving up rights and freedoms for that program.
-- I'm not a pessimist, I'm a realist. It's not my fault that life sucks so much. --
I don't know what it's like in the UK, but in in Australia a passport is considered a very good means of identification. Of course this raises the question of how to I provide enough evidence to prove who I am in order to obtain a passport? Making a identification card compulsory add another layer - now how do I prove who I am in order to obtain an identification card so I can get a passport (no, you can't use your passport)?
The ultimate question is: How can you *prove* who you are?
In the end it comes down to webs of trust.
Of course, all of this misses the point. Are these measures meant to make us safer? From what? Terrorism? The guys who blew themselves up on the London undeground and on the buses were not hiding their identities. They were British citizens and in walked freely.
How does a compulsory id card to obtain a passport (which is already compulsory for travel) going to prevent this?
I don't make predictions, and I never will.
are terrorism, surely?
Wikileaks, no DNS
You have to be creative to understand the kinds of misuse that can occur. For example, in Canada there has been allegations that gun registry information is being used by thieves to specifically target houses known to have guns (yes, kind of ironic). It is not irrational to be scared of computerized personal information because computers make the scale of theft much larger and allow for efficient analysis and merging of personal information. Lastly, while we know we expect employers to respect employees private lives, would employers really treat someone as fairly if they had all the information about views, relationships, hobbies, recreational activities, etc.? It is safer to simply not have the information available.
Take a look at what is happening in Zimbabwe if they find out you vote against Mugabe's party. How about what happened to the Jews because the Nazi's knew there religion. Or how about Cambodia where the wrong shape head could get you killed? This isn't a Utopia, thing about how the information could be used in good times and in bad.
What's depressing about your point of view, is your think everyone is being worried for no reason. Simply because you didn't take the time, or use your brain to think things through.
If you truly do believe that the various western goverments are not answerable to the voter then what exactly is the difference between living say in the US/UK and the Soviet Union/China? Either the west has democracy and then anything the goverment does is by the will of the people OR you liven in a dictatorship. Remember, the soviet union did have elections. Just you could chose between a communist and a communist, not at all of course like the US where you can choose between a capatalist and a capatalist. Or the UK where you can choose between a corrupt party, a party that doesn't matter and a left-wing party so right-wing it makes the right-wing party look left-wing.
If you believe that it the west is a democracy then shut up. This is obviously what the majority of voters want. Democracy can only work if the minority accepts the rule of the majority. The only difference between dictatorship and democracy is really the size of the group that does the telling.
The older I get the more I come to believe that democracy is fundementally flawed. The majority of voters are to stupid to truly consider the results of their voting (voting for parties that are for policies the voter is totally against), you got only 1 vote for a generic candidate so screw you if on some issues you lean to the left and other you lean on the right. Myself I am dutch. I am pro socialism when it comes to helping people who are in trouble but I am right wing when it comes to people leeching from the system. Or put another way. A single mother with kids should be able to get good social security to raise her kids but uni graduate who can't find a job in whatever useless field he studied can go sweep roads. Wich party do I vote for? Tax me for the needy but put the whip on the lazy.
Of course with just 1 vote every four years how can I make my views known? Do I vote against the mess that is the current health care change over (left) or do I vote against the current mess with imigration (right)?
This move to compulsiry indentification is nothing new and is happening in various stages throughout the west. The reasons are simple. In the view of the currently elected goverments it needs to know who its people are and what they are doing. Simple stuff like knowing who is holding what job so you can collect the taxes. Oh sure you can rely on the honor system but apparently that ain't working well enough.
Who has judged it not working well enough? Well us the voters it seems. If you voted for tax cuts then you voted for the taxman needing more powers to make sure that everyone pays the reduced taxes. 1 person not paying taxes equals another person paying double to raise the same amount after all.
Same with imigration, if you ever complaint about illegal immigrants then you vote for indentification since that is the only way to find them.
At times it is easy to feel that the goverment doesn't listen to the voter but when you spend some time trying to understand what the voter wants you start to realize that the goverment has no choice.
Everyone wants cheap electricity, nobody wants a powerplant in their district. So what choice has goverment got? Build no powerplant and upset everyone a bit, build one and upset whatever district it is in a lot.
The whole discussion about identification needs to get out of the "the mean goverment is forcing me' moaning and into a debate about what we are willing to live with. Do we want anonimity even when it costs us a lot in taxes because of fraud OR do we want to be tracked througout our life?
Considering that the best election result still goes to the guy who promises he is going to cut taxes I think the answer is clear. We may moan about id cards but seem unwilling to live with effects of not having them.
Put it simple, your driving license is an ID card. We as a soc
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
No need for any -actual- event, even. If you can get away with shooting an unarmed man with no connection to terrorism, just on the grounds of terrorism in general, one would imagine you could push this through pretty easily with the same tactics.
To fight the war on terror, stop being afraid.
The national health number is not for identification, but for health-care purposes. The absence of a warm and fuzzy feeling towards security? The lack of control by politicians?
The scary thing about this is not the card itself, it is the database that will be set up.
The bill calls for an Identity Register that will contain not only all of the information that is provided at signup, along with biometric identifiers such as fingerprints and iris scans, but also a record of every access of that information. Think about this - the database will know that your identity was checked by the doctor, the hospital, leaving the country, maybe even your bank or your employer. A corrupt official with access to this information could build up one hell of a profile about you. Got nothing to hide? Are you sure? This database could unocover whatever it is that you don't think you have to hide.
Before this bill there were specific laws that prevented government departments from sharing information in their databases because of potential abuse of it by government or otherwise. The Identity Cards bill demolishes those laws and establishes a database containing all of the information that was previously scattered around and impossible to link, and it shares that database with every government department there is.
A few months ago I pledged that I would not sign up for an ID card and that I would give money to fight it in court. Given that Passports renewed after 2008 will be accompanied by an ID card, the question I now have to answer is whether I should renew my passport 5 years early to avoid registration, or if I should become one of the first cases to fight in court as far as I can.
A latent existence
"I personally don't have a problem if a someone knows who many times I day I shit, what kind of tea I buy, what party I vote, etc. so I have real trouble comprehending this strange fear"
Please kindly reply to this comment with the following:
1) your full name and home address
2) a history of your shopping record, including times and dates so i can pattern match to see when your most likely to be not at home
3) Detailed purchase information from your local big box store so that when i come to your house and murder your wife, i can do it with a recently purchased like model knife or blunt object.
Honestly, the only people who are for mass databases really have no imgination.
I'll just use my special getting high powers one more time...
The website on your profile links to a University in Slovenia... You're coming from a culture which spent 50 or so years under Soviet domination where the private was the public.
The abuse arguments aren't silly from our perspective. It's what we've learned from history. If something is susceptible to abuse, eventually it will be abused. The question then is the tradeoff, of whether it is worth it or not.
It's how the jews were identified for extermination. The nice thing about a computer system though is they can mark the identity on the computer and the person doesn't need to know they've been singled out. Very handy.
Deleted
As I wrote on another forum: they will make ID cards compulsary by clever manipulation of thicko MP's and public.
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At the time it is brought back to Parliament for compulsion, they will say, "The many billions we have spent so far is wasted and ID cards are not fully effective - unless the database is complete with entire population - as the thieves and terrorists are not registering".
You can see it coming a mile away.
http://www.hosted-forum.com/index.php?boardid=not
I do wonder.... sometimes I think Tony just turned coat completely - imagine you voted for Amnesty International, and when they get into power they turn into Pinochet..... other times, you think, Cherie is a human rights lawyer who makes a lot of money out of sueing the UK government for trampling on human rights. Either they are maximising the family income, or they must have interesting dinner table conversations.
Either way, Tony's government position on human rights and civil liberties makes Margaret Thatcher and Michael Howard look like a bunch of bleeding hippies, which is quite an achievement.
Oh, and the trains still don't run on time. At least Mussolini managed to get that done.
no taxation without representation!
There's a valid association in this case, though. South Africa issues "ID books" to all its citizens, a practice which started way back in the apartheid days, to be able to better keep track of who should be considered a first-class citizen and who shouldn't. By the late '80s, they were fingerprinting everyone and keeping that on file. It's not a coincidence that the most draconian regimes love to maintain detailed databases on their citizens - it helps them maintain control in all the wrong ways.
When legitimate, democratic governments start wanting such tools of control, no matter how noble the alleged purpose, it's worth examining all the ways in which they can be abused, and the regimes which have abused them in the past. All it takes for abuse to start is a few bad people.
I don't like our gun control. Thanks very much.
I used to enjoy shooting guns, handguns particulary. Innocent fun. The legislation was extrenely badly drafted and flied in the face of traditional British fair play. The fact is, massive overreaction to incidents like dunblane didn't reduce gun related killings, they've gone up, helping nobody, but something was *seen to be done*.
Apparently, they're after my air pistol next.
"but the one or two nutters who used to get their guns from the gun club and go mad have been deterred. Criminals still get guns,"
Wow. That's laying it on the line. You (England, not you personally) gave up the right to self defense, the oldest and most basic right there is, in order to keep a very small group of loons from getting hold of a gun (forcing them to substitute with explosives in London, no doubt). You had no intention or even much interest in reducing crime, which is the reason the anti-gun crowd is always spouting about in the US.
Talk about a difference in values. I'm going to think about this for awhile.
PS, I own rifles, shotguns, and handguns (note the plurals of each) and am not a member of the NRA. In make a point mentioned above, I just bought a box of shotshells the other day, and was not asked for ID. Just paid cash, and left. Granted I'm obviously over 18, but this is been the way it works everywhere I have lived.
Look, the cards are not a major problem, so please stop saying 'I have one and we have no problems', it's the huge database (the National Identity Register) that sits behind the cards and holds lots of information on the card holder (which can link all existing government databases on the card holder, something which currently tends to take a court order, or the security services and an awful lot of manpower due to people being known by slightly different names, addresses etc.) and an audit trail of all transactions using the card.
No Government in the world has done anything like this before! Although the French are now thinking of doing it. This is the big problem, the law is mainly about the creation of this register, and the Government have been trying to avoid people realising this. If you think about the implications of this register it truely is something out of an Orwellian nightmare!
Here are some of my issues with this scheme...
1. I've heard a lot about WHAT this card would do, but no HOW. Apparently this will stop illegal immigration. How? Most employers of illegal immigrants are in on it anyway, so this won't stop them. Apparently his will stop terrorism. How? The bombers on 7/7/2005 all used their own identities. The bombers in Madrid all had ID cards. Apparently this will combat crime. How? If they are so sure of this, why don't the police commit to an X% reduction in specific kinds of crime over a certain period?
2. The government refuse to be transparant about the costs. Their argument for ID cards is that if you have nothing to hide then you won't mind having one. On this basis, they MUST have something to hide.
3. The card is backed by a database containing all of your information. This WILL be used inappropriately. Even if you totally trust our current government (in which case, please contact me ASAP - I have this money from this deceased dictator that I need to move and only you can help!), by agreeing to this, you agree to trust every future government from now onwards to not abuse this system. Just see the illicit and immoral investigation into the lady who led the action group for rail crash victims. With all of this data in one place, it will be easier for them to run these 'dirty tricks' campaigns, and we are less likely to find out about them because with less places to look, there will be fewer leaks.
4. When I lose a number, I can get a new one. When I lose the digital representation of my right index finger, I can't get a new one. So if the data that represents my finger is compromised and used by someone else, how do I combat that ?
5. If I lose a finger, am I going to be treated as a pariah because I can no longer use your official identity scheme? Will I be treated with suspicion by know-nothing till operator morons who think I lopped my finger off just to beat their system? My wife recently lost a digit in an accident, and just travelling to the US while her hand was bandaged (lost finger, multiple stitches across hand) became a nightmare. I've never seen anyone treated so badly in my life, and I've spent time behind a South African police station counter.
6. Many experts in various intelligence, military and criminal fields have made public statements that this card will not address the issues that the government will say it will. Who should I believe? Experts who have proved themselves through their work, or MPs who lie to me about major issues on a regular basis?