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Deadline For Saying "No" To National ID
cnet-declan writes "If you don't like the idea of a federalized ID card, you have only have an hour left to let Homeland Security know your thoughts: the deadline to file comments on the Real ID Act is 5:00 pm EDT on Tuesday. Probably the best place to do that is a Web site created by an ad hoc alliance called the Privacy Coalition (they oppose the idea, but if you're a big Real ID fan you can use their site to send adoring comments too). Alternatively, Homeland Security has finally seen fit to give us an email address that you can use to submit comments on the Real ID Act. Send email to oscomments@dhs.gov with 'Docket No. DHS-2006-0030' in the Subject: line. Here's some background on what the Feds are planning."
Well, for a start, I work in the computer industry and that inevitably means I have to visit your country for work now and then.
But, more importantly, a number of countries look to the US for a model of what it means to be free.
How we know is more important than what we know.
I guess he cares because he's British.
In Britain there seems to be no option for registering disgust at our national ID scheme - seems we're getting one and that is that. For all the horrific breaches of privacy and freedom that the Patriot Act etc have brought you over there - at least you do have the right to protest. PLEASE PLEASE DO!!!
If you can regain your freedom, then there's some hope for us over here in Airstrip One - maybe they'll even take down a couple of million cameras - you, know like 25% of them... (sounds like that's a sarcastic exaggeration doesn't it. But it's not, sadly)
Living in the neighboring country to the north of the States, we have a log running tendency to blindly follow in their example. Thus, anything being introduced or changed there, will generally always have a direct impact on our laws and society, and when this isn't the case, the big U.S. corps generally see to it that our parliament gets lobbied into submission.
So that is why it matters to us.
Is it kind of sad when you are afraid to submit an email in fear of being added to some kind of database of people who don't want this? As an American it makes me kinda sad when in this day of data gathering and mining, it's worrisome to voice ones opinion.
What it means is any power not specifically granted to the US federal government in the Constitution is in the jurisdiction of the various states. Issues like abortion and drug prohibition are to be decided by each state; the founders did this for a reason--you could move to the state whose politics most closely matched your own. The more centralized the federal government has become, the less choice we've had in regards to the policies governing us.
(Not to mention that the Real ID won't help us catch terrorists, but I figured that was a given.)
Truckin like the Doo-Dah man...
The argument against all ID is that it eventually becomes mandatory. These days we are required to identify ourselves to our governments. This is demeaning as it is too much like stock keeping of people. Every year that goes by people forget about this. They start to think of themselves as belonging to a government instead of the government belonging to them. In the end, we accept requirements being placed on us by the government, and this inevitably leads to dictatorship and fascism.
So yes, it's not specifically the fact that this ID is federal that is the problem, but I hope you can see that the abuse of power is easier. More efficient is something people are taught is a good thing. We live by the clock. But when it comes to government, more efficient is the opposite of what you want.
How we know is more important than what we know.
But, more importantly, a number of countries look to the US for a model of what it means to be free.
Six years ago, that would've made me proud.
Now, it kind of makes me really depressed.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
The first thing to wrap your head around is that aside from the general issues of your liberty to travel and your privacy, the legislation for the ID contains enabling sections for - as yet - unspecified technologies to be part of the card. The most likely candidate, for quite a few reasons, is RFID, though something with more range might replace that. RFID allows your card to be read without you presenting it. This is a definite escalation from you deciding to show someone your ID in return for, oh, a bottle of wine, or that DVD of Erica Campbell you've been thinking about.
Any such technology creates a number of very bad potentials; someone could walk through a crime scene with a clone of your RFID (trivial to do, by the way) and thus "establish" your presence at the crime, at the time. You might have been home in bed, but your RFID was out being a criminal. You'll be arrested and then your lawyer can sort it out (after you mortgage your home, of course - criminal lawyers don't work on a "work now, pay later" basis. Or they could clone your card and purchase weaponry, using your good name, which they could then use in the commission of a crime. As far as the police are concerned, you bought those weapons. To prove otherwise, you're going to have to locate the fake card. Good luck with that.
Suppose you go like a good citizen to get your card, and the computer is corrupted, or someone was there first, and they say, no, we've already issued the card that matches your information (birthdate, name, SSN, mother's last name, birthplace and date, etc.) You can't get your card. Now you can't partake of any federal service. Yes, that's written right into the RealID act. Got cancer? Poor? Need your meds? Sorry. You're going to die. No federal services. Period. Of course, they're still going to tax you to pay for them.
Another issue is that tracking everything you purchase becomes 100% practical. So what? Well, let me point out that lately, it has been the habit of the legislature, backed up by the Supreme Court, to create and approve ex post facto laws. This class of laws includes those that make things crimes after they were done. The constitution guarantees your immunity to the four types of ex post facto law, but that has been disregarded and from the government's point of view, is irrelevant. They can, and will, jail you for such things. They've been doing so to others for years. Now. Imagine you buy a Playboy magazine. This is tracked. A year later, fundamentalists get laws passed that make purchasing such a magazine a crime - pornography, etc. Now they can come and get you; all it takes is the knowledge that you made the purchase and an ex post facto law.
Because of the unknown, secretive technological component of these cards, the threat to liberty escalates into a serious threat to privacy and security. Either should be enough to halt the program, expose its exact workings, and then allow evaluation on the basis of precisely known parameters. But they're not offering that opportunity. In 20 minutes, the window for even general objections base don what we do know - which is incomplete - closes.
The only redeeming thing at this moment is that they expect the states to bear the burden of the costs, and some states - Montana, Maine - are refusing. I suspect it is entirely budgetary, despite the high sounding words, but I'll take what I can get at this stage of the game.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
1. The 4th Amendment states you have a right "to be secure in your papers". That means squat if, by looking at one card for any reason, a gov't bureaucrat can pull up darn near ANYTHING about you. Does your participation in Social Security really have anything to do with being pulled over for speeding? Are your travel records really necessary for borrowing a book from the library? Does pulling health records really need cross-linking with when you got a driver's license? Is your credit rating really needed to board an airplane?
... YOU CAN'T EVEN BUY BEER!
2. Sure, they'll promise to only use relevant data appropriately. Right. Governments do not have a good history of using such pervasive data without oppression (up to and including genocide).
3. The more ID is needed to function in society, the more valuable IDs become. A national ID becomes a one-stop-shop for ID theft. Crack one card, and I become you.
4. Without the national ID, you can't participate in government. You can't enter a courthouse, visit your Congressman, etc. because you won't be able to even enter the building - no ID, no entry.
5. Ultimately a national ID is a license to exist. No license shown on demand? You're detained until your ID is found, one is created, or you get removed from society. The fact that you exist means nothing; no card, no you.
6. Corrupted data screws you over. Your file gets marked "deceased"? You're officially dead, and no amount of "but I'm standing here ranting at you!" won't help. At least with diverse cards & databases you can argue "8 out of 9 government databases say I'm still alive; please correct yours!"
7. Pervasiveness. No card, you can't function. Without that one centralized ID card, which you don't get unless everything is in order, you can't drive, fly, ride, vote, own property, get married, file suit, work,
Can we get a "-1 Wrong" moderation option?
I care because totalitarianism is insidious. "It's only an ID card" becomes "you have to carry the ID card at all times" becomes "the RFID chip (or whatever) allows us to track you, wherever you are" becomes
I care because the state is our servant, not our master.
And I do not have to tell you good folks that it will be expensive, and it will be insecure, and it will not prevent crime or terror or social disintegration.
I care, becase it won't work - and it is dangerous.
Ian D. K. Kelly
idkk Consultancy Ltd.
"Quality through Thought"
...lemme tell you where it leads to.
In my country it's mandatory to carry a (real, state issued) ID wherever you go. No matter what, when a cop stops you and asks for your ID, you have to be able to prove that you're you. And they can do that whenever, whereever and for whatever reason they want. Failure to comply results in an arrest.
If you want that, don't write. It's what you'll get.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Yes, and Poindexter is still assembling a huge database on Americans -- as they've privatized the Total Information Awareness gambit.
... did you agree to let the government, or bank lose your data on a laptop recently? No? Did you ask them to sell the data -- the bank can't do it by law, but there is no provision against the government doing it. What about false information?
IF you wanted to blacklist someone, you might enter anything into a database about that person. Everyone paying attention to how much fun we've had with the Credit Score companies and how long it took to force them to tell us what the damn score was without spending $40 for the privilege of correcting their errors?
And, who is going to bet me $10 that you won't be allowed to know what data gets on your ID card? As well as medical health, and most like genetic data, you might even have job history, traffic accidents -- think of all the baggage a corporation would want to have about you. All this data gets sold right now to private corporations -- did we vote on that? Please, by all means google it. Yes, the Bush administration takes info from your tax forms, or from Homeland Security, and sells it to private companies that do things like identify issues for politicians to campaign on -- or probably anything someone will pay for.
I'm sure future employers will consult the National ID card when they hire you. What sort of information will be on that card? Well
No, the national ID card isn't to identify you -- it's to track you, and to build a database on you. It's to make you a citizen at the level that they think you deserve to be. What happens to a traveling salesman who gets on the "Do Not Fly" list?
It might be your SAT score or it might be some government information that decides what college you or your kids go to. "Not corporate friendly" might keep you out of Yale. I'm sure my voting record would be useful, so that they could keep me out of Political debates -- who needs a loyalty oath when you can actually determine if someone is the "right sort."
You may call me paranoid. I just think if you don't imagine what the abuse could be -- you are being naive.
>>"ad space available -- low rates!!!"
Seriously, I haven't noticed any. I know that facts really don't matter, but nothing in my life has changed since the PATRIOT Act was passed.
Just because you haven't been charged with something, or spied on, or in some other manner had your rights compromised because of this nasty product of the Bush administration, doesn't mean you won't. By then, though, it will be too late. Keeping control of government is all about keeping the horses in the barn- trying to get them back after they've escaped is a very long and arduous process.
Want to stop the Real ID act? Have a proposal about what to do instead of it?
Um. First you'll have to explain just what problem this attempting to solve. I've never seen a consistent explanation of the purpose of this act to begin with.
1) Because you need the old password, and you sit down at some place like a bank -- or anywhere authorized, and show them photo IDs, mail -- all the stuff you do now when you lose an ID and go to Motor Vehicles. This is at least 10 times more secure ... so what's the beef?
Why can't the bank authentication be faked? Well, if I were faking being John Doe -- I'd be in a bank or somewhere getting my photo and finger print and hoping there were no other John Doe screaming about identity theft... and the bank has a few Million in the vault and expensive property -- so I doubt they'd want to make money on fake IDs.
2) That's the point of the "check code" -- the handshake in private/public key incryption. I punch my ID in a box that is authorized and hooked up to a phone line -- just like we do right now, billions of times a day, with credit cards. When I enter in my SSN, I get something back like "Ouch!" -- because that's what I set up as my "check key." Now, however someone wants to create the authorization scheme to verify that box -- they are still going to have to intercept incrypted codes for anyone who's ID they are going to want to steal. I could get very detailed but I could say with a GPS, authorization procedures, and a phone line -- these ID boxes could be pretty hard to steel -- you could authorize them by day, and for one location on the planet.
OK, now that I saw "Ouch!" on the screen -- I know it is an authorized ID system I'm hooked up to. Unless someone has intercepted my last transaction with an authorized device, and is running an elaborate scam -- this is at least many times more work than what it takes to steal a bank pin on my Debit card -- which is harder to steal than my SSN right now. So now I can send my password that goes to the ID system, and then they wire back to the Vender an authorization like "John Doe Approved" and a transaction number -- just like credit card companies use -- a time stamp and hash that could be used to prove later that I, John Doe, really did buy that crappy leather jacket so pay up!
3) Yes, it doesn't reduce tracking. But I would want such a system to be State-based authorities. Not Federal. I don't have a problem with a company like VISA being an authorized ID System. The point is; someone needs to know that I'm John Doe -- if they are wrong, VISA is going to lose some money. THAT sort of privatization is fine with me. In the National ID scheme; huge government beuaracracy authorizes cards, but outsources to one politically friendly company. I guess it's pretty much that I know BushCo will screw it up, and it will cost us a lot of money, and only benefit friendly crooks. What else is new? But any ID system needs to only provide a reasonable guarantee to Company X or Person Y that I am John Doe. VISA has a vested interest in Credit Cards and would be financially damaged trying to screw me over -- see, they have something to lose! Not one appointed company made for the sole purpose of privatizing and keeping he system forever from oversight.
4) Um, because my password can be changed. If someone steals my ID Number -- how do I change my unique ID like a SSN? Everything is based on some sort of fixed tracking number in every database ever used. The password can change and be used merely to authorize that I am John Doe using such and such SSN. It's only a slight inconvenience like a bank pin -- you don't need it everytime you shop -- you just use this INSTEAD of your SSN. Like when you take our a loan, or apply for that fricken' blockbuster video card where they think I'm going to trust them and 20 part-time teenagers with my SSN to rent a video.
So, in short -- you don't use your SSN to go shopping now. You use your credit card and occassionally your drivers license. In fact, you can even use CASH. McDonalds does not need to know I'm John Doe in order to sell me a hamburger. They just need my money. If VISA wants to do a better job of securing money -- then let THEM solve it. I don't want a MORE PERFECT ID system -- I just
>>"ad space available -- low rates!!!"
Yes, it is. He's the executive, he could have vetoed this if he found anything in there he did not support. Apparently he did not, and neither did the legislators who voted in favor of it. It's their fault, too.
That's the last time I run code posted in somebody's sig...