Passport Required To Buy Mobile Phones In the UK

David Gerard points out a Times Online story that says: "Everyone [in the UK] who buys a mobile telephone will be forced to register their identity on a national database under government plans to extend massively the powers of state surveillance. Phone buyers would have to present a passport or other official form of identification at the point of purchase. Privacy campaigners fear it marks the latest government move to create a surveillance society. A compulsory national register for the owners of all 72m mobile phones in Britain would be part of a much bigger database to combat terrorism and crime. Whitehall officials have raised the idea of a register containing the names and addresses of everyone who buys a phone in recent talks with Vodafone and other telephone companies, insiders say." We've recently discussed other methods the UK government is using to keep track of people within its borders, such as ID cards for foreigners and comprehensive email surveillance.

Comments

Speaking as A Brit...

[pandrijeczko]

...I don't see why this is such a bad idea.

Sure, I'm very much into privacy laws and not being snooped by the Government but as a home owner and car driver with a home phone and Internet connection, I am already registered in databases for Council Tax, the electoral role, the DVLA (Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency) and with my telephone provider (even though I'm not in the UK phone white pages as deliberate "ex-directory"). So having to go on one more database for owning a mobile phone is pretty meaningless.

In addition to the above, perhaps if email addresses (for example) were also registered to unique individuals or organisations to the point of being traceable, then the whole issue of SPAM and worms would pretty much disappear overnight. I would be more than happy to register all of the email addresses I use for some minimum cost of, say, £1, such that the address is tied to a particular credit card that means it's a validated address.

No, I don't want to hand over my personal freedoms lightly, but I happen to be a law-abiding British Citizen without a criminal record who has no intentions of breaking the law. Sure, I've been hacked off for getting three points on my driving license and a £60 fine for driving at 7mph over the speed limit past a speed camera but if someone in a control room wants to watch me on CCTV going about my daily business then I hope they're not bored easily.

Yes, I'll be more than pissed off if someone in a black suit comes knocking on my door with a piece of CCTV footage or taped phone call but I'll worry about it when it happens.

And to all the "freedom loving Americans" out there, I have a much bigger problem with your openly heavy-handed customs people and security types who are stood there stereotyping everyone that walks past them. The first time I entered your country on holiday during the late 80s, I was taken to one side and questioned heavily purely for having a Slavic-sounding surname in my passport.

Houses, cars and (at least) home phones are already registered to a person in every Western country as it stands - and if a few people with less better things to do with their time than make anonymous nuisance calls from unregistered "pay as you go" phones have to stop what they are currently doing then, so be it.