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South Korean ID System To Be Rebuilt From Scratch After Massive Leaks

Posted by Soulskill on from the maybe-think-it-through-this-time dept.

AmiMoJo writes: South Korea's national identity card system may need a complete overhaul following huge data thefts dating back to 2004. The government is considering issuing new ID numbers to every citizen over age 17, costing billions of dollars. The ID numbers and personal details of an estimated 80% of the country's 50 million people have been stolen from banks and other targets. Some 20 million people, including President Park Geun-hye, have been victims of a data theft. Citizens are unable to change their credentials, which are used in many different sectors, making them an attractive target for hackers.

3 of 59 comments (clear)

  1. Re:20 million out of 50 million stolen? by mlts · · Score: 3, Insightful

    We have the same thing here in the US, but good luck getting a new SSN if it gets compromised.

  2. But the ID shouldn't have to be secret by Lorens · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Granted it's not good if the IDs are easy to guess, nor if the list of IDs+names gets out, but as long as you're not using the ID to authenticate people, only to identify them, it shouldn't be a terrible problem. Think ID=username, not password. What they say about the credentials seems a bit more worrying, but we'd need a lot more info here . . .

  3. Re:20 million out of 50 million stolen? by Reason58 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    National identifaction is perfectly fine. The problem is when it is also used as the national authentication.