I've been protesting this National ID since September last year and have found that it is quite difficult to understand. (This is on purpose so it is difficult to attack.) Let me describe briefly the main points that are a problem.
1) The 11 digit number will be widely used in government databases and there are plans already to use it in a variety of databases much more widely than the SS#. There is no privacy law or privacy commissioner watching the central government and their use of these databases for profiling, etc. The Japanese government is notorious for leaking information and it is likely that things such as the whistle-blower list, the FOIA requesters list, genetic information, medical records, arrest records, subscribers to radical newsletters (this list is regularly leaked to HR departments of big companies), etc. will be leaked with people's numbers.
2) The number will be on an ID card that will be used widely and will proliferate more quickly that the SS#.
3) Unlike the US, the Japanese citizen registry is based on a multi-generation record at the local government level and is a very strong identifier and much harder to change/move. For instance, our family has been living in the same house for 27 generations and our gravestone and family records can be traced back and possibly used against us.
I think that they should dump the national ID and use separate identifiers for different databases, hopefully non-human readable things such as hashes or digital signatures.
I am currently on the inquiry commission re-writing the consumer protection law and I am trying to build in pseudonymity and anonymity and hope that, for instance, whistle-blowers will be able to prove that they work for a company without identifying themselves and ending up on the whistle-blower list, which is how it is today.
I think privacy underpins democracy and it appears that the Japanese government has no intention of protecting privacy. This national ID is just a symptom of a basic lack of understanding on the part of the government. I am pushing to freeze the system until we can involve experts and also have a public debate.
Finally people know about it because of the last minute media attention, but in March 85% of Japanese surveyed didn't even know the bill had passed!
We have a web site in Japanese detailing the protest movement. http://kokuminbango.hantai.jp/
CPSR, EPIC, Crypto Rights Foundation, Privacy International and others have been very supportive.
I have to agree that Linux is not the first large project and GNU software has been around longer. I think that the description on the web page may be wrong in this regard. I may be digging myself into a hole, but I think we chose Linux over GNU because it was (using Eric Raymond's metaphor) more bazzar like and because the media that is being hyped (or vice versa) is all part of the work (I think.) What I mean is that Linux was the right thing at the right time and most people are excited about it even though they don't even know what it is. (points for cool media hack whether it was intentional or not.) I think very few artists create work out of nothing. Obviously Linux builds on everything else on the Net and does not exist by itself. I think that Linux is a symbol for the way the Net is going. That's why were are giving it an art award. There are many great things going on right now. Linux is just a great example. We are not giving awards solely for the work's contribution or importance, but for the particular aesthetic and sense that the work represents and symbolizes and its ability to convey this to the general public.
Having ranted again, I am not the only jury member and these opinions are my own and not necessarily the consensus of the jury.
Hi folks. I'm actually writing my comments for the jury statement right now and your comments are very helpful.
A few comments...
First of all, although Ars Electronica is considered an "art" competition, we are trying to push the envelope on technology and art. The primary purpose for the awards is to encourage the development of an new area of technology through the activities of artists. An artist does not necessarily have to create what the art community would call "art."
Many people believe that it is the "artists" who push technology making it do what it was not "designed" to do. We are looking for such people.
The.net category (formerly the web category) has been looking for works that move forward the development of the Net as a new medium. We have been looking for pieces that are community building, self-organizing, distributed, not possible without the Net, growing beyond the design of the artist, etc. We have been looking for work that creates an aesthetic example about how something can be done on the Net through an intentional, but not necessarily direct description. I think that Linus and his community represent how strong an "aesthetic" or a philosophy can be in bringing a community, assets, ideas and attention together. I think he and his community deserve an "art" award to recognize the importance of the "aesthetics" in the Linux movement.
The jury did have a discussion about the award being a bit late and maybe getting lost in the "Linux Hype Wave" but we decided that it was still not to late to give an art award and that late was better than never.
As for the fact that it was not a submitted work... We have traditionally taken unsubmitted works in the.net category. The works over the last few years have become exceedingly design and single person oriented diverging from the community and self-organizing works that we were looking for. Recently most of the submissions would have worked better on a CDROM. The Golden Nica for the last two years has gone to visualization oriented projects. I hope that this year's choice sends the right message and gets more hackers to think of themselves as artists and submit their projects to our Prix!
Slashdot Mirror
It is expensive to track you across multiple identites. With one number, all you need is a PC and excel...
Do you know the story about Mizuho bank? They spend billions trying to merge their database and they still can't get it to work.
I've been protesting this National ID since September last year and have found that it is quite difficult to understand. (This is on purpose so it is difficult to attack.) Let me describe briefly the main points that are a problem.
1) The 11 digit number will be widely used in government databases and there are plans already to use it in a variety of databases much more widely than the SS#. There is no privacy law or privacy commissioner watching the central government and their use of these databases for profiling, etc. The Japanese government is notorious for leaking information and it is likely that things such as the whistle-blower list, the FOIA requesters list, genetic information, medical records, arrest records, subscribers to radical newsletters (this list is regularly leaked to HR departments of big companies), etc. will be leaked with people's numbers.
2) The number will be on an ID card that will be used widely and will proliferate more quickly that the SS#.
3) Unlike the US, the Japanese citizen registry is based on a multi-generation record at the local government level and is a very strong identifier and much harder to change/move. For instance, our family has been living in the same house for 27 generations and our gravestone and family records can be traced back and possibly used against us.
I think that they should dump the national ID and use separate identifiers for different databases, hopefully non-human readable things such as hashes or digital signatures.
I am currently on the inquiry commission re-writing the consumer protection law and I am trying to build in pseudonymity and anonymity and hope that, for instance, whistle-blowers will be able to prove that they work for a company without identifying themselves and ending up on the whistle-blower list, which is how it is today.
I think privacy underpins democracy and it appears that the Japanese government has no intention of protecting privacy. This national ID is just a symptom of a basic lack of understanding on the part of the government. I am pushing to freeze the system until we can involve experts and also have a public debate.
Finally people know about it because of the last minute media attention, but in March 85% of Japanese surveyed didn't even know the bill had passed!
We have a web site in Japanese detailing the protest movement. http://kokuminbango.hantai.jp/
CPSR, EPIC, Crypto Rights Foundation, Privacy International and others have been very supportive.
I have to agree that Linux is not the first large project and GNU software has been around longer. I think that the description on the web page may be wrong in this regard. I may be digging myself into a hole, but I think we chose Linux over GNU because it was (using Eric Raymond's metaphor) more bazzar like and because the media that is being hyped (or vice versa) is all part of the work (I think.) What I mean is that Linux was the right thing at the right time and most people are excited about it even though they don't even know what it is. (points for cool media hack whether it was intentional or not.) I think very few artists create work out of nothing. Obviously Linux builds on everything else on the Net and does not exist by itself. I think that Linux is a symbol for the way the Net is going. That's why were are giving it an art award. There are many great things going on right now. Linux is just a great example. We are not giving awards solely for the work's contribution or importance, but for the particular aesthetic and sense that the work represents and symbolizes and its ability to convey this to the general public.
Having ranted again, I am not the only jury member and these opinions are my own and not necessarily the consensus of the jury.
Hi folks. I'm actually writing my comments for the jury statement right now and your comments are very helpful.
.net category (formerly the web category) has been looking for works that move forward the development of the Net as a new medium. We have been looking for
.net category. The works over the last few years have become exceedingly design and single person oriented diverging from the community and self-organizing works that we were looking for. Recently most of the submissions would have worked better on a CDROM. The Golden Nica for the last two years has gone to visualization oriented projects. I hope that this year's choice sends the right message and gets more hackers to think of themselves as artists and submit their projects to our Prix!
A few comments...
First of all, although Ars Electronica is considered an "art" competition, we are trying to push the envelope on technology and art. The primary purpose for the awards is to encourage the development of an new area of technology through the activities of artists. An artist does not necessarily have to create what the art community would call "art."
Many people believe that it is the "artists" who push technology making it do what it was not "designed" to do. We are looking for such people.
The
pieces that are community building, self-organizing, distributed, not possible without the Net, growing beyond the design of the artist, etc. We have been looking for work that creates an aesthetic example about how something can be done on the Net through an intentional, but not necessarily direct description. I think
that Linus and his community represent how strong an "aesthetic" or a philosophy can be in bringing a community, assets, ideas and attention together. I think he and his community deserve an "art" award to recognize the importance of the "aesthetics" in the Linux movement.
The jury did have a discussion about the award being a bit late and maybe getting lost in the "Linux Hype Wave" but we decided that it was still not to late to give an art award and that late was better than never.
As for the fact that it was not a submitted work... We have traditionally taken unsubmitted works in the
If anyone is interested, I wrote a short piece about aesthetics and the Internet
awhile ago. It is available here:
http://www.neoteny.com/jito/contex t/context.html
I haven't finished my jury statement so your comments would be greatly appreciat
ed.