infinite ideas machine

Re-posted from archive of infinite ideas machine 2004:

Privacy International have published ‘A Nation Divided’ [45 KB PDF file] – a poll of UK electors to determine views and opinion trends relating to the proposed National Identity Card. The poll was conducted by YouGov, who questioned a representative sample of 2,003 electors across the UK between May 11 & May 13.

It makes for interesting reading:

KEY FINDINGS

The majority say they support ID cards, but not to the extent that the
government claims.

• 61% of the population support compulsory identity cards. This
  contrasts markedly with repeated claims by government that 80% are
  in favour of its proposal.

However, the majority of respondents oppose key elements of the Draft
Identity Cards Bill.

• Many people object to the legal requirement to notify government of
  change of address (47% against; 41% in favour)
• Most people object to the legal requirement to inform government
  whenever a card is lost, stolen or damaged (45% against; 44% in
  favour)

Opponents may be in the minority, but they are signalling a new Poll Tax revolt.

• 28% of those opposing compulsory cards said they would take to the
  streets to participate in demonstrations. This represents approximately
  4.9 million people.
• 16% of those opposing compulsory cards said they would participate
  in a “campaign of civil disobedience”. This represents 2.8 million
  people.
• 6% of those opposing compulsory cards said they would prefer to go
  to prison rather than register for a card. This represents over a million
  people.

Tory voters are much more likely to oppose the ID card proposals.

• Nearly a quarter (24%) of Tory voters who object to compulsory ID cards said they are prepared to take part in a “campaign of civil disobedience”

Anyway, I’m off up to Mistaken Identity where it seems a certain Mr Blunkett will be notable by his absence! More later…

Re-posted from archive of infinite ideas machine 2004:

No longer published, Connecticut Department of Social Services’ Biometrics in Human Services User Group Newsletter [final issue] offers “a fascinating 7 year up close and personal look at biometric technology through the eyes of government users.”

Written by Dave Mintie – who now writes and edits Biometric Watch – its user focus and plain language approach means that quite a number of the articles are still relevant and the complete series provides a useful source of reference on applied biometrics. The BHSUG Newsletter Index allows you to search for articles by Issue Date, Author, Title, Technology, Industry & Location.

This entry has been sitting in Draft for a while now, but – especially given this week’s upcoming Missing Identity meeting – I’m becoming more and more convinced that it must be worth trying.

Back at the end of March, Irdial Discs published his No Central Biometric Database idea in reference to biometric passports, picked up in John Lettice’s article on 19th April, ‘Fingerprints as ID – good, bad, ugly?’. I have seen a number of subsequent references to it, but no evidence that the approach – or principle! – has been given any serious consideration by the ‘powers that be’.

Simply stated, and in his own words:

This is how you do it.

• Each passport or ID document contains a cryptographically signed digital portrait of the holder, signed by the passport issuing authority.
• When your passport is swiped, your picture comes up on the screen, loaded from the passport, and NOT a central database.
• The digital signature of the passport photo is also downloaded.
• A PGP-like signature check is done against the public key of the national passport issuing authority, which is stored on the keyring of the swiping device.

If the signature is good, the document is genuine.
If the signature is bad, the document is a forgery.

It is an elegant and potentially far cheaper solution than Blunkett’s proposed scheme that solves the specific problem of forged identity documents in a way that addresses most, if not all, of the publically-expressed goals of ID cards and a National Identity Register – without requiring a central database.

The Home Office has requested feedback on the Draft Bill, and would – I believe – have to respond to a practical demonstration of such an approach. At the very least it may smoke out some of the ulterior motives / thinking behind the NIR, and at best it may raise / provoke a (techno)logical debate that currently doesn’t seem to be happening.

This sort of fits with some of the things I have been doing professionally over the past few years (e.g. CareZone, where we had to grapple with lots of the issues around smartcards and security) and is very much in line with the philosophy of virtualised (a current joint venture – site in development), so I intend to dedicate a proportion of my time in the coming weeks to trying to build, document and – hopefully! – demonstrate a working version of a biometric (i.e. facial photo) ‘ID document’ that uses no central database.

I should say at the outset that I am NOT a ‘hands-on’ programmer, but I do have a fair amount of IT skills and experience – especially in the area of conceiving and getting prototypes built. Much of what seems to be required is in the public domain and if all that comes of this is a thorough written response to the Home Office then, in my opinion, it won’t have been a complete waste of time.

Any help offered would, of course, be gratefully received.

N.B. I am aware that I may well be biting off more than I can chew, but I would at this point rather fail trying than not try at all.

Re-posted from archive of infinite ideas machine 2004:

Thanks to White Rose for linking to Darren Andrews’ cogent and elegantly-argued, ‘The Case Against ID Cards: A Principled Approach’. It’s so good, I just had to add it (as Freedom-Central.net) to the side bar…

Re-posted from archive of infinite ideas machine 2004:

Simon Davies’ paper about Campaigns of Opposition to ID Card Schemes on the Privacy International site offers several insights and a superb in-depth analysis of the Australian anti-ID card campaign in the mid-80s:

This movement, the largest in recent Australian history, forced a dissolution of the parliament, a general election, and unprecedented divisions within the Labour government.

Sounds like a good idea! Unfortunately, I somehow can’t see that happening over here in the near future. One phrase in the closing paragraphs stands out for me, and cuts right to the heart of the matter:

Trust within society would be replaced by the demand for formal identification.

In the current climate notions of trusting the government (and elements of the media) seem almost ridiculous. The arrogance and lack of principles demonstrated before, during and after the invasion of Iraq show a level of contempt for the citizenry – 1,000,000+ of whom marched to oppose the war – from a government that, despite holding a large majority in Parliament, fails to realise / acknowledge its crumbling mandate.

Tony Blair reckons he will be judged by history – I can tell him now that it’ll happen a lot quicker than that!

[For crying out loud, the government are so desperate to get kids ‘interested in politics’ – i.e. actually voting – that they’ve even resorted to teaching ‘citizenship’ in schools. Fine, even admirable, in a healthy democracy – but a bit pathetic as a response when (young) people are turning off party politics in droves…]

But back to trust. Not only have a significant number of our leaders shown themselves to be untrustworthy (WMD anyone?), with ID cards / NIR they are demonstrating that they simply don’t trust US (not the U.S. – if only!). It is terrifying that they seem to trust (a) the technology companies that stand to make untold millions out of an ID card scheme, and (b) technology itself more than the citizens that they are supposed to be serving.

In moving towards universal formal identification, the government will be further dismantling the ‘human infrastructure’ of society. ID cards won’t ever help you get to know someone and yet, if implemented, will almost inevitably end up being used as some sort of transactional stand-in for trust – the irony being that, because they are based on technology (and therefore fallible), they are probably less trustworthy in the long run than actually getting to know a person. You know, build a relationship… have a conversation…