UK ID Cards: What's in store...
UnderTheCarpet / 02-10-2007
There are many people in the UK who are unperturbed by the prospect of ID cards being introduced. After all, our continental counterparts have been carrying ID cards for many years now. There will, however, be one key difference with the UK system and that is the National Identity Register. Other European ID cards have a limited national register and safeguards in place to protect against the accumulation and centralisation of information. In fact, Germany has constitutional limitations on the creation of any national number for obvious historical reasons.
ID systems are an essential requirement in modern society. With vast amounts of international travel and immigration comes a need to monitor the locations of individuals at any given time. There are also other ID requirements when dealing with government infrastructure such as the National Insurance number and the collection of taxes. These systems are traditionally limited in scope and relatively independent of each other.
The UK ID card system will be a radical expansion on previous ID systems and, as many have warned, has the potential to permanently alter the relationship between the citizen and the state.
�Because of the power it possesses over us, I believe the government will gradually become less accountable and less responsive to the needs and wishes of the people. Whereas once politicians were our servants, they will become our masters and we their slaves.�
Henry Porter,
Guardian
For many observers, it has become apparent that the UK ID project has no clear boundaries, is open ended and destined for progressive �function creep�. What may begin as system of identification will inevitably turn into a means by which the state can look into many aspects of our private lives and will form the basis of a greater nation-wide surveillance network.
"The creation of this detailed data trail of individuals' activities is particularly worrying and cannot be viewed in isolation of other initiatives which serve to build a detailed picture of people's lives, such as CCTV surveillance (with automatic facial recognition), use of automatic number plate recognition recording vehicle movements for law enforcement and congestion charging, and the proposals to introduce satellite tracking of vehicles for road use charging."
Richard Thomas, The information Commissioner.
Guardian
In the last several years the size, scope and nature of the proposed ID cards has become increasingly apparent�
�From 2010, all passport applicants, even if they are simply renewing their old one, will also have to apply for an identity card�Labour also wants all first-time applicants for a British passport to travel to the same 69 centres for interview, when they will be asked about things like previous addresses and bank accounts.�
London Telegraph.
�The new applicants, half of whom will be aged 16 to 19, will be asked to prove their identity by responding to a stock of about 200 possible questions on their family and financial history.�
Guardian.
�The National Identity Register will allow police to add the entire adult population of the UK to their suspect list, giving them the opportunity to check fingerprints left at scenes of crime against those collected from ID card and passport applicants, says Tony Blair. Nor are fingerprints in other EU countries necessarily safe - the introduction of biometric technology, he adds, will "improve the flow of information between countries on the identity of offenders.�
The Register
�Banks and other businesses are to be sold access to personal information stored on the Government's ID cards database...Now ministers are planning to charge companies around 60p a time to check details held on the giant "big brother" database. They hope for up to 770million "verifications" each year...The Daily Mail has learned that a top firm of headhunters is already working for the Government, seeking a consultancy expert to market the benefits of the database to the private sector.�
Evening Standard.
�A police force will be set up to issue �1,000 fines to anyone who fails to update their personal details on the Government's new database, it has emerged. The unit, part of the Identity and Passport Service, is expected to send the penalties by post, after snooping through computer records...Shadow Home Secretary David Davis said: "This sinister force will be collecting money from UK citizens to go straight into the Treasury. There is a real danger this will be another stealth tax."
Evening Standard
�Whitehall papers, which the Government has fought for two years to suppress, disclose that Labour intended to force the public to sign up to the programme...Former Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman Mark Oaten, who successfully fought to get the internal documents published, said: "They show Ministers had no basis to claim the cards would combat benefit fraud, that from the very beginning the cards were going to be compulsory and that Ministers were consistently not telling the truth about their true intentions."
Daily Mail
�Officials had hoped to base ID cards on a National Identity Register but will instead use the Customer Information System run by the Department of Work and Pensions. This holds the records of everyone with a NI number, sparking concerns that HM Revenue & Customs could track a person's personal life through their ID card, which must be produced whenever a proof of identity is required...Gareth Crossman, policy director at Liberty, added: "The Government sold us the ID card scheme under the guise of terror and crime protection, but the reality is that it has the potential for massive, unanticipated state access into our private lives." Damian Green, the Conservatives' shadow immigration minister, said: "The public will be alarmed at this sinister Big Brother development."
London Telegraph
What lies in store is a database system whereby the state essentially has a file on every individual in the country.
The Identity Cards Act currently sets out fifty different types of information to be held on each individual. However, the Act also allows the amount of information to be increased in the future. It is not difficult to imagine a situation where personal details ranging from mobile phone tracking to health history are stored on one central system to be used by the government and anyone willing to pay for the information.
ID cards and, more importantly, the centralised database is a system that would allow all of the current surveillance and monitoring to be collected and pooled for each and every individual. Is this really what anyone wants? Who really stands to benefit from this system?
The Home Office is to have a range of unchecked executive power over many aspects of the ID Card programme. They will be at liberty to enter and alter information on a profile without informing the individual and will have no obligation to ensure the accuracy of that information. The Home Secretary will also have the power to take away an individuals� ID Card without any appeals process.
"The Home Secretary may cancel or require surrender of an identity card, without a right of appeal, at any time. Given that the object of the scheme is that an ID card will be eventually required to exercise any ordinary civil function, this amounts to granting the Home Secretary the power of civic life and death."
NO2ID
The home secretary, Charles Clarke, is transforming Britain into a police state, one of the country's former leading anti-terrorist police chiefs said yesterday...Mr Churchill-Coleman told the Guardian: "I have a horrible feeling that we are sinking into a police state, and that's not good for anybody. We live in a democracy and we should police on those standards.
Guardian
�My anxiety is that we don�t sleepwalk into a surveillance society.�
Richard Thomas, The information commissioner.
The Times
In a climate of fear and the �war on terror�, where our civil liberties are under constant attack from those posturing to be �tough� on terrorism, we should remain vigilant and not allow an advanced system of surveillance to be implemented under false pretence. As history has shown privacy and civil liberties are easily taken away but much harder to regain once lost.
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