I have no problem with ID cards. I effectively have one in my wallet already.
I have a objection to you JOINING THAT INFORMATION, exactly like the cookie problem you describe.
Literally, just give people driving licences when they turn 18 that don't have entitlements on them - that's the ID card problem solved.
What *you* want, though, is a central system to tie in everything I do to that number. I don't currently have to provide a driving licence number to, say, rent a house. Or file a complaint against my council. Or ring my bank. Or access an adult site. Or rent an 18 movie.
What I'm concerned about is not another bit of plastic. That's just an expensive exercise in redundancy, we can knock those up today if you want to pony up the money for them.
No, it's that once you get an "official" ID card, what are you going to join together, and what new things will suddenly be linked to / require my ID? The first that springs to mind is things like website access, ISP records, etc. Government are pushing for mandatory ID for such things, rather than just proof of age (entirely different thing). Currently, it would be suspicious and a deliberate act to join, say, my Internet credit card purchases to my running for local councillor. It would involve court orders to banks, police records, etc. etc. But once you join the databases it's "too easy" for someone to do that just playing about on the ID database - we know this because as NHS goes digital the number of people being done for "just looking" at celebrity details are far too common.
And then you want to tie it in via NHS number? Bang, there's my medical records for you too. Benefits. Driving record. All kinds of things currently held at different places which are all formally recording requests for access and providing the minimum information required. Join them together and those guarantees won't survive. It'll be a free-for-all.
We know, because everything from council bin collection agencies to food standards agencies are putting in requests that they never used to be able to before to track and trace people. Join them all into "one easy number" and you will end up with cops sneaking into your celeb profile, linking it to your purchases from your Amazon account for sex toys, your online browsing of legitimate and legal porn, and leaking it to media. Hell it happens WITHOUT those connections, with them just makes it worse. And no amount of log-keeping, warnings, etc. has yet proven effective at stopping people with access doing such things.
Now, there are obviously advantages to linking things. If nothing else, spotting financial fraud, etc. But it has to be controlled and justified. Tying everything to an ID number is a dangerous and stupid thing to do.
I don't care about the card. But it is another worthless piece of plastic. Like Manchester trial of ID cards where people effectively threw their own money in a bin on something that nobody ever really recognised.
I care about the data connections. The government does not, and has no need, to know my Amazon account, emails I use, domains I own, movies I watch, etc. Even if they could legitimately obtain that information if a court so ordered, they don't need to. And I have to trust that the courts wouldn't allow it unless it was necessary for law enforcement. That's my safety barrier.
Linking systems and centralising an ID bypasses that, if all those systems have to query the central database for authentication, they are basically advertising the records that join together. While they are separate, they don't advertise the connections to a single, central authority.
Now, I have "nothing to fear". I trust law enforcement and the courts. You can see my posts on that everything. I really don't care about someone potentially finding out that I earned £X but claimed £Y in income for tax purposes because for me X=Y at all times. That's not the issue. The issue is that the potential for misuse is too great and tempting for a nation state. By not having it, they can't do it, certainly not without expense and a paper trail which is our primary safety barrier. But the second there's a central authority that everyone has to authenticate against and which links into every bank, every contract, every shop, every thing you do in everyday life... that potential can and will be misused.
Even if it's to tax people who buy too many plastic items, or chase why they bought 100g of plastic this week but only put 80g in their recycling bin. Whatever it is, however petty, that potential is damaging.
And I object to *that*.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
