Wed 26 Apr 2006
Are You from the Past?
Posted by anaglyph under In The News, Technology, Web Politics
[18] Comments
In Australia, our risible government has just announced the genesis of a personal identification card for the citizenry, something this conservative party has been trying to instigate for over two decades. It has never been popular, but since this government seems to believe it is invincible (and indeed, I am beginning to wonder if the Australian populace has had a sudden plunge in IQ, fulfilling this belief), it has just issued an edict that the card will be so, and that, apparently, is that.
I don’t want to dwell on the implications of infringements of personal freedoms here – I’m sure the smart readers of The Cow are already aware of such perils – but instead highlight some of the continuing idiocy that seems rife when it comes to modern technology.
Specifically this claim: The card would have the Highest Levels of Security and that it would be Completely Safe.
Now. Politicians and other people who think we are still living in the 1950s hear me: NOTHING IS ‘SAFE‘ IN THE DIGITAL WORLD. NOTHING!
This pig-headed, arrogant and stupid belief is based on the supposition that all the smartest people out there are:
a: Employed by friendly government or legitimate business interests, and/or
b: Honest
This is demonstrably not so, and as we become more and more reliant on the digital world for our data storage, the risk becomes proportionately greater. At the moment things hang together because the ad hoc system is diffuse and evolving and new, and the exploiters are by and large amateurish and not organised. But slowly that’s changing, and as the recent Citibank frauds have shown the execution can be novel and simple and devastating.
If you trust your valuable data to the online world unaware of the risk, you are a fool. An incidence of massive online fraud of some kind is inevitable and imminent.
Aside from intentional criminal manipulation for actual monetary gain, the other commodity that has value in the digital world is information. I have exactly zero faith that a government like ours, which has demonstrated time and time again its complete failure to grok the online world, would have even the remotest chance of protecting valuable personal data from someone who really wanted it. Or, that once such data is accumulated, it will not be used for purposes other than those for which it was collected.
I believe a ‘Smart Card’, for that is what they are calling it, is a very dumb idea.
*tch* Duh! Of course there will be problems. Two-digit year?! Didn’t they learn anything from paying bazillions of dollars to all those COBOL programmers a few years back?
Comrade, if you can’t trust in your own government, who can you trust?
Our current government is a long way down the list of people who I would be willing to trust.
I was shocked and amazed at this too. Last time they tried to get this particular 1984 snippet in we had actually got a choice (and said no) – it seems this time we have no choice. Pretty indicative of the character of this government.
The thing is, it’s the same old trick – introduce the thing with just Medicare records, say you don’t need to carry it around, then once people have got used to it, add more things to it and eventually make it compulsory to make available to your friendly neighbourhood law enforcement officer. The old Trojan Horse, and it’s happening again.
The Howard Government can do things like this because they have no opposition in the House. This is the wonderful ‘mandate’ in action. So we’ll never really know what the Australian people think of this idea because as the government sees it, anything they choose to do has the complete endorsement of the masses.
Not only dont I trust my valuable info to th online werld, when Im travlin thru cybrspace, MISinformation swirls round me like dust aroun Pigpen.
You would be a ‘misinformation magnet’ then.
if the experts refuse to do anything online, why would we want to? I did a unit on online security in high school, and man, there is no WAY I would ever, EVER trust my valuable personal details to the net. Nor would I want anyone to go trawling theough my personal files if they felt like it. That’s what’s wrong with Marxism; they work on the assumption that everyone’s going to be honest and good and working for the people.
Yeah, and capitalism works on the assumption that the masses are stupid and easily manipulated, and you know what, that’s pretty much right.
so having my drivers license and / or medicare card are not already our personal ID card ?
What I’m against is storing everything in one place.
And that in fact is the distinction that is at issue. The card that the government is proposing would contain a chip to record information. This information would presumably also be stored elsewhere. Sure, we can assume that it will be harmless if it only contains, say, your Medicare details, but there is no reason to suppose that it would stop at that, and every reason to suppose that it would attain ubiquity.
Already, people who have no driver’s license are disadvantaged. The government says that this card will not be compulsory, but they sneakily avoid telling you just how difficult your life will be if you don’t have one.
And back to my point – I have no faith that once all this data is accumulated online it will be safe from compromise. Think about it – it only has to be compromised once and suddenly all your personal data will be forever public.
But you’ve got nothing to hide, right? That small drug infringement in high school was when you were young and foolish and no employer would care about that. And lots of people take anti-depressants these days, that won’t affect your job application. And so what if Huntington’s disease runs in your family, you wouldn’t lose out a position to someone over that! And really, who cares if you hired a couple of porn videos the other night, it’s not illegal. And everybody used to belong to the Communist Party when you were young, why should that ever be a problem? And so you’re Jewish; you’re free to have your own religious beliefs. That’s never going to cause you any grief, right?
They’re trying to pull that shit here, too.
Hey! You editd my coment!
What a BRILLYANT way t show how vulnrable we all are in cybrspace!
Yes, Joey, but I only did it for the greater good. I would never do anything evil… mwahahahaha!
I went to get my passport renewed recently, and mostly it can be done on-line. You have to provide some personal details and your old Passport number, nothing that was terribly difficult to get. Then you print out the application and provide some photos (yes they now accept digital images printed on approved Photo paper). But the thing that got me was when I went to the Post office for the “interview” I had to bring my old passport which was then destroyed (by cutting the front cover and stamping cancelled in the pages. At some point in the interview I was asked for identification…….. I waited…..I figured it was a post Office worker joke……No, Sir. I need to see some identification. Ah…you have my passport there in front of you with my photo in it….not enough sir…..do you have a drivers license?
So, I can travel the world with my passport and no-one will question my identity, but here in Australia that is not enough. I guess that is why we need an identity card.
Personally, the main reason I can see in favour of an Identity Card is so that I won’t forget who I am.
Everyone has some information about themselves that can be considered detrimental. My parents have been trying hard for several years to make sure no databases or anything list me as disabled, because it can be SO hard to get employed if you do, even with the laws in place now. That’s the kind of thing I want to keep private.
And that’s exactly the kind of thing people would be able to find out about you if this ‘Smart’ card became ubiquitous. It wouldn’t even need for others to have access to your medical records. For instance, if you had at some stage applied for a Disabled Parking Permit, that kind of government information would probably be widely available.
One other thing that is not talked about in these kinds of personal database schemes is ‘inferred’ data. That is, if you know A and B about someone, you might be able to infer C. The more comprehensive a database becomes, the more likely it is that something like that will be possible. So even if there isn’t actual information, a third party might act on an inference.
Also, certain kinds of data can cast a ‘shadow’ on your profile. Let’s say for instance that you requested an AIDS test, because you’d met a new partner and both of you wanted to be assured that the other was healthy. An insurance company could use that information against you. The argument goes like this: you requested a test, therefore your behaviour must be in the risk category. Otherwise, why would you ask to be tested? Therefore, you are a high risk individual and you could be denied insurance.
There are many, many reasons why personal data should not be freely available, and especially not be all in one place. The old ‘if you’ve got nothing to hide’ argument doesn’t hold water.