Mark Twain* said "Keep all your eggs in one basket. Then guard that basket." A good solution to identification would be a central state operated database. But

Mark Twain* said "Keep all your eggs in one basket. Then guard that basket." A good solution to identification would be a central state operated database. But it would have to be backed by strong laws defining what it can be used for with no loopholes, not even for police of "national security", and a default deny policy. It would help secure taxes, welfare benefits, health care, voting, and background checks. The database information cannot be sold, data mined, or used in a criminal investigation without a non-rubberstamped warrant. The database can be used to confirm identity but the ID number cannot be stored anywhere else. Other agencies, both government and non-governmental, will be required to generate their own internal IDs without recording the national ID so if one database is compromised it doesn't collapse the whole house of cards. These are common sense policies but they are all human policies. No amount of technical wizardry can stop a human from doing something stupid. That's what laws and regulations are for. However the US has been stuck in a counterproductive attitude of treating regulation as a bad thing. So poorly implemented policies keep screwing up all the best technological intentions of the engineers. (* Like most Mark Twain quotes there's a good chance this is misquoted or misattributed.)