5 ms·

The thing in China is that so many trivial daily activities require government-issued ID. Buying a coach/train ticket. Buying a SIM card. Every website/mobile a

by schuke 10y ago

The thing in China is that so many trivial daily activities require government-issued ID. Buying a coach/train ticket. Buying a SIM card. Every website/mobile app registration require a mobile phone number, which means any account is easily traceable to your government-issued ID, too. Hell, even visiting your friend in a hotel requires recording your ID before hotel staff will let you go upstairs (strictly enforced in cheap hotels). Internet cafes' administration system had been linked up to government ID systems more than a decade ago. This is the Polizeistaat that Hitler could only dream of. It's a whole other level over any credit card surveillance.

yueq 10y ago
The key issue is the data is on sale or not or potentially could be sold. Agencies collecting data is totally fine. No one can avoid it in this world nowadays. Showing IDs seems very old-school. Remember PRISM? As long as one is using a smartphone, they are being tracked every single second.
- darpa_escapee 10y ago
  Showing ID is a reminder that you can't function in society without staying in line. You can't really fall back on dropping out of digital, financial and location tracking no matter where you are.
  - EGreg 10y ago
    Sure you can
    - demosthenes111 10y ago
      Care to expand on that?
      - sametmax 10y ago
        You need a network of people you can trust, or build some fake lifes, or do a lot of things in parallel of the system. Most of the time all of them together. It's work, but it's possible. The problem is: it's more work for ordinary people. The systems in place are making it difficult for citizen to exist outside of the system, change it, or express differences. But it doesn't make it as difficult for criminals to be criminals, because those accept destructive consequences of their acts.
        kuschku 10y ago
        > build some fake lifes How do you plan on doing that if most stores and banks stop accepting cash, and to get a debit or credit card you need to show government ID, which is electronically verified (it has an RSA keypair, signed by the government, stored on its chip). It becomes impossible.
        sametmax 10y ago
        Most stores don't stop accepting cash right now, and I doubt they will in the future. I know more shops refusing credit cards than ones refusing cash in France. You can also live without a bank. Several people I know do so. Again it's work, but it's possible. A lot of the time, people saying it's impossible really are asking "how can I keep my confortable life 'as-is' while going off the grid". THAT is impossible. You can't live your current life, because it depends heavily on the system.
        kuschku 10y ago
        The situation changes depending on country. In Sweden, not even banks accept cash anymore, and close to no stores. There, it is literally impossible. Germany and France tend to be a lot more sceptical of new developments, which I’m grateful for.
- drinkjuice 10y ago
  This is a world humans are building AND sustaining by repeatedly saying yes to it, and it's putting the worst as a cork on the bottle in which the best should asphyxiate. That's just silly; the reasons are silly and the excuses are silly as well. People claim it's necessary, but they're just parroting someone like the guardian in that Kafka story: it's just talk. Just walk on through while you still live. Until we do, I don't even see a "there" where we are, I just see black and white moving pictures and hear sad music.
coconutoperator 10y ago
There are always security/privacy trade-offs when it comes to applying policies. There are 1.4bn people in China. It has to take a much scalable approach to manage the population to ensure safety for average people and smooth functioning of a society. Especially given there is modern terrorism randomly seeks opportunities. Btw, not every app is interested in tracing you, and quite a few are giving options to email registration . And for Internet cafes, believe it or not, the gov set up ID-link was primarily to forbid children to go to there(most of them skip their classes to play games) since they have to wait till 16 yo to obtain a ID card.
- schuke 10y ago
  Recording ID for hotel visitors and chef's knife purchases are hardly 'scalable'. And, it's not the apps that are tracing you. It's apps linked with ID that enables not only government surveillance, but surveillance that's as convenient for the government as possible, and for as many governmental agencies as possible.
pcr0 10y ago
Yeah, as a tourist I was surprised that all hotels ranging from 5 star to small local inns were insistent on having everybody's passport when checking in.
- ared38 10y ago
  The hotels I stayed at in Spain, France, and Italy made copies of mine.
  - schuke 10y ago
    Chinese hotels are required to purchase computerized ID readers, which are connected to police databases, where all kinds of records are stored. So if you have a history of drug abuse, expect late night urine checks. If you are an protester against illegal land-grabs checking into a hotel in Beijing, expect police and local government staff to show up in a few hours (to take you home or to detention centres without any court involved). In China, every person staying or visiting a hotel room must go through this ID check. In other countries, my experience is that normally they will ask for some sort of ID of one person, even if two or more will use the room.
- jwong_ 10y ago
  That's part of the law. It's because foreigners need to register with the local police where they are staying. If you stay in a hotel, the hotel does it for you.
  - kobayashi 10y ago
    This seems to be standard in many Asian countries.
monksy 10y ago
When going overseas, all of those are required anyways: 1. The DB wants to see id (that they can verify) for Eurorail passes. The DB or the Belgian rail people require seeing the purchasing CC. 2. Buying a sim in europe requires a passport. 3. Most things you sign up for in the US requires a phone number. Loyalty programs certianly do. 3.1 Walgreens requires your ID in hand to scan it to verify that you're "over 21" (Really they just want to rip the info) 4. Hotels require passport details (England, Belgium, Germany, Netherlands, France, carrebian, etc)
- mschuster91 10y ago
  > 1. The DB wants to see id (that they can verify) for Eurorail passes. The DB or the Belgian rail people require seeing the purchasing CC. Who except students uses Eurorail passes anyway, these days? 2. Buying a sim in europe requires a passport. No; in Austria and Germany you can (at least at the moment) still buy SIM cards without providing an ID. Germany requires online activation but no one verifies if the address or the name is real.
  - rconti 10y ago
    I did not have to go online to activate my O2 SIM but I did provide a hotel address at purchase time. Of course it did not match any identity documents I had on me. Some activation step happened when I inserted the SIM but it didn't involve using a computer.
- rconti 10y ago
  1. Yes, I've always had to use my passport with my Eurail passes; though often it's to prove I'm an American who is eligible for the cheaper pass. 2. No, only in certain countries. I've bought SIMs from vending machines in Iceland and Denmark. In Italy the merchant made me seriously promise, I really mean it to send him a photo of my passport as soon as I returned home with my SIM. He gave me his personal gmail address to do so (probably because he certainly didn't want that info going to his work email where it would be obvious he ignored the rules). In Germany, rumor was you basically had to be a German citizen to get a SIM; that turned out to be untrue but I cannot remember if I gave them my (EU but not German) passport. IIRC I could not buy a SIM in Sweden as a non-resident though. UK was no problem to buy a SIM. 3. Yeah, but that's just an identifier. You could use any number, and a different number for every merchant, and nobody would know. Though there was a case of a fireman convicted of arson, partially on evidence of firestarters bought using his wife's Safeway loyalty card number. 4. I can't really ever remember being asked for my passport in the 5 of those 6 countries, but of course it's not unreasonable to be expected to show ID so I cannot say for sure I never produced ID. Though I remember in Poland and I think the Czech Republic they actually hold your passport, which made me very uncomfortable. When you leave the room for the day you swap key for passport, and vice versa on your return. Whether this is government or business policy, I do not know.

by schuke 10y ago

yueq 10y ago

The key issue is the data is on sale or not or potentially could be sold. Agencies collecting data is totally fine. No one can avoid it in this world nowadays. Showing IDs seems very old-school. Remember PRISM? As long as one is using a smartphone, they are being tracked every single second.

darpa_escapee 10y ago
Showing ID is a reminder that you can't function in society without staying in line. You can't really fall back on dropping out of digital, financial and location tracking no matter where you are.
- EGreg 10y ago
  Sure you can
  - demosthenes111 10y ago
    Care to expand on that?
    - sametmax 10y ago
      You need a network of people you can trust, or build some fake lifes, or do a lot of things in parallel of the system. Most of the time all of them together. It's work, but it's possible. The problem is: it's more work for ordinary people. The systems in place are making it difficult for citizen to exist outside of the system, change it, or express differences. But it doesn't make it as difficult for criminals to be criminals, because those accept destructive consequences of their acts.
      - kuschku 10y ago
        > build some fake lifes How do you plan on doing that if most stores and banks stop accepting cash, and to get a debit or credit card you need to show government ID, which is electronically verified (it has an RSA keypair, signed by the government, stored on its chip). It becomes impossible.
        sametmax 10y ago
        Most stores don't stop accepting cash right now, and I doubt they will in the future. I know more shops refusing credit cards than ones refusing cash in France. You can also live without a bank. Several people I know do so. Again it's work, but it's possible. A lot of the time, people saying it's impossible really are asking "how can I keep my confortable life 'as-is' while going off the grid". THAT is impossible. You can't live your current life, because it depends heavily on the system.
        kuschku 10y ago
        The situation changes depending on country. In Sweden, not even banks accept cash anymore, and close to no stores. There, it is literally impossible. Germany and France tend to be a lot more sceptical of new developments, which I’m grateful for.
drinkjuice 10y ago
This is a world humans are building AND sustaining by repeatedly saying yes to it, and it's putting the worst as a cork on the bottle in which the best should asphyxiate. That's just silly; the reasons are silly and the excuses are silly as well. People claim it's necessary, but they're just parroting someone like the guardian in that Kafka story: it's just talk. Just walk on through while you still live. Until we do, I don't even see a "there" where we are, I just see black and white moving pictures and hear sad music.

coconutoperator 10y ago

There are always security/privacy trade-offs when it comes to applying policies. There are 1.4bn people in China. It has to take a much scalable approach to manage the population to ensure safety for average people and smooth functioning of a society. Especially given there is modern terrorism randomly seeks opportunities. Btw, not every app is interested in tracing you, and quite a few are giving options to email registration . And for Internet cafes, believe it or not, the gov set up ID-link was primarily to forbid children to go to there(most of them skip their classes to play games) since they have to wait till 16 yo to obtain a ID card.

schuke 10y ago
Recording ID for hotel visitors and chef's knife purchases are hardly 'scalable'. And, it's not the apps that are tracing you. It's apps linked with ID that enables not only government surveillance, but surveillance that's as convenient for the government as possible, and for as many governmental agencies as possible.

pcr0 10y ago

Yeah, as a tourist I was surprised that all hotels ranging from 5 star to small local inns were insistent on having everybody's passport when checking in.

ared38 10y ago
The hotels I stayed at in Spain, France, and Italy made copies of mine.
- schuke 10y ago
  Chinese hotels are required to purchase computerized ID readers, which are connected to police databases, where all kinds of records are stored. So if you have a history of drug abuse, expect late night urine checks. If you are an protester against illegal land-grabs checking into a hotel in Beijing, expect police and local government staff to show up in a few hours (to take you home or to detention centres without any court involved). In China, every person staying or visiting a hotel room must go through this ID check. In other countries, my experience is that normally they will ask for some sort of ID of one person, even if two or more will use the room.
jwong_ 10y ago
That's part of the law. It's because foreigners need to register with the local police where they are staying. If you stay in a hotel, the hotel does it for you.
- kobayashi 10y ago
  This seems to be standard in many Asian countries.

monksy 10y ago

When going overseas, all of those are required anyways: 1. The DB wants to see id (that they can verify) for Eurorail passes. The DB or the Belgian rail people require seeing the purchasing CC. 2. Buying a sim in europe requires a passport. 3. Most things you sign up for in the US requires a phone number. Loyalty programs certianly do. 3.1 Walgreens requires your ID in hand to scan it to verify that you're "over 21" (Really they just want to rip the info) 4. Hotels require passport details (England, Belgium, Germany, Netherlands, France, carrebian, etc)

mschuster91 10y ago
> 1. The DB wants to see id (that they can verify) for Eurorail passes. The DB or the Belgian rail people require seeing the purchasing CC. Who except students uses Eurorail passes anyway, these days? 2. Buying a sim in europe requires a passport. No; in Austria and Germany you can (at least at the moment) still buy SIM cards without providing an ID. Germany requires online activation but no one verifies if the address or the name is real.
- rconti 10y ago
  I did not have to go online to activate my O2 SIM but I did provide a hotel address at purchase time. Of course it did not match any identity documents I had on me. Some activation step happened when I inserted the SIM but it didn't involve using a computer.
rconti 10y ago
1. Yes, I've always had to use my passport with my Eurail passes; though often it's to prove I'm an American who is eligible for the cheaper pass. 2. No, only in certain countries. I've bought SIMs from vending machines in Iceland and Denmark. In Italy the merchant made me seriously promise, I really mean it to send him a photo of my passport as soon as I returned home with my SIM. He gave me his personal gmail address to do so (probably because he certainly didn't want that info going to his work email where it would be obvious he ignored the rules). In Germany, rumor was you basically had to be a German citizen to get a SIM; that turned out to be untrue but I cannot remember if I gave them my (EU but not German) passport. IIRC I could not buy a SIM in Sweden as a non-resident though. UK was no problem to buy a SIM. 3. Yeah, but that's just an identifier. You could use any number, and a different number for every merchant, and nobody would know. Though there was a case of a fireman convicted of arson, partially on evidence of firestarters bought using his wife's Safeway loyalty card number. 4. I can't really ever remember being asked for my passport in the 5 of those 6 countries, but of course it's not unreasonable to be expected to show ID so I cannot say for sure I never produced ID. Though I remember in Poland and I think the Czech Republic they actually hold your passport, which made me very uncomfortable. When you leave the room for the day you swap key for passport, and vice versa on your return. Whether this is government or business policy, I do not know.