14 ms·

> Former Senator Alan Cranston has described the national I.D. card as "a primary tool of totalitarian governments to restrict the freedom of their citizens."

> Former Senator Alan Cranston has described the national I.D. card as "a primary tool of totalitarian governments to restrict the freedom of their citizens." Ugh. National IDs are common in Europe as well as other places where identity theft is mostly an exotic concept featured in the news about America. It's hard to call Belgium a totalitarian regime. Whereas in countries without national IDs, people are forced to provide personal details to scores of vendors big and small who use these details for their purposes and may lose them to online criminals. But hey, we are protected against a hypothetical tyranny.

MrRadar 9y ago
In this context wouldn't the EU be a better entity to compare against the US federal government? In that sense the ID situation in the US is pretty much the same as in Europe (each member state issues its own IDs), except the US has an extra ID number at the federal level that was never even intended to be a federal ID number (and is consequently terrible at being that).
- yxhuvud 9y ago
  No, at least some of the IDs in Europe is valid in all or most of EU. In Sweden, the ones given out by the police is valid in EU, while for example drivers licenses is not (as an ID. They are valid to drive with).
  - Dylan16807 9y ago
    What do you mean? I can use my driver's license as an ID in any state.
    - Symbiote 9y ago
      An EU driving licence is only proof of being qualified to drive, not proof of residence or nationality. That makes it ok for some identity purposes (age, name) but not sufficient for crossing a national border. (I'm not sure this is relevant, but I'm explaining the situation here.)
    - dx034 9y ago
      To proof your age but not to identify for official business (e.g. opening bank accounts) or with governments.
    - zaarn 9y ago
      A drivers license is not an ID in the EU. It is usually used for age verification. If you do a post-ident or anything official, you need your proper ID.
      - 0xffff2 9y ago
        In most (all?) US states the DMV or equivalent issues both IDs and driver's licenses, with the side effect that if you have a driver's license it is also your state ID. So the fact that they are separate in the EU is tangential. The term "driver's license" in the US is synonymous with both "ID" and "driver's license" in the EU, and can be compared to either.
mistersquid 9y ago
Forgive my ignorance, I only (sort of) know how this works in the United States. How do Belgian creditors verify the creditworthiness of an applicant who claims to be the individual identified by a particular credit history? Am I wrong to presume the Belgian National ID is not used for identification and verification by Belgian creditors? I also wonder (just thinking out loud, not part of my question) what would prevent US creditors from shirking the responsibility and withholding the required resources to establish an identification and verification system which does not rely on a national ID (different from a Social Security number). EDIT: remove extraneous word, add parenthetical to last sentence.
- kmm 9y ago
  There is a governmental agency, part of the national bank, that keeps track of credit. Information is kept for three months after a successful repayment of credit, one year after a delayed yet complete repayment, and 10 years after a default. Only credit information is kept, nothing regarding defaults on rent, unpaid medical bills etc... Getting a record of your own credit history is completely free, either online, by writing a letter, or just stopping by the bank. Yes, national ID is used for that purpose. I've only very rarely heard of identity theft by strangers, there are many hoops to jump through, like photo ID and a physical letter sent to the corresponding address for verification. What would prevent that? Privacy laws. Keeping and sharing blacklists is not forbidden but regulated in Europe. Creditors also are obligated to use the central credit agency.
- vadimberman 9y ago
  I'm not Belgian, I just had to deal with them extensively, so I can't reply. But the credit score is not related to the existence of the national ID. I know that the monstrous institutions thriving on the FICO score are an exception. In most countries, it's the usual payslips, bank statements, stuff like that. No one needs weird stuff like secured credit cards or asking their relative to "piggyback" on their credit score. I know that the US credit agencies tried to "educate" the local business communities in some countries on the importance of the credit score and are currently occupying a small obscure niche.
smnrchrds 9y ago
Isn't it legally required that you carry your ID at all times unless you are within 200 meters of your home? That would horrify most Americans. I know it is not in reality, but it sounds totalitarian.
- peoplewindow 9y ago
  Yes. People don't though. In practice people do tend to have a driving license in your wallet. This joyous setup is the result of the Schengen zone. When national borders were "abolished" (not really, they came back due to the migrant crisis) the way governments got police and immigration forces on board with it was to say that everyone had to have their ID on them at all times and an ID check could be done anywhere at all within the zone. I've never heard of anyone getting in trouble for not having ID on them though.
  - skrause 9y ago
    That's a log of myths and misinformation spread here. In the EU you only have to carry an ID while you're crossing a border. If you stay in another country of the EU you should have your ID available somewhere in that country. But if you actually have to carry around your ID all the time depends on the laws country you're in. Here in Germany you don't.
    - helloindia 9y ago
      Year 2011, I was touring Berlin with a friend, and a policeman asked us to show our ID. So, tourists need to carry passport at all times? How'd police know who is a tourist?
      - zaarn 9y ago
        Spotting tourists is usually not hard for someone who lives at the location. Additionally, it could just have been chance. In general, yes, you should have your ID/passport on you, but there is no real punishment for not having it other than being required to later show up at a police station and/or being escorted by the policeman to your apartment/hotel to show your ID. A bigger problem is usually not having a drivers license on you, that gets some of the people in the police riled up (but again, no real punishment as long as you show up later at the police station)
syshum 9y ago
>>>Ugh. National IDs are common in Europe as well as other places Proving the Senator Point.. I am sure you believe Europe is free, it is not. Europe is very very very very very Authoritarian and restrictive. > It's hard to call Belgium a totalitarian regime. Belgium is Totalitarian. Seemed pretty easy to me, I just typed things on my keyboard and they appeared like magic on my screen.... National ID is the first step to https://www.aclu.org/ordering-pizza https://www.aclu.org/ordering-pizza
- kelnos 9y ago
  > National ID is the first step to https://www.aclu.org/ordering-pizza https://www.aclu.org/ordering-pizza A national ID is by no means required for something like this. If businesses wanted to, they could already identify us uniquely enough to pool all their information and be able to do something like that.
- andruby 9y ago
  Did you miss a <sarcasm> tag or are you being serious?
bhandziuk 9y ago
> we are protected against a hypothetical tyranny This is America in a nutshell. Most of it's efforts are spend protecting against what it can't see and not on the problems in front of it.
- vadimberman 9y ago
  Sad I can only upvote once. But then, aliens and zombies will have a hard time invading the US.
dawnbreez 9y ago
Who has authority to revoke the ID? Can someone get angry and un-citizen me? Will the process of getting re-identified take a day, a week, a month, years? Will I be able to continue working in that time? We need to build with these security concerns in mind. The reason SSNs are failing is that security was never supposed to be a concern for them, so no thought was paid to it.
- rtkwe 9y ago
  The clear answer to that would be only you can revoke the certificate either by signing or by going to something like the post office/DMV with 1-2 additional pieces of ID (for cases where your card is lost/stolen). Also the cert is only for SSN like things and proving your identity in those cases not that you're not a citizen if your cert is out of date. So you couldn't say open a new bank account or apply for a new loan but everything else just keeps working.
- tremon 9y ago
  No, the ID's cannot be revoked, and they are assigned at birth or at the moment you apply for immigration. There are some efforts to allow stripping dual-nationality criminals of their citizenship, but that process requires both a judge and a cabinet minister to sign it, and the ECHR will not allow people to be stripped of their only citizenship. And even in those cases, the national ID's will not be revoked, just invalidated. So let's skip all the hypotheticals about having to recover one, unless you can point to an actual case from the EU, instead of Hollywood?
- thephyber 9y ago
  > The reason SSNs are failing is that security was never supposed to be a concern for them, so no thought was paid to it. NO. The reason SSNs are "failing" is because they have been adopted by the public and private sectors because they are a de facto "username". SSNs serve the same purpose as driver's license numbers and passport numbers, only they have less authentication, but are still more common (because most young children don't have DLs or passports).
- lorenzhs 9y ago
  IDs get lost and stolen sometimes, so there are established processes for that. In Germany, they cost 28.80€ to replace and take 3-6 weeks to be manufactured. You can continue working normally, and generally there are is no impact on your daily life. The process takes less than an hour, excluding waiting time. Your citizenship isn't tied to the ID, either.
romaniv 9y ago
On the other hand, there are countries that use national IDs to restrict the freedom of their citizens. You can't base your reasoning about something like this solely on what's happening in some countries right now. That's how SSN mess started in the first place. They weren't intended as a global identifier, there were concerns that they will be used as such, but those concerns were ignored. Also, I'm not convinced that spinning up a new ID system is necessary to solve the issue at hand.

MrRadar 9y ago

In this context wouldn't the EU be a better entity to compare against the US federal government? In that sense the ID situation in the US is pretty much the same as in Europe (each member state issues its own IDs), except the US has an extra ID number at the federal level that was never even intended to be a federal ID number (and is consequently terrible at being that).

yxhuvud 9y ago
No, at least some of the IDs in Europe is valid in all or most of EU. In Sweden, the ones given out by the police is valid in EU, while for example drivers licenses is not (as an ID. They are valid to drive with).
- Dylan16807 9y ago
  What do you mean? I can use my driver's license as an ID in any state.
  - Symbiote 9y ago
    An EU driving licence is only proof of being qualified to drive, not proof of residence or nationality. That makes it ok for some identity purposes (age, name) but not sufficient for crossing a national border. (I'm not sure this is relevant, but I'm explaining the situation here.)
  - dx034 9y ago
    To proof your age but not to identify for official business (e.g. opening bank accounts) or with governments.
  - zaarn 9y ago
    A drivers license is not an ID in the EU. It is usually used for age verification. If you do a post-ident or anything official, you need your proper ID.
    - 0xffff2 9y ago
      In most (all?) US states the DMV or equivalent issues both IDs and driver's licenses, with the side effect that if you have a driver's license it is also your state ID. So the fact that they are separate in the EU is tangential. The term "driver's license" in the US is synonymous with both "ID" and "driver's license" in the EU, and can be compared to either.

mistersquid 9y ago

Forgive my ignorance, I only (sort of) know how this works in the United States. How do Belgian creditors verify the creditworthiness of an applicant who claims to be the individual identified by a particular credit history? Am I wrong to presume the Belgian National ID is not used for identification and verification by Belgian creditors? I also wonder (just thinking out loud, not part of my question) what would prevent US creditors from shirking the responsibility and withholding the required resources to establish an identification and verification system which does not rely on a national ID (different from a Social Security number). EDIT: remove extraneous word, add parenthetical to last sentence.

kmm 9y ago
There is a governmental agency, part of the national bank, that keeps track of credit. Information is kept for three months after a successful repayment of credit, one year after a delayed yet complete repayment, and 10 years after a default. Only credit information is kept, nothing regarding defaults on rent, unpaid medical bills etc... Getting a record of your own credit history is completely free, either online, by writing a letter, or just stopping by the bank. Yes, national ID is used for that purpose. I've only very rarely heard of identity theft by strangers, there are many hoops to jump through, like photo ID and a physical letter sent to the corresponding address for verification. What would prevent that? Privacy laws. Keeping and sharing blacklists is not forbidden but regulated in Europe. Creditors also are obligated to use the central credit agency.
vadimberman 9y ago
I'm not Belgian, I just had to deal with them extensively, so I can't reply. But the credit score is not related to the existence of the national ID. I know that the monstrous institutions thriving on the FICO score are an exception. In most countries, it's the usual payslips, bank statements, stuff like that. No one needs weird stuff like secured credit cards or asking their relative to "piggyback" on their credit score. I know that the US credit agencies tried to "educate" the local business communities in some countries on the importance of the credit score and are currently occupying a small obscure niche.

smnrchrds 9y ago

Isn't it legally required that you carry your ID at all times unless you are within 200 meters of your home? That would horrify most Americans. I know it is not in reality, but it sounds totalitarian.

peoplewindow 9y ago
Yes. People don't though. In practice people do tend to have a driving license in your wallet. This joyous setup is the result of the Schengen zone. When national borders were "abolished" (not really, they came back due to the migrant crisis) the way governments got police and immigration forces on board with it was to say that everyone had to have their ID on them at all times and an ID check could be done anywhere at all within the zone. I've never heard of anyone getting in trouble for not having ID on them though.
- skrause 9y ago
  That's a log of myths and misinformation spread here. In the EU you only have to carry an ID while you're crossing a border. If you stay in another country of the EU you should have your ID available somewhere in that country. But if you actually have to carry around your ID all the time depends on the laws country you're in. Here in Germany you don't.
  - helloindia 9y ago
    Year 2011, I was touring Berlin with a friend, and a policeman asked us to show our ID. So, tourists need to carry passport at all times? How'd police know who is a tourist?
    - zaarn 9y ago
      Spotting tourists is usually not hard for someone who lives at the location. Additionally, it could just have been chance. In general, yes, you should have your ID/passport on you, but there is no real punishment for not having it other than being required to later show up at a police station and/or being escorted by the policeman to your apartment/hotel to show your ID. A bigger problem is usually not having a drivers license on you, that gets some of the people in the police riled up (but again, no real punishment as long as you show up later at the police station)

syshum 9y ago

>>>Ugh. National IDs are common in Europe as well as other places Proving the Senator Point.. I am sure you believe Europe is free, it is not. Europe is very very very very very Authoritarian and restrictive. > It's hard to call Belgium a totalitarian regime. Belgium is Totalitarian. Seemed pretty easy to me, I just typed things on my keyboard and they appeared like magic on my screen.... National ID is the first step to https://www.aclu.org/ordering-pizza https://www.aclu.org/ordering-pizza

kelnos 9y ago
> National ID is the first step to https://www.aclu.org/ordering-pizza https://www.aclu.org/ordering-pizza A national ID is by no means required for something like this. If businesses wanted to, they could already identify us uniquely enough to pool all their information and be able to do something like that.
andruby 9y ago
Did you miss a <sarcasm> tag or are you being serious?

bhandziuk 9y ago

> we are protected against a hypothetical tyranny This is America in a nutshell. Most of it's efforts are spend protecting against what it can't see and not on the problems in front of it.

vadimberman 9y ago
Sad I can only upvote once. But then, aliens and zombies will have a hard time invading the US.

dawnbreez 9y ago

Who has authority to revoke the ID? Can someone get angry and un-citizen me? Will the process of getting re-identified take a day, a week, a month, years? Will I be able to continue working in that time? We need to build with these security concerns in mind. The reason SSNs are failing is that security was never supposed to be a concern for them, so no thought was paid to it.

rtkwe 9y ago
The clear answer to that would be only you can revoke the certificate either by signing or by going to something like the post office/DMV with 1-2 additional pieces of ID (for cases where your card is lost/stolen). Also the cert is only for SSN like things and proving your identity in those cases not that you're not a citizen if your cert is out of date. So you couldn't say open a new bank account or apply for a new loan but everything else just keeps working.
tremon 9y ago
No, the ID's cannot be revoked, and they are assigned at birth or at the moment you apply for immigration. There are some efforts to allow stripping dual-nationality criminals of their citizenship, but that process requires both a judge and a cabinet minister to sign it, and the ECHR will not allow people to be stripped of their only citizenship. And even in those cases, the national ID's will not be revoked, just invalidated. So let's skip all the hypotheticals about having to recover one, unless you can point to an actual case from the EU, instead of Hollywood?
thephyber 9y ago
> The reason SSNs are failing is that security was never supposed to be a concern for them, so no thought was paid to it. NO. The reason SSNs are "failing" is because they have been adopted by the public and private sectors because they are a de facto "username". SSNs serve the same purpose as driver's license numbers and passport numbers, only they have less authentication, but are still more common (because most young children don't have DLs or passports).
lorenzhs 9y ago
IDs get lost and stolen sometimes, so there are established processes for that. In Germany, they cost 28.80€ to replace and take 3-6 weeks to be manufactured. You can continue working normally, and generally there are is no impact on your daily life. The process takes less than an hour, excluding waiting time. Your citizenship isn't tied to the ID, either.

romaniv 9y ago

On the other hand, there are countries that use national IDs to restrict the freedom of their citizens. You can't base your reasoning about something like this solely on what's happening in some countries right now. That's how SSN mess started in the first place. They weren't intended as a global identifier, there were concerns that they will be used as such, but those concerns were ignored. Also, I'm not convinced that spinning up a new ID system is necessary to solve the issue at hand.