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I'm wondering how exactly you GET a photo ID in the first place. You need to identify yourself to whoever is taking that photo. I lived in Norway for a couple

I'm wondering how exactly you GET a photo ID in the first place. You need to identify yourself to whoever is taking that photo. I lived in Norway for a couple of years. There I just opened a bank account online, giving them my person number - and they posted something to my address as registered with the government. But in Australia our privacy advocates killed the "Australia Card" idea, so instead we have a tax file number with all the disadvantages of a national ID number and none of the advantages... Anyway, back the main point. To be totally frank with you I think photo IDs are largely bullshit security theatre. You're asking a human factor[tm] to look at a fuzzy photo taken 10 years ago and confirm that it looks similar enough to the person in front of them.

rahimnathwani 9y ago
"I'm wondering how exactly you GET a photo ID in the first place." In the UK, for a passport, there's a chain of trust. You need a professional or some other trusted community member (vicar, doctor, lawyer etc.) to sign the back of the photo saying it's you, and to provide their contact info for further verification. Not perfect, but I don't think many people are skilled enough to successfully procure a passport where the photo isn't of the named person). "To be totally frank with you I think photo IDs are largely bullshit security theatre." They're not 100% reliable, sure, but they're extremely useful in establishing whether the person in front of you matches a particular identity. One excellent use case for photo ID: consumer lending. If you lend someone money, you need to establish that the person you give the money to is actually agreeing to pay you back, and to pay you interest.