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Am I the only one who is wondering how this comment ended up on top of this discussion? The argument seems highly problematic. How far is a government allowed

by stfu 14y ago

Am I the only one who is wondering how this comment ended up on top of this discussion? The argument seems highly problematic. How far is a government allowed to go "to minimise the probability of false, duplicate, or un-recoverable identities". Let us pretend for a moment, that these are indeed core issues, that justify a billion dollar project. If a government is allowed to intrude personal freedom just because the technology is there, why don't we make caring a gps tracking device mandatory for everyone leaving their registered residence. I mean, it is keeping the streets save, right? What gives a government the right to demand from someone fingerprints and iris scans, but not demand the GPS tracking or mandatory DNA samples of every citizen. If we go on and just lament that this is just how it is and government has to keep the streets clean, these steps are consequential. After all a few decades ago nobody cared about fingerprints, and it was purely some crime-fighting technique. And so are DNA samples and monitoring anklets today. U.S.'s tracing abilities given in the example based bank accounts or cell phones are voluntary, i.e. I can take a bag of cash and a throw away phone and government agencies would have to put substantial manpower into keeping track of my actions. With the iris scan, all they need to do is have a high resolution camera installed at the front of the store and they know where I spend that money.

JumpCrisscross 14y ago
"just because the technology is there" The Indian government isn't collecting biometrics for fun. Every government, particularly democracies and those with social spending, need to know (a) who is in their country, and, (b) said individuals can reliably prove their identity. Instead of filing forms and pictures in a centralised database the Indian government has opted to generate unique IDs hashed from biometrics. "What gives a government the right to demand from someone fingerprints and iris scans, but not demand the GPS tracking or mandatory DNA samples of every citizen." Slippery slope fallacy. By this logic any potential for data collection is totalitarian. Note that to gain U.S. residency (or, for that matter, work at a U.S. financial institution) I had to give my fingerprints to the FBI. "With the iris scan, all they need to do is have a high resolution camera" Facial recognition technology would be easier, cheaper, and as technologically inaccessible as planting high resolution cameras looking at peoples' irises everywhere.
- dalke 14y ago
  "reliably prove their identity" What is the relationship between the level of reliability and the ability to provide democratic government and social support? Obviously democracy does not demand 100% reliable identification, if only because many countries with governments based on democratic principles do not require 100% reliable proof of identify in order to vote, participate in government, etc. (Nor am I suggesting that you think it's 100% - this is a rhetorical point only.) Historically, the case of Clarence Henry Willcock in the UK is relevant. The National Registration Act 1939 re-introduced compulsory identification cards. The practice extended after the war ended. In 1950, Willcock refused to present his card, saying "I am a Liberal and I am against this sort of thing". While the courts upheld the decision and fine, public opinion was against that level of identity checking, and the policy was scrapped in 1952. In part too because of the cost. So we have the case of a democratic system, with social care programs, which seemingly decreased their ability to identify people reliably. Denmark is another example of a country, widely accepted as having both a democratic system and high social services, which doesn't have a highly reliable identity system. So it does not seem that what you are saying is essentially true, and it is possible for a democratic government to have high social support systems without having a reliable method to prove their identity - at least, no more reliable than we had 100 years ago.
  - jhatax 14y ago
    Reliably proving your identity becomes very important in India due to the vastness of the population and the number of subsidies earmarked for the under-privileged. Subsidies aside, reliably identifying someone guarantees their right to suffrage. Umpteen columns of newsprint are devoted each election year to voter fraud - people go to their designated election office to cast their vote but are turned away because they have "already voted". Having a reliable way to identify an individual will reduce the occurrence of these activities, if not totally eliminate them. I have railed about the corruption in India in earlier posts and comments. That the government has green-lighted a project that leverages India's strength in IT to actually help its citizens is a departure from the norm, and is worth lauding. It remains to be seen if this will actually be implemented once the current government's term runs out.
superuser2 14y ago
Please clarify how reliable government-issued ID impacts personal freedom. You're making an awfully big leap here. This argument seems to be based on an assumption of the right to anonymously take out loans, make bank transactions, and conduct business with the government. That right simply doesn't exist. People don't have a right to passable fake ID either, which is all this system really prevents. Requiring ID for activities that shouldn't require it (prepaid cell phones, flight, all electronic forms of US dollars) is an invasion of privacy. Having more secure ID for activities that do isn't.
- batista 14y ago
  >Please clarify how reliable government-issued ID impacts personal freedom. You're making an awfully big leap here. Is he? It is obvious that the government amassing all the more data for it's citizens impacts personal freedom, from privacy, to dissident control, to squashing protest movements etc etc. People make the assumptions that current governments are the be all end all, and something like a mass protest moment and/or revolution will never again be necessary to change them. Even if that was true for the US, how about in places like India or thinly-veiled dictatorships all around the world? >This argument seems to be based on an assumption of the right to anonymously take out loans, make bank transactions, and conduct business with the government. That right simply doesn't exist. No right "exists" (in nature). Rights are not god-given, they are what the citizens of a country can demand of their government and what the political forces in play can negotiate for them. The right to anonymously make whatever transactions is as valid as any other right if it's fought for and won. And a few decades ago, before prevalent credit cards, it was not a right someone would defend, it was what everybody assumed to be the normal situation, unlike nowadays where almost all financial transactions are tracked and catalogued.
  - superuser2 14y ago
    > It is obvious that the government amassing all the more data for it's citizens impacts personal freedom, from privacy, to dissident control, to squashing protest movements etc etc. It may be obvious to you, but that's a pretty handwavy dismissal. Once again, please explain how a government knowing biographical/demographical information about its population impacts personal freedom (or more importantly, how reliable identification impacts personal freedom in a way that unreliable identification does not). >And a few decades ago, before prevalent credit cards, it was not a right someone would defend, it was what everybody assumed to be the normal situation, unlike nowadays where almost all financial transactions are tracked and catalogued. Tracking and cataloging financial transactions is not just an integral function of a bank, it's the definition of a bank. The term "bank account" long predates credit cards, and for a reason: banks keep track of the money you've put in and taken out, and what they've done with that money inbetween. Old school, small town banks identified people by gasp facial recognition; it's just that their facial recognition happened to be manual. And if the bank manager didn't know your family, you were probably out of luck. Reliable government-issued identification made credit available to people who don't have "roots" in any particular community. It is never and was never good business to make a loan to someone (accept a "promise to pay") without a means of extracting that "promise to pay" should the debtor choose to break it. If you're going to make the outlandish claim that one could anonymously take out a loan before the advent of the database, you're going to need to prove it.

by stfu 14y ago

JumpCrisscross 14y ago

"just because the technology is there" The Indian government isn't collecting biometrics for fun. Every government, particularly democracies and those with social spending, need to know (a) who is in their country, and, (b) said individuals can reliably prove their identity. Instead of filing forms and pictures in a centralised database the Indian government has opted to generate unique IDs hashed from biometrics. "What gives a government the right to demand from someone fingerprints and iris scans, but not demand the GPS tracking or mandatory DNA samples of every citizen." Slippery slope fallacy. By this logic any potential for data collection is totalitarian. Note that to gain U.S. residency (or, for that matter, work at a U.S. financial institution) I had to give my fingerprints to the FBI. "With the iris scan, all they need to do is have a high resolution camera" Facial recognition technology would be easier, cheaper, and as technologically inaccessible as planting high resolution cameras looking at peoples' irises everywhere.

dalke 14y ago
"reliably prove their identity" What is the relationship between the level of reliability and the ability to provide democratic government and social support? Obviously democracy does not demand 100% reliable identification, if only because many countries with governments based on democratic principles do not require 100% reliable proof of identify in order to vote, participate in government, etc. (Nor am I suggesting that you think it's 100% - this is a rhetorical point only.) Historically, the case of Clarence Henry Willcock in the UK is relevant. The National Registration Act 1939 re-introduced compulsory identification cards. The practice extended after the war ended. In 1950, Willcock refused to present his card, saying "I am a Liberal and I am against this sort of thing". While the courts upheld the decision and fine, public opinion was against that level of identity checking, and the policy was scrapped in 1952. In part too because of the cost. So we have the case of a democratic system, with social care programs, which seemingly decreased their ability to identify people reliably. Denmark is another example of a country, widely accepted as having both a democratic system and high social services, which doesn't have a highly reliable identity system. So it does not seem that what you are saying is essentially true, and it is possible for a democratic government to have high social support systems without having a reliable method to prove their identity - at least, no more reliable than we had 100 years ago.
- jhatax 14y ago
  Reliably proving your identity becomes very important in India due to the vastness of the population and the number of subsidies earmarked for the under-privileged. Subsidies aside, reliably identifying someone guarantees their right to suffrage. Umpteen columns of newsprint are devoted each election year to voter fraud - people go to their designated election office to cast their vote but are turned away because they have "already voted". Having a reliable way to identify an individual will reduce the occurrence of these activities, if not totally eliminate them. I have railed about the corruption in India in earlier posts and comments. That the government has green-lighted a project that leverages India's strength in IT to actually help its citizens is a departure from the norm, and is worth lauding. It remains to be seen if this will actually be implemented once the current government's term runs out.

superuser2 14y ago

Please clarify how reliable government-issued ID impacts personal freedom. You're making an awfully big leap here. This argument seems to be based on an assumption of the right to anonymously take out loans, make bank transactions, and conduct business with the government. That right simply doesn't exist. People don't have a right to passable fake ID either, which is all this system really prevents. Requiring ID for activities that shouldn't require it (prepaid cell phones, flight, all electronic forms of US dollars) is an invasion of privacy. Having more secure ID for activities that do isn't.

batista 14y ago
>Please clarify how reliable government-issued ID impacts personal freedom. You're making an awfully big leap here. Is he? It is obvious that the government amassing all the more data for it's citizens impacts personal freedom, from privacy, to dissident control, to squashing protest movements etc etc. People make the assumptions that current governments are the be all end all, and something like a mass protest moment and/or revolution will never again be necessary to change them. Even if that was true for the US, how about in places like India or thinly-veiled dictatorships all around the world? >This argument seems to be based on an assumption of the right to anonymously take out loans, make bank transactions, and conduct business with the government. That right simply doesn't exist. No right "exists" (in nature). Rights are not god-given, they are what the citizens of a country can demand of their government and what the political forces in play can negotiate for them. The right to anonymously make whatever transactions is as valid as any other right if it's fought for and won. And a few decades ago, before prevalent credit cards, it was not a right someone would defend, it was what everybody assumed to be the normal situation, unlike nowadays where almost all financial transactions are tracked and catalogued.
- superuser2 14y ago
  > It is obvious that the government amassing all the more data for it's citizens impacts personal freedom, from privacy, to dissident control, to squashing protest movements etc etc. It may be obvious to you, but that's a pretty handwavy dismissal. Once again, please explain how a government knowing biographical/demographical information about its population impacts personal freedom (or more importantly, how reliable identification impacts personal freedom in a way that unreliable identification does not). >And a few decades ago, before prevalent credit cards, it was not a right someone would defend, it was what everybody assumed to be the normal situation, unlike nowadays where almost all financial transactions are tracked and catalogued. Tracking and cataloging financial transactions is not just an integral function of a bank, it's the definition of a bank. The term "bank account" long predates credit cards, and for a reason: banks keep track of the money you've put in and taken out, and what they've done with that money inbetween. Old school, small town banks identified people by gasp facial recognition; it's just that their facial recognition happened to be manual. And if the bank manager didn't know your family, you were probably out of luck. Reliable government-issued identification made credit available to people who don't have "roots" in any particular community. It is never and was never good business to make a loan to someone (accept a "promise to pay") without a means of extracting that "promise to pay" should the debtor choose to break it. If you're going to make the outlandish claim that one could anonymously take out a loan before the advent of the database, you're going to need to prove it.