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Fake IDs in the age of the internet

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Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#141

Post by sandworm101 »

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #105
delecti wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not really a relevant question. The problem is that the "neighborhoods" are too large for there to be a location that's walkable for enough people.

In college students will a mile or several to/from parties or over the course of a night party hopping. Not walking everywhere is more of a social norms issue. In college towns you see many more non-students walking everywhere. People expect people to walk everywhere in college towns and consequently you don't get bothered by the cops for walking around after a reasonable hour unless you're doing something stupid. In…

I would add that for any young female, in any town, walking a significant distance home from the bar after a night of drinking should be avoided.

Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#142

Post by Someone1234 »

malnourish wrote: post #129
Someone1234 wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The worst part is that teaching kids about alcohol safely at home, European style, is ILLEGAL in much of the US, meaning that social services might come take your kids if they discover you gave them a glass of wine at Christmas. I grew up in Europe. I was planning on letting my kid try a small glass of wine with food in their early teens. But doing so in the US, I actually risk jail and loss of parental custody. Let…

In Wisconsin, at least: > Can an underage person possess and consume alcohol beverages on licensed premises? > Yes. Persons under age 21 may possess and consume alcohol beverages if they are with their parents, guardians or spouses of legal drinking age; but this is at the discretion of the licensee. The licensed premise may choose to prohibit consumption and possession of alcohol beverages by underage persons. https…

This site has a good summary[0] of Wisconsin, and in general I think Wisconsin's drinking laws are very sane.

But contrast it with Utah[1], Arizona[2], Kansas[3], North Dakota[4], Tennessee, Alabama, Florida, North Carolina, Tennessee, Indiana, West Virginia, Pennsylvania or Vermont.

[0] https://alcoholpolicy.niaaa.nih.gov/APIS_State_Profile.html?...

[1] https://alcoholpolicy.niaaa.nih.gov/APIS_State_Profile.html?...

[2] https://alcoholpolicy.niaaa.nih.gov/APIS_State_Profile.html?...

[3] https://alcoholpolicy.niaaa.nih.gov/APIS_State_Profile.html?...

[4] https://alcoholpolicy.niaaa.nih.gov/APIS_State_Profile.html?...

Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#143

Post by closeparen »

SamBam wrote: post #28
Arcten wrote: post #2

I've been interested in this topic for a while. The article was fairly good but I did have a few minor quibbles. For one, ordering from IDGod (the vendor in the story) is known to be very reliable. If packages get stopped at customs, a customer can contact support to get a replacement shipped at no charge. Additionally, the advanced scanner BarZapp is pretty much a non-issue. Almost any ID purchased from vendors on t…

How will a fake id pass BarZapp? According to the article (I know nothing about this, so could be wrong) it looks up the id in a database and returns the name and dob of the owner. How could the made-up name be in the database? Or are they cloning existing IDs, and the buyer doesn't get a choice in the name?

ID lookups against databases are actually pretty rare. The information is embedded in the barcode, and not in a cryptographically secure way.

Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#144

Post by aidenn0 »

_jal wrote: post #86
delecti wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a big part of the problem is that America is very large and very car focused. If you can reasonably walk to where you're drinking (or more importantly, walk home from there), then you're less likely to drive drunk. Many bars in America essentially require driving to and from.

I think the car-orientation of the US would greatly benefit from a European-style approach to teaching kids about alcohol. I lived in Germany for a year as an exchange student when I was 16, the age at which kids can drink without a parent present. They can't get a license until 18. The vast bulk of kids there, in my experience, seemed to figure out sane drinking well before they got behind the wheel. Coming back to…

When I visited Germany on a 1 month exchange, it seemed like it was the 10th graders that were doing stupid things around drinking, but of course none of them were even close to being the age at which they would have a car. Whereas in the US, I got my learners permit in 10th grade, and was driving myself to school in 11th (it saved about 30 minutes versus taking the bus).

Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#145

Post by tyingq »

scurvy wrote: post #46
post_break wrote: post #4

This reminds me of back in the day when someone broke into the Ohio DMV and stole the machine that made the IDs and starting making exact "fake" IDs.

Before the days of prevalent computers and searchable databases, one would just take someone else's information to the DMV and get a real ID with their info.

In the 70-80's, we made them with colored stock paper, hand-drawn seals, and rub on letters and border lines. You would make them much larger than the real deal, then take photos and reduce the size. That masked any imperfections.

The back side was typically just text, so we could photocopy that. Insert the photo, and find a high end laminating machine. Oh, and fake a neighboring state ID so it's less critical to have it perfect.

Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#146

Post by icantdrive55 »

delecti wrote: post #58
TazeTSchnitzel wrote: post #5

The mass use of fake IDs of this sort is a bizarrely American problem. In the UK, you're considered an adult at age 18. Most (aside from the unfortunate 17-year-olds) university students can legally purchase alcohol, smoke, or gamble if they so choose. But we don't have MADD, I guess.

I think a big part of the problem is that America is very large and very car focused. If you can reasonably walk to where you're drinking (or more importantly, walk home from there), then you're less likely to drive drunk. Many bars in America essentially require driving to and from.

And Americans kinda overreact when there's a tradegy like a drunk driving accident.

And America believes they can solve complex proplems with ham fisted laws, like .08 percent for Everyone. (We all know that person who has one drink and is a mess.)

And America gets very used to the extra fees/grants to local agencies brought in by DUI fear/arrests.

Texas is the only state I know of that takes a person's susceptibility/tolerance to alcohol in effect when prosecuting a DUI.

This .08 for everyone is not the way. I would rather the state, federal government take some of those taxes they slap on alcohol purchases, and put it towards testing individuals when a driver's licence is renewed. People would have diifferent percentages printed right on the drivers licence. Mixing medications would invalidate that number. You could test the individuals at a remote location? "You want to drive, and drink--lets take a test?"

We all know there's people who shouldn't be driving after one drink.

I know there's people, like my decised father, who was a maintance drinker, that could safely drive after more than a few drinks.

I'll get a lot of downvotes, but I'm tired of getting pulled over by cops looking for a marginal DUI.

I'm tired of them looking into bars, and following patrons home, just hoping to make a bust.

I'm tired of cops thing everyone drinks to excess like they do on their days off. Yes--many do drink heavily, and "the flash of the badge" is still alive and well in America. Did you ever wonder when the profession with the highest rates of alcoholism never seems to get DUI's?

Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#147

Post by fivestar »

So many interesting threads to discuss on this matter.

The problem in the US is too many people hate that others have freedom--hence the MADD group's desire to remove any semblance of fun in order to make everyone else as miserable as they are.

The US drinking age, if there should be one at all, should revert to 18 and the ID problem would pretty much disappear.

I can't describe all the ways that people have become emotionally and socially stunted simply because we have too many laws making typical, normal human behavior illegal in order so that some company can earn higher profits (think lawyers, think insurance industry). They've ruined our way of life and we need it back. We are a nation in hiding, ducking too many laws, too many cops, and too many restrictions. I'm not saying people should be free to drink and drive, but I am saying that all the laws limiting behavior have had tremendous negative consequences.

On to the lowly driver's license. Once upon a time, possessing one demonstrated that one could competently operate a motor vehicle. No more. Today, most "driver's" can't drive worth a damn, and the "license" they hold is an over-regulated, poorly implemented national identity card that you must have in order to get on a flight or enter certain Federal facilities. It's utterly stupid. Identity cards in general are dumb and over-wrought contrivances that are mostly totalitarian in nature "your papers please"--how soon we forget. And now we have RealID, which is even worse, and soon there will be a massive data breach of all that RealID information the feds are hanging on to with all the attendant negative consequences for the people who willingly surrendered themselves to big government.

That there exists a thriving illegal Id industry in the 21st century makes me happy because it means the trap of tyranny isn't completed shut--there is still resistance, still a means of escape.

People, Americans especially, and HN readers most notably, need to forego their fears and re-learn what it means to be free again. Free doesn't mean "subject to incalculable bureaucratic restrictions on one's life." Quite the contrary. Be free, resist the bullshit!

The other, related matter that irks me is the background check. Never was there are more worthless, false sense of security than the background check. But that is a matter for another day.

Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#148

Post by Analemma_ »

The_Hoff wrote: post #35

> The options for payment were Bitcoin and Western Union; since I’m neither a Russian hacker nor a Dark Web impresario, I opted for the latter. This is so frustrating for me to read. Western Union has its own set of problems and its users throw money away on fees, but why is cryptocurrency being thought of as a only being used by Russian Hackers and Dark Web impresarios?

> and its users throw money away on fees,

Have you seen the transaction fees for Bitcoin lately?

Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#149

Post by simplyluke »

TazeTSchnitzel wrote: post #5

The mass use of fake IDs of this sort is a bizarrely American problem. In the UK, you're considered an adult at age 18. Most (aside from the unfortunate 17-year-olds) university students can legally purchase alcohol, smoke, or gamble if they so choose. But we don't have MADD, I guess.

The craziest part of it in the US, to me, is that everyone involved knows it's BS.

Most vendors/bouncers in a college town are going to know the kid handing them a florida ID thousands of miles away from florida is almost certainly a fake - the fakes being produced by IDGod and most of the other college vendors are pretty terrible. They don't care though, it's enough to keep them from being fined/losing an alcohol license should police become involved. Hell, most of the local police departments in college towns are relatively unconcerned about underage drinking unless they can use it as a way to shut down other behavior they deem an issue. Most parents in the US are fine with their college students drinking as well.

The optimist in me thinks our insane drinking laws are the next to fall after widespread legalization of cannabis, but unfortunately most of the influential people in politics are so far removed from that period of life that they're apathetic towards it being an issue.

The better question is among those who plan to drink in the US, who actually waited to be 21 to drink? I don't know anyone.

Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#150

Post by simplyluke »

post_break wrote: post #55
0xfeba wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Depends on the state, but Federal law does require you to be 21 or older to purchase a handgun. Ammunition can be sold without any background checks or ID checks in some states.

21 to purchase from a retail, I believe it's still 18 to purchase from an individual, making it even more backwards.

This is correct in Texas. It's rooted in an issue in how the ATF defines weapons.
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