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The other Sean Byrne doesn't exist

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Re: The other Sean Byrne doesn't exist

#141

Post by necovek »

layer8 wrote: post #126
Aozora7 wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In this particular case, it would be harder to produce a fake signature from a non-existent person if the signatures in questions were digital and backed by a national identity number. The kind of that I'm submitting when signing documents at work.

Aside from the fact the entry in question was added to the list almost two decades ago, it’s naive to assume that people would only be put on these lists if they have a verified identity number. If that was a rule, the easier rule of requiring a birth date would already have helped. Because while not everyone has a national ID number, pretty much everyone has a birth date.

There are people whose birth date is not really known (babies left at doorsteps, people from war-torn countries with no official record who had no parents to tell them of their birth date...).

I do not know how are they handled, but they probably get assigned one plausible date and it probably depends on the country.

In a sense, a birth date can be just as much an assigned number as an ID is. An ID can also have a checksum in it, potentially even a cryptographic one that only government can sign.

Re: The other Sean Byrne doesn't exist

#142

Post by kmoser »

gucci-on-fleek wrote: post #8
kmoser wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is trading one problem for another: when the name on your birth certificate doesn't match the name on your government issued ID, certain other government entities tend to deny you services.

I would think that changing the last name only should be fine though, since up until somewhat recently, most women changed their last names when they got married, so most systems should be equipped to handle this.

You would think. But that's not always the case: Florida residents face driver’s license denials over mismatched documents https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FSwv_D8gxw (Now, it's Florida, which may partly explain the idiocracy.)

Re: The other Sean Byrne doesn't exist

#143

Post by necovek »

thetimewotitis wrote: post #139
Aozora7 wrote: post #26

This is one of the obvious consequences of not having a national identity number assigned to everyone at birth, which exist in most developed countries, except for anglosphere, for some reason.

I mean in theory, it doesn't have to be a serial number, and I think that's better. Something about it suggests being enlisted in a national army. It says the state assigns "A body" a number. -vs- The state is made up of us as individuals. So while the serial keyfield is a data engineers dream, politically I'd welcome something more personal. Time of birth/parents and other identifying information is on our birth cer…

The problem with that is that it leaks too much information to anyone seeing it — this is bad if it needs to be used with any party you might not trust (or not trust their security). Serbia (former Yugoslavia) already does something similar since 1970s, and your Unique Citizen Number (JMBG) is derived from your date of birth and county of issuance (usually birth county) and sex at birth, a couple of digits and a single digit checksum.

Ideally, government could issue a cryptographically signed ID, so anyone with access to countries' public key can verify authenticity (with revocation mechanism built-in for both individual keys and all keys signed with one government — this is where it gets tricky). Obviously, governments become new CAs, and people in them can provide fakes when they want if they are corrupt, but anyone can easily validate it.

Re: The other Sean Byrne doesn't exist

#144

Post by eru »

YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #118
Aozora7 wrote: post #26

This is one of the obvious consequences of not having a national identity number assigned to everyone at birth, which exist in most developed countries, except for anglosphere, for some reason.

I'm from Greece, where I have a national identity number. In fact I've had several (maybe half a dozen?) national identity numbers. You see, the national identity number is, literally, the number on your national identity card, or in other words the serial number of the document; not the person. When the document changes, the number changes with it. Same as with passports. Even in the Anglosphere people have passport…

> You see, the national identity number is, literally, the number on your national identity card, or in other words the serial number of the document; not the person. When the document changes, the number changes with it.

In Singapore, your number is fixed, even when they give you a new document.

Re: The other Sean Byrne doesn't exist

#145

Post by necovek »

sneak wrote: post #138
UltraSane wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish people were assigned a identity certificate with public and private key at birth.

What happens when they lose it? What happens when someone else gets a copy of the private key? What happens when every app, website, and mobile OS requires a signature for every single post or message, tying all communication to an identity that the government can retaliate against? This creates many more problems than it solves.

I agree and believe revocation is the most important problem.

With services requiring it, you can just not use them: as long as it does not get mandated (unfortunately, a direction we are heading in), hopefully market self-regulates and privacy conserving options win.

Yes, we all know that's not how that movie plays out :)

Re: The other Sean Byrne doesn't exist

#146

Post by basilikum »

hdgvhicv wrote: post #89
basilikum wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

2FA over SMS is stupidly bad. It's worse than TOTP in every aspect including this reason. It is also much less secure. You could start switching accounts to TOTP regardless of this and then decide if you want to switch your number later when you have the option. TOTP is portable and can be backed up. I went a little bit off on a tangent, the stupidity of SMS 2FA is a pet peeve of mine.

If I lose my phone I have no totp access or sms access I walk to the local phone shop and get a replacement sim for my number with a few of bits of ID and I regain sms access. Totp access is gone forever. It’s clearly not worse that totp in every way.

Only if you don't backup your TOTP tokens. Just like you lose your photos when you lose your phone. One of the main advantages of TOTP is that it is portable and can be backed up.

> I walk to the local phone shop and get a replacement sim for my number with a few of bits of ID and I regain sms access.

Or someone else gets access to your SIM by sim swapping you, which is not as stupidly easy as it used to be, but still SMS remains insecure. Building an authentication system on it is just a bad idea from virtually every angle.

Re: The other Sean Byrne doesn't exist

#147

Post by veeti »

Cider9986 wrote: post #91

The App Store as the only way to install apps is the worst part about iOS and why I'll never use it again. I'm always helping friends with piracy and I have to tell them they can't conveniently use a native app because it isn't listed on the App Store. And then there's the removal of ICE apps. It's too much control. On iOS, if the government banned Signal, Apple could enforce it. On GrapheneOS, you can use whatever a…

Once Android developer verification rolls out globally, Alphabet Inc. in Mountain View and the US sanctions and export controls list will become the sole arbitrer of accepted software publishers. Only minority platforms like GrapheneOS, Mac OS X, Win32, Linux remain as free general computing operating systems.

Re: The other Sean Byrne doesn't exist

#148

Post by po1nt »

tonfa wrote: post #119
po1nt wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah and that's exactly what shouldn't happen. Government's should not have a power to ask a private company for data under any circumstances and they should not make "race" a compulsory data to submit, so that you could exercise your rights.

In some European countries government (and private entities) isn't allowed to collect ethnicity information.

Unfortunately ethnicity isn't the only thing you can discriminate on. You can figure out the ethnicity from surname a lot of the times.

Re: The other Sean Byrne doesn't exist

#149

Post by functionmouse »

Aozora7 wrote: post #26

This is one of the obvious consequences of not having a national identity number assigned to everyone at birth, which exist in most developed countries, except for anglosphere, for some reason.

Yes. And they should be tattooed onto the person's arm, so there can be no mistake. Maybe a bar code?

Re: The other Sean Byrne doesn't exist

#150

Post by msandford »

larsnystrom wrote: post #69
pibaker wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If they put an ID on a sanction list, there’s a possibility to verify it They didn't care to figure out if the Sean Byrne of County Sligo actually existed before putting the name on the list. I doubt they would bother verifying an ID number. Plus, going back to my point about the list being full of foreigners, how do you verify the validity of a foreign ID number and address? Maybe Ireland is going to comply with a…

Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good. As you said, Ireland might comply, which would’ve solved this particular issue.

Yes it's true we shouldn't let perfect be the enemy of good. But good also has to be good enough to solve the problem without creating more problems faster than it solves them.

It's fine to propose a solution but if people aren't convinced just throwing an aphorism grenade at them isn't productive.

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