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Rights groups urge UK PM Starmer to abandon plans for mandatory digital ID

bigbrotherwatch.org.uk

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Re: Rights groups urge UK PM Starmer to abandon plans for mandatory digital ID

#141

Post by gambiting »

mytailorisrich wrote: post #137
gambiting wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly the biggest problem is that government requires companies to verify identity of their employees but doesn't give them any means to do so. There was a recent case where a fish and chip shop owner was fined £40k for employing someone without a legal right to work in the UK, and the owner said the guy literally showed him his British passport, turns out it was a fake - but how was he(the business owner) suppose…

Articles in this case all say that the illegal worker only provided a photocopy of his alleged British passport. I.e. the employer did not properly and seriously carry out the checks as he didn't ask for the original, hence the heavy fine. " The business did not see the original copy of the man’s passport, which its owner, Mark Sullivan, said was a “clerical error” " [1] As I commented previously it is hard to counte…

I literally just got a job with a big British corporation and all they wanted was a photocopy of my passport, no one checked the original. So this practice seems at least relatively common.

Re: Rights groups urge UK PM Starmer to abandon plans for mandatory digital ID

#142

Post by mytailorisrich »

gambiting wrote: post #141
mytailorisrich wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Articles in this case all say that the illegal worker only provided a photocopy of his alleged British passport. I.e. the employer did not properly and seriously carry out the checks as he didn't ask for the original, hence the heavy fine. " The business did not see the original copy of the man’s passport, which its owner, Mark Sullivan, said was a “clerical error” " [1] As I commented previously it is hard to counte…

I literally just got a job with a big British corporation and all they wanted was a photocopy of my passport, no one checked the original. So this practice seems at least relatively common.

This just means that incompetence, or worse, is widespread (not a surprise, though).

Then they will feign ignorance when fined 40k+.

Re: Rights groups urge UK PM Starmer to abandon plans for mandatory digital ID

#143

Post by kolektiv »

crimsoneer wrote: post #133
kolektiv wrote: post #99

For me the objections in the UK is not really about the principle (although there are always going to be some privacy/liberty/etc. concerns in that sense), but about the likely implementation. If we could be assured that whatever was put in place was genuinely privacy/security focused, had open and transparent governance, and wasn't susceptible to capture by corporations/other powerful actors, I suspect many people w…

The COVID NHS APP was open source, secure and excellent?

An anomaly for sure, and I think as much as anything else one caused by the fact that Covid meant that government couldn't do business as usual. It wasn't procured and developed in the usual way, it didn't have the usual political pressures and fights from all sides. Yes, it's an example of what could be done if government was insulated from the usual environment!

Re: Rights groups urge UK PM Starmer to abandon plans for mandatory digital ID

#144

Post by monerozcash »

worldsayshi wrote: post #38
stringsandchars wrote: post #34

OTOH - partly playing devil's advocate here - I'm dealing with several bank and inheritance-related issues in the UK from my home in Sweden now, and needing to do pretty much ANYTHING with an authority in the UK feels like stepping back into the 17th century. There's a constant requirement for paperwork to prove who I am - always in the form of items that are 100% digital nowadays in the Nordic countries (like a "uti…

Swede here. I would not want to go back to days without BankID and related tools. That being said, the implementation has some less than desirable features. It's privately owned by some kind of joint venture by the banks. It only supports the major OS:s. So you're pretty much forced to own a Android or IPhone to function. Also, I haven't had the need to do this myself but taking care of somebody else's legal dealings…

Absolutely hate BankID, making it too easy to integrate has resulted in businesses and the government requiring it in places where it's totally unnecessary.

I live overseas, don't have a Nordic bank account. Now when I'm occasionally visiting, I can't buy alcohol because the website requires me to prove my age with BankID.

This, as opposed to most of Europe where you can just have alcohol delivered without anybody asking you for ID at any point. I'd be happy to show an ID at the point of collection/delivery, but buying beer shouldn't require strong KYC.

Re: Rights groups urge UK PM Starmer to abandon plans for mandatory digital ID

#145

Post by worldsayshi »

monerozcash wrote: post #144
worldsayshi wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Swede here. I would not want to go back to days without BankID and related tools. That being said, the implementation has some less than desirable features. It's privately owned by some kind of joint venture by the banks. It only supports the major OS:s. So you're pretty much forced to own a Android or IPhone to function. Also, I haven't had the need to do this myself but taking care of somebody else's legal dealings…

Absolutely hate BankID, making it too easy to integrate has resulted in businesses and the government requiring it in places where it's totally unnecessary. I live overseas, don't have a Nordic bank account. Now when I'm occasionally visiting, I can't buy alcohol because the website requires me to prove my age with BankID. This, as opposed to most of Europe where you can just have alcohol delivered without anybody as…

Sweden is one of the most legally restrictive European countries when it comes to buying alcohol though. So no surprise that it's harder here in that regard. I'd be very surprised if you didn't need to use BankID to buy alcohol online. I'm surprised you can buy online at all.

Re: Rights groups urge UK PM Starmer to abandon plans for mandatory digital ID

#146

Post by stuaxo »

OJFord wrote: post #56
martinald wrote: post #15

The UK already has (various) digital IDs but this is the 'new' one https://www.gov.uk/using-your-gov-uk-one-login . So what's going to be different? Just making it mandatory? I can see some justification (sorta) for not making it mandatory, but saying it won't improve citizens lives is complete rubbish. Having one login for all government services would massively improve the efficiency, especially if other department…

Government website login isn't really a 'digital ID' is it? I've never thought of it like that anyway - could be used as one, maybe, but it isn't currently. E.g. you say this would help the NHS - well gov.uk login isn't any different from NHS app login is it? So the NHS already has 'digital ID' too. (Don't expect this to solve multi-computer-system NHS though, ha! That's been tried and failed how many times, for how…

These systems are deliberately separate at the moment.

Re: Rights groups urge UK PM Starmer to abandon plans for mandatory digital ID

#147

Post by memsom »

LatteLazy wrote: post #65

Chiming in as a Brit: I m generally opposed to this. I already have a passport and that is digitalised and universal. Why not just use that? The UK has a bad habit of launching these programs and not being able to deliver on them. We have had National Insurance numbers for a long time, these are used to track income tax payments and benefits. But that doesn’t work apparently. So I had to set up a Unique Tax Reference…

I half agree, but a passport is a mid sized paper book, and an ID card is plastic and credit card sized. A plastic card goes in my wallet. I do not want to carry my passport around with me - having done this previously in Europe (both to use as ID and to not leave it in the hotel room with no safe), it is very annoying.

Re: Rights groups urge UK PM Starmer to abandon plans for mandatory digital ID

#148

Post by osivertsson »

monerozcash wrote: post #144
worldsayshi wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Swede here. I would not want to go back to days without BankID and related tools. That being said, the implementation has some less than desirable features. It's privately owned by some kind of joint venture by the banks. It only supports the major OS:s. So you're pretty much forced to own a Android or IPhone to function. Also, I haven't had the need to do this myself but taking care of somebody else's legal dealings…

Absolutely hate BankID, making it too easy to integrate has resulted in businesses and the government requiring it in places where it's totally unnecessary. I live overseas, don't have a Nordic bank account. Now when I'm occasionally visiting, I can't buy alcohol because the website requires me to prove my age with BankID. This, as opposed to most of Europe where you can just have alcohol delivered without anybody as…

You are misrepresenting this slightly in my opinion.

Yes, we have strong laws around alcohol sales in Sweden that try to limit damage to society from excessive alcohol consumption while bringing in tax that can be used for state services instead of going to corporations.

However!

We have a well-run state monopoly (Systembolaget) that sells alcoholic beverages at reasonably good prices, with a wide selection and friendly knowledgeable staff. You don’t need BankID to shop at any of their physical stores which are spread all across the country. If they think you might be under 20 you will need to show physical ID, passport is fine.

Any restaurant or bar that sells alcohol will happily sell to you, unless you are underage.

Low-grade alcoholic beverages (<=3.5%), including many beers, can be bought in any grocery store.

Re: Rights groups urge UK PM Starmer to abandon plans for mandatory digital ID

#149

Post by monerozcash »

osivertsson wrote: post #148
monerozcash wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely hate BankID, making it too easy to integrate has resulted in businesses and the government requiring it in places where it's totally unnecessary. I live overseas, don't have a Nordic bank account. Now when I'm occasionally visiting, I can't buy alcohol because the website requires me to prove my age with BankID. This, as opposed to most of Europe where you can just have alcohol delivered without anybody as…

You are misrepresenting this slightly in my opinion. Yes, we have strong laws around alcohol sales in Sweden that try to limit damage to society from excessive alcohol consumption while bringing in tax that can be used for state services instead of going to corporations. However! We have a well-run state monopoly (Systembolaget) that sells alcoholic beverages at reasonably good prices, with a wide selection and frien…

I'm certainly not complaining about the in-person experience, but specifically about how the online experience sucks.

Re: Rights groups urge UK PM Starmer to abandon plans for mandatory digital ID

#150

Post by sjw987 »

The implementation bothers me.

They've announced it'll take the form of an app on a smartphone. What do non-smartphone users do? They don't even know yet.

I'm fine with a unifying ID, even a digital one. But why must it be on my phone? Am I going to need to carry my phone with me everywhere I go? I know some people already live like this, but I don't, and I don't want to have to.

At the moment it's just for right to work, but in the end I'm sure it'll be linked to more things. Eventually not carrying a smartphone around with you (and all the internet connected sensors that it holds) is going to make you suspicious, when really that should be the norm or baseline.

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