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Switzerland votes against electronic ID system provided by private companies

swissinfo.ch

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Re: Switzerland votes against electronic ID system provided by private companies

#271

Post by IG_Semmelweiss »

tchalla wrote: post #256
nickez wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Sweden we have a company running the ID system and that works fine. The company is coowned by all the large banks afaik. I was really surprised at how far behind Switzerland is compared to Scandinavia when it comes to digitalisation. Being able to handle my life hassle free online instead of going to physical places (like post office, banks, gov office) is liberating. I also get all my bills digitally and all my r…

Are you willing to give up your privacy to corporates to be liberated online?

most importantly, what about those that are not ? Is that decision made without their consent ?

Re: Switzerland votes against electronic ID system provided by private companies

#272

Post by vinay427 »

jeofken wrote: post #240
zorked wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It has its advantages and disadvantages. It is also the political system that caused this: "In 1991 following a decision by the Federal Supreme Court of Switzerland, Appenzell Innerrhoden (AI) became the last Swiss canton to grant women the vote on local issues." Notice how it was a court decision, not a result of the political process. I'd say 1991 is a bit too late to have full voting rights for women. https://en.w…

How can you so sure that your ideal is how they should live? What I admire about the Swiss is how they live and let live - they may disagree with the neighbour, but let them be.

Granting the right to vote is a bit of a different ballgame because it's a meta-question. Not consulting women (or just everyone, or all citizens, or all adult citizens, etc.) on this issue indicates, to me, that the will of all people concerned in AI was not even considered. There is no consensus in AI to disagree with, from this perspective.

Re: Switzerland votes against electronic ID system provided by private companies

#273

Post by yawaworht1978 »

nokya wrote: post #183
chrisseaton wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> those aren't opinion polls What do you think a referendum is, if not a poll of the population's opinion on something? My answer to your question is to look at their actual positive impact all around the world, including for Islamic countries, not their opinions on architecture or dress. I literally don't think there's a more peaceful, welcoming, open-to-others' cultures anywhere in the world than the Swiss. If you…

As a Swiss citizen (my age range is 40-50), I can only provide my own witness account about what you just wrote: I think you're completely wrong. The fact that some Swiss were able to contribute immensely to a "positive impact all around the world" doesn't magically turn us into a nice and warm population, open to other people's cultures. A large part of the population hates foreigners, considers them as opportunists…

This is a honest and candid review. People think the country with the highest standards of living is a wholly charitable entity. Ask the first generation Italians. Or Turkish. Or Sri Lankans. Albanians. Former Yugoslavs. Some 50% of German immigrants , notabene with the same education and language(minus the dialect) leave this alleged paradise within 1 year.

Same language, same education. Now add a different skin color to that and lack of speaking the language to that, then you might be able to grasp how these people felt there.

Of course there are some die hard open minded people there, not enough, though.

Sounds like I have nothing good to say about Switzerland? There are good aspects, I just blow a head gasket every time a person who has not lived there from early on and dealt with the institutions or does not have relatives there thinks it is a nation of innocence , milk(this is true, though) and honey. People are less likely to be beat up by a racist mob, that is not how it is done in Switzerland. The Swiss are silent sufferers and more sophisticated than that.

I simply think that classist amd racists are the blindest people walking earth.

Plenty of those in Switzerland. Ps even that direct democracy is a crock of manure.

A wise man once told me, the Nazis the communists amd other such opportunists ....in Switzerland they will have a smile and wear a suit.

Re: Switzerland votes against electronic ID system provided by private companies

#274

Post by yawaworht1978 »

cmehdy wrote: post #74
esja wrote: post #8

Quite a few people who voted against this did so purely because they didn’t want private companies controlling the system. If the proposal had been for the government to issue and control the identities, it may well have passed.

Which makes a lot of sense in Switzerland, since "the government is the people" is more true than in the overwhelming majority of countries on Earth. Pragmatic take from the Swiss as usual :) (said by a jealous French citizen)

Mon ami ne crois pas tout ce que tu entends.

Re: Switzerland votes against electronic ID system provided by private companies

#275

Post by IG_Semmelweiss »

wombatmobile wrote: post #55

Switzerland has an awesome electoral system [1]. Instead of being ruled by a president or a prime minister who can be polarising, divisive, or selective, Switzerland has an Executive Council. The 7 member Executive Council is composed of the top 7 candidates from each election. The chairperson of the executive council rotates each year, so that the top 4 vote winners each get a turn at being chairperson. This means t…

i disagree wholeheartedly in that it is more cooperative. Switzerland is anything but cooperative.

But that's what makes this country so great. We take our divisions, within cantons, and leverage them for positive externalities to (accidentally) benefit the greater good.

In CH, every very canton sets their own citizenship policy. Its not a coincidence. Did you hear about the woman that's been living in Zug, and been denied citizenship for years? Why? Because she's annoying. She doesn't respect her neighbor's customs. That's literally why. Yes! Our canton can't even agree between about who can be a citizen, and who may not! But we argue far more... and it won't make the papers. We argue about the standard size of doors, whether we can vote electronically, whether a free trade agreement with andorra should be allowed. Etc etc

This means, big project ambitions get cut down to size, and few grand things if any, get done at the federal level. But this is glorious: it is very hard for regulations to become calcified within the state apparatus.

So, while spain sends soldiers to die in Afghanistan, or the UK wastes decades of development on a grand EU project, or US citizens get spied on by their own govt via Patriot Act.... CH is just sitting pretty, doing its thing. Arguing about every little detail to exhaustion.

The best thing that could happen to us, is to remain just as we are. I welcome the next 800 years of peace and economic development.

Re: Switzerland votes against electronic ID system provided by private companies

#276

Post by dheera »

KirillPanov wrote: post #177
dheera wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My best solution right now is a UPS box, which gives you a proper street address. Most places that ask for utility bills will accept a phone bill or insurance bill or some such which you can have arranged to be sent to that address. I'd be interested to know if there are similar services that are cheaper and ideally less well-known than UPS but equally reliable. Delivery to my real address with the ability to trust t…

> My best solution right now is a UPS box, which gives you a proper street address. USPS maintains a very immaculately curated list of CMRAs (Commercial Mail Receiving Agents). It's not hard because they need to register with USPS in order to receive mail on behalf of customers who pay them for mail-receiving service. USPS is allowed to deny them mail delivery if they refuse to register, and does. Every place that wa…

> buying an uninhabitable toxic dump is actually cheaper

Considering I'm in the bay area, land alone is actually expensive here so that doesn't really work. Is there any way to buy this unhabitable dump in a remote area and have the mail picked up and delivered to me? Are there any businesses doing this?

Re: Switzerland votes against electronic ID system provided by private companies

#277

Post by AnthonyMouse »

nickez wrote: post #70
esja wrote: post #8

Quite a few people who voted against this did so purely because they didn’t want private companies controlling the system. If the proposal had been for the government to issue and control the identities, it may well have passed.

In Sweden we have a company running the ID system and that works fine. The company is coowned by all the large banks afaik. I was really surprised at how far behind Switzerland is compared to Scandinavia when it comes to digitalisation. Being able to handle my life hassle free online instead of going to physical places (like post office, banks, gov office) is liberating. I also get all my bills digitally and all my r…

> Being able to handle my life hassle free online instead of going to physical places (like post office, banks, gov office) is liberating.

The US has an incoherent assemblage of spare parts for an ID system and it's been years since I've seen the inside of a physical bank.

You have bank credentials and use them with with the bank. You have post office credentials and use them with the post office. This is far better from a security and privacy standpoint that any kind of centralized ID. If someone steals your post office credentials they can't drain your brokerage account, ransomware your employer's cloud services in your name and take out a home equity loan against your house and convert it into Bitcoin.

Centralized identity is a bug, not a feature.

Re: Switzerland votes against electronic ID system provided by private companies

#278

Post by sologoub »

vinay427 wrote: post #269
oumua_don17 wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AFAIK, Switzerland is the only country with direct democracy or ‘Govt is the people’. As you said overwhelming majority, are there any countries that have direct democracy or come close?

California (not a country, obviously) is otherwise virtually comparable with Switzerland in this respect. Full constitutional amendments and legislative vetoes can occur via referendum. EDIT: In practice, larger cities in California seem to have a comparable number of referendums as well. Unfortunately, they're all bundled into an election every 1-2 years rather than the Swiss system of elections every 3-4 months. Th…

Not familiar with the Swiss system, but CA system has some interesting nuances - laws enacted as approved propositions cannot be modified at all, except by another approved proposition. In theory, that protects them from legislative overwriting/meddling, but also does not allow to fix unintended consequences. Here’s an example where a proposition was needed to authorize state legislature to make modifications to an older proposition: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_California_Proposition_7

And of course, CA still has daylight savings time because this proposition required two thirds vote.

Re: Switzerland votes against electronic ID system provided by private companies

#279

Post by AnthonyMouse »

Ericson2314 wrote: post #51
esja wrote: post #8

Quite a few people who voted against this did so purely because they didn’t want private companies controlling the system. If the proposal had been for the government to issue and control the identities, it may well have passed.

Yes, and that's a good thing. Balkanizing ID info between a gazillion government databases as we do in the US just creates inefficiency, and raises the thirst for more intensive surveillance to counter the inefficiency with which the data is used. (Consider the talk after 9/11 on the FBI and CIA not sharing info, and then we get the Patriot Act.)

> Balkanizing ID info between a gazillion government databases as we do in the US just creates inefficiency

It improves security through the reduction in the scope of harm and eliminating single points of failure. If someone compromises your Candy Crush login they can't drain your bank account.

> and raises the thirst for more intensive surveillance to counter the inefficiency with which the data is used. (Consider the talk after 9/11 on the FBI and CIA not sharing info, and then we get the Patriot Act.)

Your argument in favor of centralized ID is that otherwise nefarious spies will lobby in favor of something equivalent to centralized ID so they can correlate everything? That's the argument against it.

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