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Instagram Asking For Your Government Issued Photo IDs Now, Too

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Re: Instagram Asking For Your Government Issued Photo IDs Now, Too

#51

Post by ahoyhere »

phillmv wrote: post #37
rglover wrote: post #11

I hate to play the paranoia card, but this reads like a push from the government for Facebook to start cataloging people. If it wasn't happening already, this is probably the missing piece in court evidence to show that a person is who they really are. This is really, really dangerous (especially when the majority of their users probably aren't bright enough to understand the implications).

You mean, they needed something other than your birth date, birth place, real name, current residence, work history, current job, name of your parents, cousins, grandparents, not to mention the rest of your graph, to correlate you to a database somewhere?

The only thing FB has from me that is real or accurate is my birthday. All the other things you listed are either totally false or out of date. (Then again, I don't "friend" my family… IRL or online.)

Until now-ish (or the near future), FB had no way of verifying that, or forcing me to!

Re: Instagram Asking For Your Government Issued Photo IDs Now, Too

#52

Post by FourthProtocol »

rglover wrote: post #22
mistercow wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since they tell you to cover up your license number, it's hard to see how it would be particularly helpful for cataloging.

I'm thinking of a visual catalog. Where if I commit a crime and Facebook can be used as evidence, if one of my photos is my license, it guarantees that it's me. Maybe catalog isn't the right word, but some means for quickly matching a profile to an individual.

It doesn't. Ebay asked me for a scan of my passport a while ago. I changed all of the details, including my name, and they accepted it.

Re: Instagram Asking For Your Government Issued Photo IDs Now, Too

#55

Post by unimpressive »

jivatmanx wrote: post #46
Evbn wrote: post #15

HN, I will be disappointed if by this time tomorrow I don't see "Show HN: government id image generator (no numbers, so it can't be used as an fraudulent ID)" For FB's, they have to excuse from making an open source client side pre-upload number-removing tool.

Terrible idea, you'll likely be a felon for distribution of fraudulent federal Identification. Same for anyone who uses it.

This. Plus, if the service your using wants your ID, theres no point trying to trick it. Supporting them is like drinking poison then stomach pumping a few ounces of it and leaving the rest.

Re: Instagram Asking For Your Government Issued Photo IDs Now, Too

#56

Post by largesse »

vonmoltke wrote: post #32
MichaelGG wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like FB or not (I don't), it provides a lot of value to a lot of people. While it might not promote the ideals some of us "hacker" types have, on the whole, it is not flat-out evil like, say, some of those toolbar companies or botnet groups. Additionally, apart from writing in PHP, there must be tons of technical fun and deep problems to solve that makes FB fairly unique. And also, I'm not really sure how unethical i…

In addition to that, they do some good for the larger community, such as starting the Open Compute Project ( http://www.opencompute.org/ ). That effort is what has me considering Facebook as a next career step (I would love to work on that stuff). Now, this is not an attempt to defend Facebook's actions here or in their other recent efforts. I am merely providing another point of evidence to support MichaelGG's point…

Yes, I know all of that but weighed against the new social graph search and (what appears to me) to be a disingenuous and constantly shifting privacy policy, it isn't much.

Re: Instagram Asking For Your Government Issued Photo IDs Now, Too

#57

Post by arankine »

rachelbythebay wrote: post #21
largesse wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have friends who work at Facebook. I still don't know how they rationalize their employment.

I don't know about them, but I know someone from a different company who has it all figured out. Every time their company does something nasty, they just donate to the EFF. Must be nice to have it wrapped up all tidy like.

Conscience offsetting.

Re: Instagram Asking For Your Government Issued Photo IDs Now, Too

#58

Post by tsieling »

rglover wrote: post #11

I hate to play the paranoia card, but this reads like a push from the government for Facebook to start cataloging people. If it wasn't happening already, this is probably the missing piece in court evidence to show that a person is who they really are. This is really, really dangerous (especially when the majority of their users probably aren't bright enough to understand the implications).

The government has that information. This is an attack by Facebook on the idea that you control your identity, or that you can have identity outside the confines of a private company over which you have no power.

Re: Instagram Asking For Your Government Issued Photo IDs Now, Too

#59

Post by amirmc »

technoslut wrote: post #27
ForFreedom wrote: post #24

If social networks are so adamant, I will just create my website have all relatives and friends contact me via the said website. Or may be by email before social networks actually caught up.

This is the way it should be done. I will say that social networks like Facebook have introduced some interesting dynamics and engagement that could have not existed otherwise such as Caine's Arcade. I think we're all waiting for the social network we all want and pay the $10-$12/year for privacy, transparency and complete ownership over our data.

The problem will be getting everyone onto that network. Although I now understand (and value) privacy and data ownership, there was a time when I'd refuse to pay for anything if there was a free alternative.

I'm currently working on distributed systems/networks which could form the basis of a 'social graph' but there are questions about how to make it profitable (hence self-sustaining). Getting people onto a network is only part of the problem.

Re: Instagram Asking For Your Government Issued Photo IDs Now, Too

#60

Post by harshreality »

jivatmanx wrote: post #46
Evbn wrote: post #15

HN, I will be disappointed if by this time tomorrow I don't see "Show HN: government id image generator (no numbers, so it can't be used as an fraudulent ID)" For FB's, they have to excuse from making an open source client side pre-upload number-removing tool.

Terrible idea, you'll likely be a felon for distribution of fraudulent federal Identification. Same for anyone who uses it.

If you're generating them with blacked-out DL number and address, that's not really a fake identification card, is it? Not to mention you'd be generating an image, not an actual ID. Creating real-looking ID cards is much more difficult than creating real-looking ID card scans.

The most difficult elements would probably be faking the font, and post-processing it to ensure the text looked real (pixel-perfect accuracy and color for text would be a dead giveaway of computer generation).

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