The New Dark Age

As we know, Digital ID has NOT gone away!

The government’s “consultation” on Digital ID closes in less than a week (deadline 12.30pm, Tuesday 5 May).

-> You can complete the consultation HERE

-> You can also read our guide to completing it HERE

Why Your Response Still Matters

Let’s be honest: consultations are often used to rubber-stamp decisions already made, but there’s one very good reason to respond anyway:

If you don’t respond, it’s even easier for them to pretend there’s no opposition.

“Un-personing”? What the Consultation Reveals

The consultation on digital ID is about “how” not “whether” the government will introduce digital ID in Britain.

This shows that, despite overwhelming opposition, the Starmer government is still intent on pushing ahead with its unwanted, undemocratic scheme.

(Of course, we argue the Digital ID project must be scrapped – completely! – and are working hard every day to make that happen, like with our Four Nations rallies – Edinburgh pictured at top of this email.

Please join us as a member today, so we can keep organising and campaigning against digital ID as strongly as possible.)

The Power to Revoke Your Identity

One of the biggest alarm bells in the consultation comes with the comment that “the government may also have the power to revoke (i.e. cancel) someone’s digital ID“.

Remember we are presumably talking about a centralised database, in which the information about you held by different government departments and bodies is automatically linked – hence the promise of a “single sign-in” and the talk of “convenience”.

What are the implications of your digital ID being “revoked” in the future? Could we be talking full “un-personing?” Locked out of services? Unable to get a job legally? Denied the ability to open a bank account, file a tax return, apply for a driving license, access your pension details or childcare allowance?

Digital ID and Control

The consultation also hints at broader uses.

In its “BritCard” digital ID proposal, the think tank Labour Together suggested it could help tackle “online harms”… which could only really mean via increased surveillance and censorship and/or conditional access to some or all of the internet based on tying identity to expression.

Now, the Labour government, egged on by the Conservatives, have just indicated they intend to pursue a “social media ban” despite the fact another sham consultation of theirs has not even concluded.

“Conveniently,” writes Maya Thomas in The Spectator, “the government’s national digital ID scheme is waiting in the wings. This multi-billion-pound solution in search of a problem may have just found one to solve.”

In other words, digital ID could help enforce censorship laws or any new restrictions a government of the future might introduce. A digital ID could give the government the power to oversee your every action. Remember Covid? Worried by the talk of fuel rationing? Your digital ID could tell the government you’re somewhere you shouldn’t be or that you’ve bought something it doesn’t think you should have.

The consultation also asks whether people should be legally required to inform the authorities of changes. The government asks what timeframe would be appropriate and what punishments should be meted out to those who fail to meet the deadlines.

Terrific! Free labour by us to populate their master database, with fines if we fail to comply. Another convenient way for the state to generate income from us.

Data Risks and Security Concerns

And while the government it is not planning to include your address as part of your digital ID initially, it says it may “review this position in the future”.

Imagine the extent of the data lost in breaches! A recipient would potentially know not only your name and date of birth, but where you lived and what you looked like, as well as the other information – for example, financial – included on the database.

Having all that information gathered at a single point is a honeypot for hackers and other bad actors. The digital ID database in India – the other country Starmer wants to emulate – has suffered one of the world’s biggest data breaches when the personal records of 815 million citizens were put up for sale on the dark web. Another breach of the Indian system exposed the biometric data of 1.1 billion people.

As Together has repeatedly highlighted, the system on which the government plans to build this digital ID is One Login, which whistleblowers say may already be compromised. You can watch our interview with Andrew Orlowski here.

Cost and Feasibility Questions

Meanwhile, the government seems to be expecting the taxpayer to fund its experiment with the nation’s data to the tune of…

No one knows. The government has not costed the scheme, although the Office for Budget Responsibility has published a provisional estimate of £1.8 billion over the next three years.

It seems unlikely that figure is realistic. The costs of grand IT projects tend to spiral: a dozen years ago, the failed NHS IT scheme cost the nation around £12 billion. Tony Blair’s failed ID card scheme in the 2000s created total costs up to £20 billion, according to the London School of Economics.

Risks to the Vulnerable

Meanwhile the consultation suggests totally unrealistic ambitious plans to address the fact that many people in Britain don’t have the digital skills or devices needed for the system they envisage.

The government acknowledges that around four million people in the UK – that’s three times the population of digital ID poster-child Estonia – lack basic digital skills.

To square this daunting circle, it seems to imagine a raft of measures such as training schemes and local support rolled out across the UK, amounting to a kind of “assisted access”, where others help people use digital ID. Just imagine the cost and difficulty of such an enormously labour-intensive project.

Along with vague references to “alternative ways” to access the national digital ID, this should also ring alarm bells in terms of security. Having others “help” particularly older, less tech-savvy and/or vulnerable people with some of their most sensitive personal data can only open up brand new avenues for fraud, identity theft and more.

A Fully Digital Future?

Crucially, there seems to be no place for genuine non-digital alternatives for any reason. The consultation paints a picture of a kind of national digital education programme designed to bring every citizen into the net – whether they like it or not.

This is would be an unacceptable future for British citizens. According to the draft Bill of Rights Together has formulated, non-digital ways to access essential services must be available to all of us as of right.

Make Your Voice Count

Before anything else, it’s vital that as many people as possible respond to this consultation.

Even if the outcome feels predetermined, responses still shape the public record. They show that concerns exist, that opposition is real, and that these issues cannot simply be ignored.

If you haven’t already, please take a few minutes to complete it.