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Comment by pinkmuffinere | Hacker News Reader

The comments here seem to have a negative sentiment towards this project, and I want to understand that better.

I would prefer not to carry ID at all times, but it seems to me that this is a fact of modern life -- in the US at least, ID is indeed required for banking, to get a drivers license, to board planes, etc. Our ID system is ridiculous. A weird combination of SSN's, Drivers license, and Passport are forced into this role, even though they weren't designed for that, and don't do a great job. If Ethiopia builds a _good_ system, I feel that is better than whatever _bad_ system would naturally arise without planning. Am I totally off base here? What am I missing?

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Having a single digital ID that is used for everything makes sense from a technical perspective (less duplication, ambiguity, and need to maintain multiple IDs) but from a privacy perspective it is bad. Effectively everything you do online would be tied to a single comprehensive representation of your identity even if the task that uses the ID doesn't require more than knowing "this is a unique person using this service". If user data is leaked then it is easier to tie every digital service being used by a person together since there is a single ID number used everywhere.

IMO fewer things should require ID (e.g. domestic flights) because it opens up the risk of personal data being leaked or misused for often not much benefit.

But this particular ship has left the barn: everywhere where a real ID is needed, you have to dive your full legal name, and the document's dates and other details, which is easy to correlate with a low chance of error.

Yeah, I really do not think that governments are seriously stymied by the fact that the Amish don't have SSNs or that you only enter your name, DoB, phone, email, address, and state driver's license number to get a bank account instead of a federal ID number. If we really want privacy we need to firmly enshrine this stuff into law instead of slapping random data and hoping that makes privacy invasion too clumsy.

As someone with a bank account in the US, they absolutely do ask you for your SSN now-days.

Hell, even my Japan Post Bank account asked my for my SSN.

There are ways of implementing digital identity that do not require the user to divulge more information than is technically required to the party requesting authentication. This is one of the main benefits of a digital system. With physical IDs, you have to give the other party your entire driver's license/passport/whatever every time, even if they just need to know whether or not you're over 18.

> There are ways of implementing digital identity that do not require the user to divulge more information than is technically required

Yes, but the incentives for increased state power through surveillance are far greater than incentives to increase privacy.

Having a single (government ID) is bad, so instead we hand our personal details over to one of a dozen private companies, none of which has any contract with us, the user, and all of whom happily share it with the (20 or so, in Persona's case) other companies they use to farm out bits and pieces of the identity verification job. Sure this is better.

Meanwhile, I have never had any fraud, scam, identity theft or anything else as a result of, or with any connection to my country's national ID. But I can't avoid also having to hand over my details to private (and foreign to me) companies that only exist because Americans can't get act together.

Srsly.

If you view requiring id for daily tasks as a bad thing, then a more efficient and effective id system would be a bad thing for you.

Ya, I think this is the root of the disagreement. Thanks for putting it so succinctly.

It sounds great until all of an individual's activity online and offline starts being tracked through it, because transactions require a single digital ID (potentially even accessing the internet). And then, when the government decides it doesn't like what you're doing, it's amazingly easy for them to cut off your access to essential services like banking, transportation, etc...

They (any government agency) literally scan your physical ID whenever they need it. How is this materially different to a digital ID being accessed.

Because your physical ID isn't scanned every time you access your bank account, and your bank (hopefully) doesn't check with some central database the government controls before issuing you an account. With a digital ID controlled by your government, that is required for accessing your account on the other hand...

We're not talking about just governments, we're talking about the private sector having to verify a digital identity tied to your biometrics before allowing you to participate in commerce. This is a whole different ball game than having to present a physical ID before being granted access to government services.

The latter is quite normal and the former is extremely dystopian.

> your bank (hopefully) doesn't check with some central database the government controls before issuing you an account.

Hmm... the OFAC SDN and other sanctions lists? Politically exposed persons lists? These are very standard KYC/AML checks.

What about when obtaining a SIM card or internet access? What about when purchasing a bus or train or plane ticket? Do you think you should have to identify yourself with a digital ID to withdraw your own money from your own bank account? Your average citizen isn't on a sanction list or a politically exposed persons list. In a national digital ID system they will be on a list regardless of whether or not they've done anything wrong, and the government can easily block their access if they don't like what they've been doing. Governments should not have this kind of control over the lives of ordinary citizens.

Not to mention the fact that NGOs like the World Bank and the Bill & Melinda Gates foundation are funding this. It's proof that it's more than just nation states that want to implement these digital ID systems. Why should the world bank or Bill Gates have any influence on who can and cannot withdraw their own money?

about the american system- i’ll shoot. i’m a trans american, and i got my passport renewed during the 2nd trump administration. i got one with a name that is… not my legal name or what people call me in my daily life. i also live in a state in the northeast that respects my rights, so i have a drivers license that matches my legal name. this is not the case in all states [1]. a social security number, drivers license and passport all serve different functions (banking, driving, foreign travel), and centralizing all of them increases the blast radius of any abuses. if the second trump administration was in charge of a centralized digital id, they could much worse things to me.

[1] https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/kansas-invalidates-...

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