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Comment by csb6 | Hacker News Reader

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.

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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.

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