Privacy Watchdogs: New Digital ID Systems Feature is ‘Orwellian Nightmare’
A coalition of organizations and privacy experts raised concerns about a new feature of digital identity systems that allows the government to track individuals through documents such as driver’s licenses. The “phone home” functionality is built into identity systems and allows “authorities to track when or where identity is used” when the identity issuer or third party interacts with the user’s app, said a Monday statement by the coalition, which included the American Civil Liberties Union.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Privacy Daily provides accurate coverage of newsworthy developments in data protection legislation, regulation, litigation, and enforcement for privacy professionals responsible for ensuring effective organizational data privacy compliance.
“We are concerned that many authorities are unnecessarily (and sometimes unknowingly) adopting identity systems with phone home capabilities,” the statement said. “We call on authorities everywhere to favor identity solutions that have no phone home capability whatsoever, and to prioritize privacy and security over interoperability and ease of implementation.”
Though the government has no involvement when a physical driver’s license is shown to prove identity, digital driver's licenses are being built to notify the government each time they are used, said the ACLU's press release. This gives the government a “bird’s-eye view” of where, when and to whom people are showing their identity.
“Creating a system through which the government can track us any time we use our driver’s license is an Orwellian nightmare,” said Jay Stanley, senior policy analyst with the ACLU’s Speech, Privacy, and Technology project. “There is a broad consensus among those who work, think, and innovate in the digital identity space that privacy needs to be built in to any digital identity system. This is not a partisan issue, and it’s one states must act on before it’s too late.”
The 13 organizations that signed on to the statement also included the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT), Electronic Frontier Foundation and Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC). The 74 individuals who signed the statement included public-interest technologist and privacy expert Bruce Schneier, Utah Chief Privacy Officer Christopher Bramwell and Phillip Shoemaker, CEO of identity verification platform Identity.com.