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Friday, June 10, 2005 · [errrr? -mm]

telegraph

Alternative ID card costs 10 times less than the government version
By David Harrison
(Filed: 05/06/2005)

An identity card scheme that costs just £30 per person - compared with £300
per person under the Government's proposals - will be unveiled this week.

The plan, drawn up by the London School of Economics after six months of
research, would also limit the Government's access to information on the
card to a few basic details - while the Government wants to hold much more
personal information on a national database.

Sounds good doesnt it? But wait....

The LSE's proposals will reignite the debate over compulsory ID cards just
before the Government's Bill introducing the cards has its second reading
in the Commons later this month.

A 180-page LSE report says that its proposals would satisfy the need for a
national ID card to help to combat identity fraud and illegal working and
allay fears that the right to privacy would be seriously undermined by a
"Big Brother" state.

Error. The "need for a national ID card to help combat identity fraud and illegal working" is a FALSE need. Identity fraud when it comes to private transactions is a private matter, and has nothing to do with the state. It is not the state's job to guarantee identity, any more than it is to guarantee a private bank loan. Illegal working will not be stopped by the issuing of a card, any more than any other crime will be stopped by the issuing of a card. The principle behind this card is wrong, full stop. There are many ways that you could roll out a card that was cheaper and less invasive, but this is not the point. The point is that these cards are not British, and free people would never consent to being compelled to enroll for one or carry one.

The report says that the scheme, would reduce the overall cost of ID cards
to £2.25 billion, a fraction of the £12-18 billion that the LSE says the
Government's scheme will cost.

Even if the scheme costs a total of one pound it should be rejected outright. Lets say that capital punishment was to be reiintroduced to the UK. The fact that it might cost millions to set it all up could be used as an argument against bringing it back, but even if it only cost one pound to kill each prisoner, would that make it right to bring back the death penalty? These sorts of straw man argument are beneath the LSE one would have thought.

Under the proposals, the Government would have access to only a few details
- the holder's name, date of birth and photograph, plus an encrypted card
number and a unique "national identification number".

???? Looks like someone at the LSE skipped their computer literacy classes! Once you have a "national identification number" in a government database you by default have the framework to create any type of invasive database you like in the future. It would be trivial to harvest other databases where this NIN was quoted and then to attach this information to the record of an individual. For example,  your medical records would be referenced by your NIN. This would mean that HMG could attach these records to your database entry without any effort at all. The same goes for your bank details, any money transfers you make, and basically, anywhere that you have to show your ID card. Ask any american how many times they have to divulge their SSN; the places that it is demanded are astonishingly varied, from grocery stores to, well, anywhere you have to fill out a form.

As we said in our outline for a more secure passport, there is no need for a centralized database; this is the fantasy of the computer illiterate. The only need here is to ensure that the document is issued correctly, and that it is signed with a signing key that belongs to a trusted issuing authority. Then, whenever the authenticity of that document needs to be checked, you only need to check the signature and nothing else. Checking against a central register is simply not needed to authenticate a document; you distribute the public key of the signing authority to everyone and they can us their own bespoke equipment/software to check if your docs are good or not.

The scheme would be more acceptable to the public because it gives
individuals the right to decide whether to store any other information on
the cards, according to the report.

This is a lie. It is the information stored on other databases that is the problem, not what is stored on the card itself, that is the problem. It's almost as if no one either at the LSE or The Telegraph understands that data is transferrable and storable. You could have a card that stores nothing at all, being merely an ID with your number on it, and it would still be a threat, because you are compelled either by law or denial of service to show it, meaning that the number and your name, and the service you got are stored somewhere, to be copied to somewhere elese, totally out of your control, forever. If everyone understood this, they would find if most un-acceptable.

The Government's ID cards Bill faces strong opposition from many
Conservatives, Liberal Democrats and rebellious Labour backbenchers
struggling to explain to their constituents why, in the words of one rebel,
"we should spend £18 billion on ID cards when our local school has no money
for books".

Why stop there? There is money for lots of bad things - where is it all coming from? But I digress...

Opponents are concerned about the cost of the project - which the Treasury
says has to be "self-financing" - and about loss of privacy and fears that
a future government could misuse the data.

A future untrustworthy government, unlike this currently trustworthy one.

The LSE report is highly critical of the Government's plans, describing
them as "a potential danger to the public interest and to the legal rights
of individuals".

They got this part right.

The technology envisioned for the Government's scheme is "largely untested
and unreliable" and would need expensive security measures, particularly as
private and public sector organisations would have access to it, the report
says.

And this part, but they do not go far enough. Obviously these people have never heard about warez or understood just how much music is out there freely circulating, or used one of the many webservices that can find details on any american like google finds anything. No amount of legislation will stop the flow of this information into the hands of identity thievs, just as we have seen recently with the mass appropriations of credit card details and the raids on Nexis Lexis. Then of course, there are the insider jobs where an employee makes a DVDR of the entire database and then sells it, as we saw with the guy who worked for AOL. Go Google it all for yourself.

The LSE claims that its scheme is cheaper and more secure. Prof Patrick
Dunleavy, a member of the LSE's ID card advisory group, said: "This is as
small, robust and cost-effective an ID card as anybody could get away with
in the world we live in today.

No, you fail it; our sytem is better, works without a centralized database, uses the existing passport infrastructure, and, to satisfy the LSE exitement for economic models, creates a whole software and hardware industry based around verifying these public key signatures.

"The card will work better than the Government's scheme because people will
want to use it. It is also more secure because the cards will carry much
less information so there will be fewer problems if they are lost."

Once again, this is nonsense. "It will work better because people will want to use it" is just an assertion. It is not "more secure" because the cards carry less information; all carrying less information means is that you have less to loose, but in this case, because you are carrying "the essentials" on your person, which are enough for any transaction, you are still extremely vulnerable. Even if your card only had a number on it, since you are compelled to produce it to do anything, if you loose it, you are in big trouble until you can get it replaced. The 'L' in LSE doesn't stand for 'Logic' clearly. But you know this. 

Prof Ian Angell, the head of the LSE's Department of Information Systems,
and also a member of the advisory group, said that any identity card system
should be built "on the basis of public trust rather than compulsion and
coercion. An ID system will only work if it is supported by all citizens".

Thats an interesting idea; an ID card built on public trust. That instantly means that the government should  be taken out of the equation. It also means that a public key crypto system should be at the heart of it. It means that you should have the choice of what type of info you want on it, which could be just your photo and name alone, for example. People already have to  be vouched for when they apply for a passport; this could be extended so that only people who are already in the system (as in are British) can sign your key at a post office with their own key. The web of trust would be that of people who vouch for each other, but without the third party being HMG. Now that is an interesting idea. But then again, there is nothing to stop your local video store and anywhere else for that matter, demanding that you show ID before you get service, and that is the central problem of these systems, being forced to identify youreslf when there is no need for it. Our system is marginally better because you are able to change the number (the hash) that identifies you regularly, but it doesnt eliminate the central problem at all. Great for passport security however, where it should be used and licenced from us. :o

The Government's proposals had "fatal weaknesses", he said. "The system
outlined in the Bill will be insecure and costly. Our new blueprint
addresses these problems by creating a system based on proven technology
and citizen control. We want this to be the subject of as public debate."

A lie. There is no 'citizen control' over databases harvesting your card info every time you use it. Every time your card is swiped, you cannot tell where the swipe is being stored. This is a fact that eliminates 'citizen control' completely. The only way to guarantee citizen control is to not have an ID card at all.

Under the government scheme all citizens would have to register for an ID
card at one of about 70 regional centres. Details they would have to
disclose could include bank accounts, proof of residency and address, birth
certificate, passport number, NHS number, National Insurance number and a
credit reference number.

Unless they refuse to register of course, just like the Poll Tax.

In the LSE's model, individuals will have to provide only a few details,
but their application forms would have to be endorsed by three referees - a
doctor, lawyer, teacher or police officer for example - who have known the
applicant for a long time.

Well done.

Crucially, the referees will have to include a professional identity detail
- such as a doctor's or JP's registration number or police number - to
deter fraudulent applications and hold them accountable.

Indeed.

To obtain the card under the LSE scheme an applicant would go to a job
centre, post office or other authorised centre. There he or she would enter
an electronic kiosk that takes a digital photograph and embeds it into the
coded application form.

Once endorsed by the referees, the form is handed in at a post office where
the applicant chooses a biometric test - fingerprint or iris scan - for
extra security. When the card is ready, the test and photograph are used to
confirm that the card is handed over to the right person.

At this point the card is still inactive. The holder then takes it to a
"trusted third party" - a bank or post office for example - where the
applicant is well known. There a copy of the data is taken and stored
securely.

'Stored Securely' Hmmm. How many times have you been into your bank (which runs WindozeNT) and been told 'the system's down'. Have you seen the new stamp printing system used by the Royal Mail? It is beyond absurd. Paper stickers are not fed into the printers by a roll, but are fed manually one by one with small sheets that hold two stamps each. The paper is fed through in one direction, and then it needs to be removed and then inserted in the reverse direction to print a subsequent stamp.

No one with any sense would entrust their fingerprints to these people; they can't even deliver mail efficiently. And in any case, none of this addresses the concept of having to be fingerprinted like a criminal just so that you can transact with at third party. That is totally unnaceptable. Period.

The card is then connected to the Government's temporary file. If the codes
match the card is validated and all data is deleted from the government
file apart from the name, code and card number.

This step is not needed of course, and is only there to placate HMG.

The holder then has a secure card with a secret code, back-up held by the
third party, and a minimum of data is held by the Government.

You don't need to have backups of your data held anywhere, other than a duplicate card which you should take away with you and keep safe; then, if you need a replacement card, under our system, all you need to to is present that card have the signature verified and then you can be issued with a new one.  All of these problems of couse dissapear  once you accept that having an ID card is a bad idea in the first place.

The LSE says that this "localised" scheme is much more secure than the
Government's because the data, apart from a few details, is spread out
among thousands of "trusted third parties" and not contained in one central
database. "There is no master key," a spokesman said.

This is nonsense, and more computer illiteracy. If you NIN is connected to all the various bits of information, they will be collated into a central place, either in a private DB or by HMG. This is a byproduct of the nature of data; these NIN are magnetic; they attract the data that they are connected to; they desire completeness. And of course, the more people have these detals the LESS secure the sytem is.

The LSE should have submitted this proposal to peer review, so that these schoolboy howlers could be removed before publication. But then again, it's all moot. ID cards are a bad idea, and it is the social aspects that cannot be engineered away that make it so wrong.