[Infowarrior] - Forno/Schneier Op-Ed on REAL ID

[Richard Forno]

National ID card a disaster in the making

By Richard Forno and Bruce Schneier

http://news.com.com/National+ID+card+a+disaster+in+the+making/2010-7348_3-61
80835.html

Story last modified Thu May 03 04:00:04 PDT 2007

Six years into the "new normal" of terror alerts, identification checks,
electronic surveillance, and increasing levels of secrecy-based security,
the prospect of a national identification card needs serious public debate.

In March, the Department of Homeland Security released its long-awaited
guidance document regarding national implementation of the Real ID program,
as part of its post-9/11 national security initiatives. It is perhaps quite
telling that despite bipartisan opposition, Real ID was buried in a 2005
"must-pass" military spending bill and enacted into law without public
debate or congressional hearings.

DHS has maintained that the Real ID concept is not a national identification
database. While it's true that the system is not a single database per se,
this is a semantic dodge; according to the DHS document, Real ID will be a
collaborative data-interchange environment built from a series of
interlinking systems operated and administered by the states. In other
words, to the Department of Homeland Security, it's not a single database
because it's not a single system. But the functionality of a single database
remains intact under the guise of a federated data-interchange environment.

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http://news.com.com/National+ID+card+a+disaster+in+the+making/2010-7348_3-61
80835.html