[Infowarrior] - Is Real ID Really Going to Happen?

[Richard Forno]

Is Real ID Really Going to Happen?
The National Identification Law Was Supposed to Take Effect This Week
By Matthew Blake 05/12/2008

http://www.washingtonindependent.com/view/is-real-id-really

Yesterday, May 11, was when the Real ID Act, signed into law three  
years ago to the day, was due to kick in.

The law set national standards for all state driver's licenses and  
other forms of photo identification. It directs states to store  
people's drivers license information in a database, along with  
additional identity information, like a digital copy of each person's  
birth certificate. The law mandates that all state databases are to be  
linked. By now, every state should have built this database and issued  
Real ID-compliant licenses to all residents.

(Matt Mahurin) But you don't need to worry about these new ID's. The  
law has yet to go into effect.

Little about Real ID has gone as planned. All 50 states, and the  
District of Columbia, were given extensions by the Dept. of Homeland  
Security to comply with Real ID. This extension was given despite the  
fact that 17 states passed resolutions saying they have no intention  
of ever implementing the program.

State governors and legislatures, members of Congress and civil- 
liberties groups have slammed Real ID. They say the program is an  
unfunded mandate and that the federal government should not be in the  
business of directing how states issue identifications in the first  
place. They also argue that the linked databases, complete with  
comprehensive identity information on people from every state, creates  
a "one-stop shop" for identity theft.

Slipped into "must pass" legislation to fund the war in Iraq and help  
victims from the December 2004 Southeast Asian tsunami, Real ID is now  
one of Washington's most maligned policy programs. Sen. Daniel Akaka  
(D-Hawaii) is leading a bipartisan effort in the Senate to repeal the  
law and replace it with recommendations made by the 9/11 Commission.  
The commission recommended that states and civil-liberties groups  
negotiate with the federal government in developing minimum ID  
standards.

So Real ID could be killed, most likely in the next administration.  
It's still not a sure thing that, if implemented, the more modest and  
politically popular 9/11 commission guidelines would strike the right  
balance among state's rights, personal privacy and the need to stop  
identity theft. The broad post-9/11 support for national ID standards  
could turn out to be an unworkable policy in any incarnation.

"I don't think that just because the 9/11 commission said it was a  
good idea necessarily makes its a good idea." said Lee Tien, senior  
staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an advocacy  
group opposed to Real ID.

The "Identification Security Enhancement Act," was introduced last  
year by Akaka, and has since picked up Republican co-sponsors Sen.  
Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and Sen. John Sununu (R-N.H.). It would  
follow suggestions from the 9/11 commission, which concluded that more  
identification requirements were needed because all but one of the  
9/11 hijackers was able to obtain a driver's license. Instead of  
outlining what information should go on a license or be stored in a  
database, the 9/11 Commission said it was best to let states, civil- 
liberties organizations and security experts set up a group to develop  
ID standards.

These recommendations were actually briefly law, after passage in  
December 2004 of the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act.  
In fact, the Dept. of Homeland Security had started to assemble the  
rule-making coalition.

But they were overwritten when Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.), then  
chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, pasted the Real ID Act into  
a 2005 emergency spending bill for the war in Iraq and the Asian  
tsunami. With Real ID, the federal government was now setting  
requirements on state-issued ID's instead of working with states and  
other stakeholders.

"By bringing everyone together," Akaka said at a Senate oversight  
hearing last week that garnered bipartisan criticism of Real ID. "I  
believe that we can address the problems with Real ID and have secured  
drivers licenses faster than through the time frame proposed by DHS's  
final rules."

That time frame for Real ID has already been pushed back twice. The  
original May 11, 2008 deadline has been extended to Dec. 31, 2009. But  
states can request an extension from DHS, to be compliant by 2011. And  
states don't need to issue Real ID's for residents over 50 until  
2017-- nine years after the original deadline.

Critics of Real ID see the extensions as a sign that the Bush  
administration doesn't seriously want to deal with implementation  
problems. "By granting all 50 states waivers, the current  
administration has handed off the issue to the next administration,"  
said Jim Dempsey, policy director at the Center for Democracy and  
Technology, another group against Real ID.

Tim Sparapani, senior legislative counsel for the American Civil  
Liberties Union, argues that DHS has not seriously addressed the need  
to develop technology that can safely store personal ID information on  
a database shared by all 50 states. Sparapani said that the linked  
databases create an appealing target for terrorists, or any identity  
thief.

"If I break into a database in Alabama, I don't just get Alabama  
information." Sparapani said . "I get information from all states." He  
added that the extra identification requirements will give a hacker  
the information to commit identity fraud.

To develop secure databases and issue new licenses, homeland security  
now estimates that Real ID implementation will cost $3.9 billion.  
Sensenbrunner's original estimate was $100 million, and so far  
homeland security has issued just $79.8 million in grants. Congress  
and the administration are reluctant, however, to make up the  
difference.

Part of the reason is that many state legislatures have made clear to  
Washington that they reject Real ID on principle. On the basis of  
state's right and privacy concerns, 17 states have officially  
announced they won't comply with Real ID, even if the money were  
available.

DHS, nonetheless, granted compliance extensions even to those states,  
saying that they are working to meet national security standards.  
"Whatever their motivations may be, states are taking measures toward  
the path of Real ID compliance," said Russ Knocke, a spokesman for DHS.

Critics of Real ID pointed out that DHS had little choice. "Being at  
DHS is not an easy job," said Tien, at the Electronic Frontier  
Foundation. "Congress has given them a stinky bill that they now have  
to make look workable."

Repealing Real ID then, through the Akaka bill, has better prospects  
under a new administration that might give homeland security a clean  
slate. "It's a political rule that nobody creates controversy during  
an election year," said Jim Harper, director of information policy  
studies at the libertarian Cato institute, "But we'll probably see it  
introduced again with a high likelihood of passage in December 2009,  
when states can apply for an additional extension."

Like Tien, Harper is uncertain whether Akaka's bill with the 9/11  
commission recommendations is a good thing. "It's obviously an  
improvement," he said. But Harper added he prefers "pushing aside Real  
ID to create a new post-9/11 conversation."

Some proponents of federal ID standards say that civil libertarians  
would create opposition to any kind of baseline ID requirement. "When  
Americans think up about national ID cards, it drives them up the  
wall," said Amitai Etzioni, director at the Institute of Communitarian  
Studies at George Washington University. "Even after 9/11, they think  
of it as totalitarian."

Along with never satisfying privacy advocates, Etizioni said that the  
negotiated rule-making called for by the 9/11 commission is wrong to  
expect that all 50 states could get on the same page. "If you  
negotiate with the states," he said, "each will have their own ideas."

But many Real ID critics do see the Akaka bill as a pragmatic  
solution. "There is a certain amount of national leadership needed to  
bring all the states up to certain minimum standards," said Dempsey,  
at the Center for Democracy and Technology. "Negotiated rule-making  
with state and local officials and privacy advocates is the right  
approach."

The Real ID Act was added onto a bill with no public debate on whether  
it effectively combated terrorism and identity theft. Almost all sides  
now talk about wanting Congress and the next administration to discuss  
the pitfalls of national standards, before killing, keeping or  
revising Real ID.

"I'm hopeful that Real ID will collapse under the weight of everyone's  
lack of enthusiasm," said Tien. "The real question is what comes next."