The concept of a national ID card is more than a concept in Great Britian now. Alpha Patriot looks at how the National ID is looming there and notes some of the questions in this debate…which eventually could be held in this country as well.
He asks a slew of questions about abuse on a large scale…and small scale:
Of course there will be official abuse: it is a sociological maxim that information captured will be information abused. Abuse by government officials and friends of the government will happen from time to time, engendering a great sound and fury of outrage by the out-of-power party of the moment, after which the gathering of additional information will continue.
But the abuse on a small scale will be unimaginably damaging. Imagine the cop living down the street being able to look at your personal information. Imagine someone in your PTA or Lions Club being able to call up everything about you and your family. Imagine the parents of the kid that your kid has asked to a dance being able to investigate you on such a personal level.
Don’t think it won’t happen? It has already happened here. Low-level IRS personnel were caught calling up information about their neighbors just a few years ago. In town after town, cops with access to arrest records have been using it for personal information or even personal gain time after time.
Furthermore, the impact of abuse will grow over time because the information gathered will grow over time.
And then there’s this:
Now imagine a potential employer being able to see your work history, medical history, financial history, perhaps even DNA information that could point out genetic predisposition for everything from depression to criminal activity. Don’t think it can happen? Forget that your neighbor could easily supplement his income by doing a little research on you for someone. What if the potential employer was the government?
He asks some other questions then ends with this (and The Moderate Voice agrees):
Do you really trust the government with all your information? Do you trust them to not screw it (and your life) up? Do you trust them to keep it secure?
I don’t. I won’t.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.