Well, really!

No Brown ID?

Jack Straw, 'campaign' manager for the man who would be king, is apparently in line to be Home Secretary (again) when Reid steps down as Blair's NuLab project finally collapses on 27 June. According to the Guardian, Jack has hinted that the ID card fiasco might be reviewed under a Brown premiership.

While the former home secretary has been supportive in public, leaked papers have made clear that he repeatedly opposed the idea in cabinet... "I will continue to urge strongly that this issue be shelved," he told his cabinet colleagues on September 24 that year [2003].

The estimated cost of the scheme is now around £6 billion, although the £510m cost of registering Britons living abroad has been offloaded to the Foreign Office budget to keep the official estimate looking better. But Gordon's eye for numbers would surely be attracted by "six billions", as he likes to say it, if he could say he was moving some of it to the NHS.

ID Cards Might Show Profit

ID Cards Might Show a Profit... for Liam Byrne, the Minister for Immigration at the Home Office. Not just a "former IT consultant", as I suggested earlier, but a major shareholder in E-Government Solutions Ltd, which provides IT solutions to the public sector and has contracts with eight police forces, according to the Mail.

"Mr Byrne founded E-Government Solutions in 2000, four years after working as a senior adviser to Mr Blair in Downing Street."

Naturally it would make sense (for him) to promote the use of smaller IT firms for the ID Card project rather than placing all the work with a mega corporation.

Hat tip: Blairwatch

A New Spin for ID Cards

As the Labour Party Conference gets under way in Manchester, a Government minister attempts to spin its unpopular and intrusive ID Card proposals in a better light. They won't be any less intrusive, but they might be cheaper.

How much cheaper? The Home Office won't say. After all, this is surely just an attempt to make the scheme sound less unacceptable, in case there are any critical debates during Conference.

According to the Beeb, Home Office Minister and former IT consultant Liam Byrne told a fringe meeting that he has undertaken a full-scale review of the controversial scheme in recent months. He said he was wary of taking a "big bang" approach. Which is what everyone else in the industry has been saying for ages.

"There are opportunities which give me optimism to think that actually there is a way of exploiting systems already in place in a way which brings down the costs quite substantially," Byrne said. He was speaking after Roger Smith, director of human rights group Justice, urged the government to use the current "lull" in the project to scale down the plans.

Was Liam Byrne speaking for himself or for the Home Office when he added:

"Ultimately, in today's world, unless we can prove to a sceptical public informed by a 24 hour news cycle that we have got those checks [on the security of the system] in place then people won't use it and its purpose will be undermined."

ID? Here's My Card

We're told that ID Cards are essential. Blair says we need them to track terrorists (but he doesn't understand the technology, and why it won't track terrorists). The Home Office says we need them to prevent identity theft (but they're not listening to industry experts who say that they won't). The DWP says we need them to eliminate Benefit fraud (but they'll just make life more complicated for people who really don't need any more complication in their lives).

These things are going to cost a lot of money. Not just what the Government spends to make the cards and set up its vast, unwieldy and potentially unreliable database and communications network, but also the cost of equipping the world and his wife with fingerprint and iris scanners, which Hard Working Families will pay for through their bank charges, less interest from their building society accounts and higher prices in the shops.

Yet the ID enthusiasts are making little effort to tell us how cards will affect our everyday lives. The Identity and Passport Service has just three simplified examples on its website: Proving your Age, Collecting a Parcel, and Transferring Money. Big deal. And the most complex of these raises more questions than it answers [I'll blog about those issues later].

What we need – if this scheme goes ahead – is legislation that will compel service providers to accept the card as the only necessary proof of ID. Otherwise we are going to remain in the current absurd situation in which even hiring a white van requires a passport, driving licence and a few utility bills (plus a photo of me on the hire company's webcam, last time I hired one). If the card is as good as they say it will be, it must be accepted everywhere as full and final proof of identity. Would they dare?

GB to Profit from ID

You don't know what to believe these days. At the beginning of July the Indy was saying:

The Treasury is launching its own study into the cost of identity cards amid growing signs that Gordon Brown may abandon the scheme if he becomes Prime Minister.

Then this morning the Sunday Times reported a leaked Home Office memo suggesting the scheme could operate at a profit if they charge £8 every time someone wants to make a change, for example to record a change in name, marital status or address, which we'd be obliged to do:

According to the leaked document, which emerged after Blair spoke in defence of the scheme, these charges will enable ID cards to raise as much as £1.5 billion a year in revenue for the Treasury.

The Sunday Times added:

Blair said that whatever the technical issues, it would be "a major plank of Labour’s manifesto at the next election"... The move was interpreted as an attempt by Blair to bind Gordon Brown, his likely successor, to the scheme. It is acknowledged in Whitehall that Brown and the Treasury have reservations about the project.

But now the Indy reports that Gordon Brown is considering exploiting the commercial potential of the ID Card scheme to fund a massive expansion of the programme:

The Chancellor, far from being sceptical about the proposed identity card and database, is exploring a range of private-sector applications. He is said to be convinced that biometric ID schemes will be introduced by the private sector, regardless of government decisions.

Standardising the official ID card and any commercial schemes would drive down the cost and enable greater data sharing between police and firms. For example, police could be alerted as soon as a wanted person used a biometric-enabled cash card or even entered a building via an iris-scan door.

So not only will we face ever increasing and ultimately unbearable intrusion into every aspect of our once private lives, but that encroachment will be fuelled by Government greed as much as by their control freakery.

UPDATE: John Lettice has a decent and deeper analysis of this "daft" plan in The Register.

ID Cards "Opaque and Muddled"

The Commons Science and Technology Committee has reported on the progress of the Home Office's ID Card scheme and expressed "disappointment" with its lack of transparency. It identifies confusion among suppliers, limited consultation and a lack of confidence in the "wider community". It complains of an "inconsistent approach" to scientific evidence, and says choices regarding biometric technology have been made before trials have even started. The Committee is "sceptical about the validity of costs produced at this stage", and notes the danger of cost ceilings driving the choice of technology.

It would be a damning report on a modest project, let alone one that will – if it goes ahead – affect the lives and pockets of every person in the country for decades. The Committee's full conclusions and recommendations are available here, the main index here.

The report confirms that critical technical decisions have been made far too quickly for political reasons by ministers who don't understand the issues and can't be bothered to listen to proper independent advice from people who do. As long ago as January 2004 the prestigious Institution of Engineering and Technology (then The Institution of Electrical Engineers) warned the Home Affairs Committee:

The UK government’s National Identity Card Scheme will fail unless the requirements for the project are formalised and rigorously analysed, the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) has again warned. Describing the project as "high risk", the IET said that this was not the consequence of the individual technologies to be employed, but from combining them in ways that are "unproven and on such a large scale".

The MPs on the Science and Technology Committee are not lawyers or career politicians; they have previous or parallel careers that are technical, financial and academic, and we can be reasonably sure they're somewhat in touch with real life. They are:

Phil Willis (Lib Dem), Chairman	Teacher
Adam Afriyie (Con)	IT Entrepreneur and Businessman
Robert Flello (Lab)	Taxation and Finance Accountant
Jim Devine (Lab)
Dr Evan Harris (Lib Dem)	Doctor
Dr Brian Iddon (Lab)	Professor, Organic Chemist
Margaret Moran (Lab)	Director, Housing Association
Brooks Newmark (Con)	Corporate Financier
Anne Snelgrove (Lab/Co-op)	Teacher, LEA Adviser
Bob Spink (Con)	Electronics Engineer
Dr Desmond Turner (Lab)	Research Chemist, Lecturer

One area in which the S&T Committee report falls short (but perhaps they ran out of paper for their criticisms) is on presentation of the alleged benefits of the scheme to the people who will have to endure and pay for it, normally known as 'hard working families'. They do say that "the Home Office has attempted to communicate with the public", and has allegedly produced a roadshow, leaflets and a DVD – though if they have they didn't tell me. The Committee says in passing that "there is a lack of clarity regarding... the scenarios when the card might be used".

Unbelievably, Blair insisted this week that this fiasco would be 'a central plank' of Labour's next election manifesto – forgetting, perhaps, that he will not be top dog at that time (at least, that's what he said earlier...)

Gordon Brown's Identity

Gordon Brown, Chancellor of the Exchequer, has announced in a written Ministerial Statement the creation of a 'Public-Private Forum on Identity Management'.

"The Forum will examine the evolving technologies used for identity management and consider how public and private sectors can work together to maximise efficiency and effectiveness. The Forum will be a key part of the identity management architecture across Government, and will build on work underway across Whitehall, which is being led by the Home Office..."

Sounds like the sort of initiative that should be announced by the Home Secretary. Or by the Prime Minister; maybe Gordon needs classes in Identity Management, before he jumps the gun.

Or is it a face-saving wheeze for kicking the ID Card project into the long grass for another year?

One of the Forum's terms of reference is to produce a preliminary report for the Chancellor and the Ministerial Committee on identity management by Easter 2007.

Its Chairman will be Sir James Crosby, Chief Executive of HBOS Plc, Non-executive Board member of the FSA, Non-executive Director of ITV plc, and Fellow of the Faculty of Actuaries.

Blair's ID Card Logic Error

At PMQs in the House today, Dave asked the PM whether ID Cards are now off, following the email revelations at the weekend:

CAMERON: Will the Prime Minister admit to the House that the whole project is now being reviewed, including the timetable and the type of card?

BLAIR: No, I certainly will not say that, because it is not correct... If the right hon. Gentleman is basing his comments on leaked e-mails in the newspapers, I suggest that he does not raise that topic. If he looks at what is happening, he will see that it is important that we proceed with identity cards for the simple reason that if we do not have a proper identity card system, we will not be able to track illegal immigrants in this country or prevent identity fraud and abuse...

Source: Hansard

"if we do not have a proper identity card system, we will not be able to track illegal immigrants." Logic Error, surely, Tony? Illegal immigrants are by their nature unknown to the authorities, so cannot be issued with ID Cards. And therefore cannot be tracked.

Meanwhile, El Reg is already ringing bells to celebrate the demise of the ID card project. I'm more inclined to believe John Lettice in The Register than Tony Blair, well, anywhere.

Glitch at the Passport Office

A good technical future ahead for ID Cards? Well, not really, after news in The Times today that the Home Office agency charged with issuing passports has withdrawn its on-line service after only 3 weeks because of computer problems, causing delays for 5,000 applicants. This is the department that will – if the ID Card scheme goes ahead – be responsible for issuing millions of cards, with more stringent data requirements, every year.

"The disclosure that the Siemens Business Services online system was withdrawn after operating for less than three weeks is a serious embarrassment to the Home Office.

"The Prime Minister and John Reid, the Home Secretary, have praised the Passport Agency as an area of government with high levels of customer satisfaction.

"The agency is also the organisation that is to develop the identity card scheme, which will involve issuing tens of millions of cards to British citizens."

[...]

"Nick Clegg, the Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman, said that the latest disclosure was 'a terrible omen for the forthcoming identity cards scheme'.

"He said: 'If the Identity and Passports Service — supposedly the flagship of competent government IT procurement — can’t handle 18,000 applications, how will it ever be able to run a database of every British citizen, with millions of applications a year?'"

Quite. Meanwhile the Beeb reports that the process of going out to tender with contracts to develop the ID Card scheme – which software suppliers expected in March – has been put back indefinitely.

ID Cards Officially Doomed?

"Just because ministers say do something does not mean we ignore reality." The Sunday Times reports leaked emails from senior Whitehall officials responsible for technology procurement for the Government's extravagant ID Card plan which show that the people who actually know about these things are staring reality in the face: it ain't going to work, and it certainly ain't going to work on time.

They reveal that there are now plans for a simpler (but still not easy to do) system, TNID, in which everyone's data is held in a temporary database but no-one gets a card. But they doubt even that can be achieved until, at best, the eve of the next general election – not a scenario NuLab would feel happy about as they know only too well this fiasco is hardly a vote grabber.

They talk about a "descoped early variant ID Card", which sounds more like the disease itself than a friendly card providing easier access to health services (and who ever believed that?).

Some excellent analysis by Tom on Blairwatch.

UPDATE: And by John Lettice at The Register (last 2 paras, especially)

ID Card Secrecy to Continue

Department of Work and Pensions has decided to appeal against the Information Commissioner's ruling on 8 June 2006 that its three feasibility reports on the potential impact of ID Cards on identity fraud – one of the key reasons the Government have used to justify the cards – must be published under the Freedom of Information Act, reports the Beeb. The appeal will be heard by the Information Tribunal.

The Lib Dems say it is disappointing that the government is still trying to "cover up the facts about ID cards". Home affairs spokesman Nick Clegg said: "The public has a right to know if the billions of pounds the government is committing to this massive project will be money well spent."

The Government said at the time that making them public could make it harder to get value for money [money seems to be the only thing that matter to Blair's people] when the government handed out contracts to firms to set up the scheme, and said that releasing such information prematurely could stop ministers and officials discussing the pros and cons of policies.

But Information Commissioner Richard Thomas ruled that the benefits of releasing them outweighed the fact that the information was exempt from the full scope of the FOI Act. "There is clearly a strong public interest in the public knowing whether the introduction of identity cards will bring benefits to the DWP, and to other government departments, and if so what those benefits will be," he said. He argued the reports would help informed public debate of the ID card issue – including whether it ought to be compulsory to carry the cards.

Is this just another delaying tactic to get them a few more months along the ID Card track?

Thin End of the ID Wedge

So, MPs have voted to go ahead with ID cards, with only 20 Labour rebels, despite some predictions that the move would be rejected, and despite earlier defeats by their Lordships for very sensible reasons. I wonder if they realize what they're letting us in for. Undoubtedly there'll be Creeping Compulsion – the card is voluntary for now, unless you need to use any government services. For a start, anyone applying for a passport after 2008 will be forced to have parts of their body photographed and held on the central computer; a good job mine doesn't expire until 2012 :-)

Of course it's not unknown for government computer contracts to run late and over budget, so 2008 might be optimistic on their part. And the Passport Office has had its cock-ups in the past as well. The problems are only just starting; trouble is it's we who have to pay for this very expensive experiment.

RFID: What's in a Name?

RFID: Radio Frequency ID. Information stored in RFID chips can be read from a distance, using radio waves. The maximum reading distance for any particular chip depends on which of various international standards it uses, and can be anything from a few centimeters to 10 or so metres from the reader. It's incredibly useful technology, used in transport cards (like London's Oyster card), injected under the skin of dogs (the pet microchip), and used to track retail products in warehouses and shops.

It's that last one – RFID chips on clothing swing tags, for example – that has slightly tarnished the RFID name, because civil liberties people have pointed out that in theory it's possible to track the product out of the shop and along the High Street, and to build up a picture of what someone is buying and where, without them knowing. In practice the chip is 'killed' (the technical term) at the point of sale or on leaving he shop, so there isn't really a problem.

But the government, ever sensitive to voters' perceptions, if not to their wishes, is being coy about actually saying R-F-I-D, as it promotes its thoughts on ID Cards. The Register has an excellent piece [30 Jan 06] about the hilarious lengths Home Office minister Andy Burnham and others are going to to avoid speaking the RF-word.

What I want to know is why they want to use RFID chips anyway, instead of the sort of technology that we have in Chip'n'Pin cards. They wouldn't want to track us all, would they? Well, really! But I'll come back to that later...

How Safe is Your ID?

The British government would like every one of us to have an ID Card. If they get their way the cards will eventually be compulsory. The benefits, they say, include reducing ID fraud for us, reducing Benefit fraud for them, stopping terrorism at a stroke, and er... Making Things Better. Personally I think it's all part of this government's control freak mentality which would like to have everyone numbered and located and recorded.

Many of us object to the cards for a variety of reasons including cost, impracticality, inconvenience, loss of privacy, and the doubtful security of the cards and their underlying database. I have a feeling I'm going to come back to some of these issues later, but let's just look at data security. The trouble with carrying all your critical information on one card is that if someone manages to steal it, they have everything. They could copy every bit of you. It's rather more serious than someone using a copy of your numberplates on their car.

But reading or cloning a card will be impossible, say the government, because of the built in safeguards (an overused word these days). Except that The Register reports [30 Jan 06] that a Delft-based smartcard security specialist has cracked the Dutch biometric passport, which uses much the same technology. And did it from 10 metres away. Well, really!