UK ID card fuss is only temporary

Keynote RSA Conference 2008
Keynote RSA Conference 2008

That was the warning from security guru and BT chief security office Bruce Schneier who said that in five years or so, people won’t have to worry about ID cards anymore.

Not because libertarians will triumph and prevent the technology from being developed, but because ID checks will happen in the background without us even realising.

“I know there are debates on ID cards everywhere but in a lot of ways,they are only very temporary. They are only a temporary solution till biometrics takes over,” he said, speaking at the RSA Conference Europe on Tuesday.

“When you walk into the airport they will know who you are. You won’t have to show an ID – why bother? They can process you quicker,” he said.

I am not quite convinced about Schneier’s time-frame as look at how long its taken to get a plastic card with a photo on it approved so how long are we really looking at for sophisticated biometrics technology and the databases in the background to make it all work.

Still while biometrics for high-level uses in airports and law-enforcement might be a longer way off – more low-level uses by commercial organisations might be rolled out a lot sooner.

mySociety: Open democracy, open source

Just finished this piece for Heise UK on mySociety the organisation behind site’s such as Theyworkforyou which provides tools for tracking what your MP is up to:

A group of free and open source enthusiasts are challenging the UK government to use the internet to its full potential

About a quarter of one percent. That’s the extent to which Tom Steinberg, director and co-founder of mySociety.org thinks the UK government has managed to embrace the potential of the Internet to re-shape democracy as we currently understand it.

For the full article go to Heise UK