Dear Sir

James Hall is wrong to claim ID cards will be voluntary (Letters, 10 June).

Sheffield residents won’t be forced onto the National Identity Register directly, unless they’re from outside the European Economic Area, however the Government intends to make it impossible for us to live without an ID card.

Compulsion will start with “critical workers” [PDF] in industries such as transport, energy and the emergency services. Next they plan to make registration a condition of applying for a passport. Students are a third group who will be targeted early.

Before long we’ll be unable to start a new job, open a bank account or make a high-value purchase without a check against the register, which may also tip off the tax man about our spending habits. The same will apply if we have to claim benefits. Nothing Mr. Hall says reassures me that we won’t be asked to surrender to the scheme before voting or seeking NHS treatment. Registration is for life and the penalties for non-compliance include £1000 fines and prison sentences.

The government presents ID cards as a Hobson’s choice: comply or they will withhold our access to public services and deprive us of our livelihoods. That doesn’t sound very voluntary to me.

I’m grateful that Sheffield City Council has stood up for freedom and our right to a private life by speaking out against this scheme. ID cards and the sinister database behind them should be scrapped.

Under the guise of improving passport security, the Identity and Passport Service (IPS) will begin forcing all new applicants to register with the ID cards database from April this year.

This morning, IPS Chief executive James Hall was in full spin mode: “I think people will recognise that its appropriate once in their lifetime to go through a little bit more inconvenience in order that we can ensure the integrity of the passport document.”

I would agree with interviewing applicants if the purpose of this exercise was only to improve passport security, but it isn’t. Once you’ve submitted to the interrogation, and your eligibility for a passport has been established, you will then be forcibly registered on the Government’s ID card database.

There’s no need for this. The only reason passports are being linked to ID cards is to ensure the Government gets that file on your private life it so desperately wants. It won’t improve passport security one iota, and you’ll be exposed to all the risks and disadvantages of having everything about you recorded in a massive online database.

Of course it’s not compulsory to have a passport, so the Government can call ID cards “optional” on a technicality. However there are many whose jobs require foreign travel. How voluntary will registration feel to them? Not to mention anyone who has relatives abroad, or would perhaps like to take a foreign holiday.

If you’re over 16 you can spare yourself the ignominy of an “intrusive interview” (the Government’s words) and keep yourself off the National Identity Register for ten years by renewing your passport now. If you don’t already hold one, you need to do this straight away, as the interrogations will begin for new applicants in April.

More info can be found at Renew For Freedom.

Apply now and tell your friends.

In my letter, I argued that safeguards on the NIR should be at least as strong as those protecting your home and business premises from being searched by the state. This would mean the police and security services would require a warrant or court order to gain access to your identity.

I’m happy to report that Mr. Hall has replied. I’m less happy to report that his response is far from comforting:

“You ask whether access to the database will be subject to obtaining a court order or warrant …

“Requests for information will not be granted automatically but will be subject to rules under section 21 of the Act … [This section] provides for regulations to be made concerning how the request for information should be made, at which level of seniority the power to request information may be given, and other requirements which requests must satisfy.

“These regulations will be subject to the affirmative process, meaning that they must be approved by both Houses of Parliament before coming into effect. Once arrangements are in place, they will be subject to oversight by the National Identity Scheme Commissioner in the case of the police and by the Intelligence Services Commissioner in the case of the security services.”

Mr. Hall seems to be saying that there are currently no rules governing access by the authorities to information about you held in the National Identity Register. They’re not sure how they’re going to control access, but you should be reassured that once Parliament has agreed a method, there will be a couple of Government quangos appointed to make sure it’s done right.

In other words, they haven’t thought about it yet.

This is why the Identity and Passport Service is unable to explain the safeguards planned to protect your identity from arbitrary intrusion by the state.

There are none.

In my experience, security has to be considered from the start of the project lifecycle to stand any chance of being effective. Sadly it seems the Home Office and the IPS are leaving it all until later, when the implementation of effective security will be much more expensive and difficult (perhaps impossible).

The Government wants to assume responsibilty for your identity. Shouldn’t they also take responsibility for protecting it?

No, silly me: if they wanted to do that they wouldn’t have dreamed up this ridiculous ID cards scheme in the first place.

“…it seems to me debatable that we are actually entering a surveillance society – and the things which are normally pointed at, like CCTV cameras, are usually being introduced under public pressure to increase personal safety. I don’t think that ID Cards will threaten personal privacy. Rather the reverse; they will likely reduce the number of times you have to reveal personal information and increase the security of your personal data. Maybe we should start arguing the case that ID Cards will reduce the threat of the Surveillance Society and help safeguard civil liberties.”

This statement is all kinds of wrong! Your right to privacy is your right to be known by only those people you trust. A National Identity Register would mean you are forced to trust the system, the operators, the Government, the technology, everything that it relies upon and everything that relies upon it. This sounds to me exactly like the kind of disproportionate and systematic privacy intrusion that would indicate a surveillance society.

Among the many other issues that were discussed, the subject of who will have access to the data on the National Identity Register was broached. Here’s another extract from the transcript:

Michael Anderson: How many people will have access to the data collected in relation to ID cards?

James replies: Michael, thanks for the question. The Identity and Passport Service today has 3,800 employees, of whom just over 3,000 are involved in authorising passports. We don’t yet know the future size of the organisation but we do not expect it to be greatly larger than the current organisation. Other organisations will be able to verify their data against the National Identity Register, but they their employees will not have access to the register itself. You might be interested to know that this can already happen with passports presented as proof of identity when opening a bank account or taking out a loan. This is proving very effective in discouraging fraud.

Noting that Mr. Hall had carefully avoided answering the question, I asked a follow-up:

Richard: Your answer to Michael Anderson doesn’t take into account the Police, Goverment departments or the security services. What is the real figure?

James replies: Richard, I take your point. The Identity Cards Act does allow information to be provided from the register to police and security services where it is necessary in the public interest for the prevention and detection of crime. The people who would have access will be IPS staff who will able to provide the information.

I then sought to find out whether a court order or warrant would be needed before access to our private data would be granted. This would seem reasonable, as oversight by the courts is a security measure against undue invasion of privacy by the state. Similar rules safeguard your home and business premises against unwarranted intrusion. However, Mr Hall declined to answer my second question.

I don’t want ID cards, but if they’re forced upon us, the least I expect is for there to be proper oversight of the system and strong safeguards against improper use of the information stored therein. If we’re to believe that the system will not be used for indiscriminite surveillance, reassurances in this area are essential. I’ll therefore be writing to James Hall to seek clarification. I’ll let you know what I find out.