Insanity - Otherwise Occupied

I've made my feelings about the Real ID Act of 2005 pretty clear, I think. Without question, it gives the appearance of greater security without any real increase in it. What does it do?

It requires governments to collect even more personal information than most states currently collect from those who desire a driver's license or identification card.
It obliterates many of the protections of the Drivers Privacy Protection Act along with the information privacy legislation of states that offer more protection.
It forces states to keep vast amounts of personal information in accessible electronic databases.
It forces states to open their driver records to all other states.

But there are a lot of things it doesn't do. Here are some humorous things that came from my Technorati feed just over this weekend:

blog.myspace.com/redcracker:

So in May of 2008, we are going to be issued a National ID card. It is going to replace your driver's license, or state id, or whatever you have. They are going to be issued by the federal government and you are going to need it to work, get a social security card, get any government programs, etc. It is going to do the same things your drivers license does. Execpt its a little more specific. It will have your finger print, or RETINA scan on it. Thats right. Everyone in the United States will have your finger print on file. Or your retina scan. And this isn't some weird movie thing. Its actually happening. Its called the Real ID Act. Its to fight bad guys. Google Real ID Act. Its freakin scary. My biggest concern or issue with it is the finger print deal.

This is so very wrong. It won't replace "whatever you have." It won't just "be issued." It's not going to be issued by the federal government. It won't be required to get a social security card (or number) because you'll need one before you can get a Real ID-compliant license or identification card. It will do just what your current driver's license does, because it's simply a new license, issued under compliance with the Real ID regulations, which haven't even been publicly released yet.

It's unlikely that it will have a fingerprint, and you can almost be assured it won't have any retinal signatures on it. Fingerprinting is not required by the act, though it's not clear what the DHS will do. Someone needs not to relay on her "cool ass friend Andy who likes to keep me up to date on the odd going ons in the world." Andy doesn't know what he's talking about.

But they get nuttier.

blog.myspace.com/thevillage88:

Real ID Act which requires that, by 2008, all states need to conform to a national ID standard which will hook everybody up to a centralized computer database called the "Total Information Awareness System" backed by DARPA. The ID will include "machine-readable technology", most likely RFID(Radio Frequency Identification), and will require four proofs of identification to obtain. They say that this will not be - by definition - a national ID card because it is entirely voluntary. Sounds good enough until you dig a little deeper and find out that anyone who lives in a state that does not conform to the Real ID, will essentially not exist to the US government. That's right. You cannot get a license to drive a car or board an airplane ride a train, enter federal buildings, national parks, and so on.

Certainly, there's probably good reason to believe that TIA never died. There's also very good reason to believe that one of the great benefits of forcing the electronic opening of all state driver databases is that it would benefit a TIA-like system. That said, the Real ID Act certainly doesn't require that all of that be done by 2008. The card is voluntary for states, supposedly, because states won't have to issue Real ID-compliant licenses or identification cards. Those without Real ID cards won't be able to use their non-compliant IDs to access federal facilities. I don't believe that means national parks, largely because I've never had my license checked to enter a park.

You can certainly get a license to drive. And can probably even board a train.

It's not at all clear that states may realistically opt-out of Real ID compliance. After all, their citizens would be severely hampered. Or, at least, they'd all have to have passports for dealing with the federal government.