Psychic ID: A blueprint for a modern national identity scheme

Abstract

The issue of identity cards is hotly debated in many countries, but it often seems to be an oddly backward-looking debate that presumes outdated " Orwellian " architectures. In the modern world, surely we should be debating the requirements for national identity management schemes, in which identity cards may or may not be a useful implementation, before we move on to architecture. If so, then, what should a U.K. national identity management scheme for the 21st century look like? Can we assemble a set of requirements understandable to politicians, professionals and the public? We've certainly had some difficulty to date. One reason might be that we lack a compelling, narrative vision. As a result, we're constructing a legacy system that will subvert the rational goals of worthwhile scheme. We're not aiming high enough. The technology, I will argue, can deliver far more than the politicians, professionals and public imagine: In particular, it can deliver the apparently paradoxical result of more security and more privacy by exploiting smart cards, biometrics and cryptography. In this paper, I will set out a high-level vision of what a forward-looking national identity management and identity " card " scheme should look like: Dr. Who's psychic paper. Not only is this a simple, clear vision that is familiar to the expert and layperson alike, but it's a very useful artistic representation of the capabilities of the technology. I will further suggest that a utility implementation of identity infrastructure can deliver the on this vision in a practical way, and that all of the technology needed to create an ID scheme for the future already exists.