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Title: Defending Anonymity Author: Anarchist Federation Date: September 2005 Language: en Topics: anonymity, identity, United Kingdom, Anarchist Communist Editions, class struggle Source: Retrieved on June 4, 2015 from https://web.archive.org/web/20150604003108/http://www.afed.org.uk/ace/anon.html Notes: Anarchist Communist Editions (ACE) No. 15. 1st edition, September 2005. 2nd edition, April 2006. 3rd edition, May 2008.
The Labour Party is bringing in a national identity scheme to Britain.
Anyone concerned about threats to our freedom from an increasingly
authoritarian state should be worried by the Identity Cards Act 2006.
This was passed with little change from what the government wanted, in
spite of all the âwrite to your MPâ lobbying by No2ID and optimistic
hopes of House of Lords amendments.
The British ID Cards Act is just one part of European and American
efforts to impose electronic identity schemes across the western world.
Around the same time, George Bush pushed one through the US Senate as an
enhanced driving license known as RealID, tacked on to a military
spending bill that was unlikely to get voted down in the middle of a
war, and is demanding biometric passports for non-visa entry to the
country. This side of the atlantic, European paranoia about borders is
helping to drive EU-wide developments of passports, ID cards and
databases.
In Britain, Labour is determined to get national ID in place for most of
us within the next few years by creating a National Identity Register
that youâll be added to when you apply for or renew a passport. This is
now planned for sometime between 2009â2012 depending how much the full
roll-out is delayed for political and technical reasons. Identity and
Passport Service offices (âinterrogation centresâ) for in-person
applications, vetting and biometric scanning have already opened in some
parts of the country. Even if you donât hold a passport, and 80% of us
already do, only one more act of parliament is needed to force ID
registration on everyone over 16 years old. Although ID may become an
election issue against Labour, it must be remembered that the
Conservative Party tried to introduce it in the 1990s before they lost
the general election to Labour! Whoever wins, the ID Cards Act is there
for any party to use.
Having judged the strong opposition that already exists against having
an actual card, the government announced in March 2008 that it wonât now
make it compulsory except for airport & power station workers, people
working on the London Olympics site, and others like doctors, nurses,
teachers and social workers. Thatâs already a lot of people, but
whatever, letâs not be fooled, because the real danger is not the
carrying of a card, itâs the computerised identity register which weâll
all have to be on. Plus the state really does want us all to have a
card, and actually hopes weâll get one by choice! Young people applying
for their first bank account will be encouraged to get an ID card for
convenience when they apply for a bank account or student loan, and to
prove their age in the pub. The rest of us are expected to follow later
when we realise we canât live without one. All of this shows us that the
state is bent on imposing ID cards âby stealthâ.
Itâs worth noting that before the ID Cards Act was passed, state
officials took advice from their industry partners that they would need
to tread carefully and introduce an ID scheme step-by-step. This does
seem to be happening via a mishmash of legislation and through national
and local government restructuring behind the scenes. For example,
foreign nationals will be issued with ID cards in the guise of
âbiometric visasâ as soon as this year (2008), linked to the UK Borders
Act 2007. Mandatory fingerprinting as well as facial biometrics is then
to be introduced for all passport and travel documents within the EU,
for children as well as adults.
The General Register Office (GRO) in England and Wales, which oversees
the recording of births, marriages, civil partnerships and deaths,
became part of the Identity and Passport service in 1 April 2008.
Various other plans, which may or may not be realised, include creating
a âco-ordinated online role of electorsâ (CORE) and encouraging
residents to pay council tax through an internet scheme called
Government Connect. All of these initiatives involve gathering local
lists into national ones, ideal for building up the register. The
government also intends to cobble together information from three
existing sources instead of going ahead with the original idea for a
brand new âcleanâ database. The idea is that your personal ID record
will be merged from data already held on different computer systems at
the Home Office, the Department for Work and Pensions, and the Identity
and Passport Service.
Moreover, the Children Act 2004 allows creation of separate databases
for all children in England, that could easily turn into ID for everyone
as this generation ages â one estimate is 50% of the population could be
covered within 20 years! Pupils and parents are already protesting
against fingerprinting (and even eye-scanning) that is being introduced
to many schools for checking out library books, getting school dinners
and signing attendence registers.
In Scotland, a national pensionerâ cards has recently been issued which
is actually a multi-purpose ID card disguised as a bus pass. Not only
that, but in November 2007, we heard that post offices and travel agents
are likely candidates for mass ID card applications and fingerprinting.
So itâs important to see this is not just about opposing one single Act
of parliament and also that bureaucrats in Whitehall, local councils and
private companies are already busy preparing the ground for compulsory
ID.
Although ID is coming through in an incremental manner, the time to
start fighting is now. The Poll Tax came in and was still defeated here
from taking notice and learning from opposition to the initial trials in
Scotland, and applying them to build a countrywide campaign. ID schemes
have already been defeated in Australia, Canada, Korea, Taiwan and
elsewhere. We would do well to look at how these examples of opposition
worked before, since an international effort may well be needed. If it
is to succeed, the campaign now needs to move beyond complaining what is
bad about ID and prepare for concerted refusal and outright revolt.
Unfortunately the situation is not exactly like the Poll Tax of two
decades years ago, when there was a clear benefit to individuals
refusing to pay, because the government has strongly linked the scheme
to national security as well as to the emotive threat of âidentity
theftâ. They hope they will convince many law-abiding citizens it will
be a price worth paying. The high cost to individuals may well help
convince a lot of people to fight the scheme, but to beat ID we really
need to win the argument that the state cannot provide security or any
bogus idea of respect, whether by ID cards, cameras or ASBOs. Society
has been made rotten by the growing inequalities that are permitted by
the system called capitalism that allows a small minority of people to
own most of the resources and organise our lives.
ID is a class issue â the rich will ensure their anonymity by their
limited need for the welfare state. Most recently we hear that children
of âcelebritiesâ (which will undoubtedly include well-known
politicians!) will be exempted from the Children Index â yet another
clear message that ID will not affect everyone in the same way. As well
as money, power and influence will give the upper classes anonymity from
the state and the private companies who will run identity databases. We
must preserve ours by downright refusal to accept ID, not because itâs
too expensive and not because it wonât work, but simply because we wonât
let the state invade every part of our lives. Out of struggle, as we
have done before, we can strengthen our own idea of community that one
day will overthrow the dominant systems of state and capitalism.
For anarchists, opposition to ID cards might feel so obvious that itâs
beyond discussion, a âno brainerâ. But the number of dodgy anti-ID
arguments coming out have only served to confuse matters. This pamphlet
aims to provide ideas and resources for those fighting ID from an
anarchist position.
of us who can least afford it
The ID database and card scheme will cost many billions of pounds. Much
of this will end up lining the pockets of the private companies who will
set up and run the computers and card-reading technology, and to pay the
personnel involved in running the scheme. A figure of ÂŁ300 per person
has been determined by dividing the likely cost of the scheme by the
population, and it it likely that a lot of this cost will be passed to
individuals when we are asked to register for a card or make changes to
our records â a kind of tax to pay for the fear and insecurity created
by our scaremongering rulers. But itâs important to remember the
principle that we wouldnât want it even if it was free. Neither should
the large fines scare us into registering. One of the strongest weapons
against the Poll Tax was the campaign of mass non-registration by the
public burning of forms or simply by ignoring council letters.
There are huge technical problems with making ID work â no government
has attempted a database scheme on the scale of the one proposed for ID
in Britain. The story of public/private Information Technology projects
has generally been one of massive delay and many additional years of
expensive tinkering which have mostly benefitted only the companies that
have the contracts. Home Office sponsored trials by Atos Origin showed
unbelievably bad results for biometric registration and validation that
would clearly discriminate against disabled, black and older people. A
Dutch trial involving RFID passports showed that encrypted personal
information could be read and the codes cracked in a very short time.
These might seem like a good basis for opposing ID, but itâs really not
our problem. Letâs not get drawn into arguing for a âfairâ or âsecureâ
system. We need to stand together and be clear we donât want any system,
and try to use government incompetence to our advantage. Registration
booths could become an important focus for direct action against the
scheme, as could the companies involved.
The government has been sneaky to lump terrorism and organised crime in
with any kind of credit card and welfare benefits fraud. But why should
we care if a few of us are working the system when corporations and rich
individuals continue to benefit from massive tax-avoidance and the
government is spending millions on arms? A lot of us depend on âpettyâ
crime to overcome poverty in our class-divided society. Organised crime
and the terror threat are mainly diversions to scare us into believing
we need the state to be secure when itâs state-imposed social
inequality, warmongering and religious bigotry that are the problems.
Many of the people who threaten us most through fear of poverty or
violence, whether they are fraudsters, terrorists, bosses or generals,
are rich people who can buy anonymity and freedom of movement. So the
bleatings of Liberty and others in the âIt wonât workâ brigade end up
just adding to the confusion, because the very act of going on about
crime or terrorism just propagates fear of each other. This is another
form of âdivide and ruleâ, keeping us down when we should be fostering
solidarity amongst ourselves to fight oppression together. Anarchists
refuse to be drawn into worrying about a state initiative from the
stateâs own perspective.
Well maybe, since the police will have access to the database and will
have powers to demand to see ID cards, but even this sort of misses the
point. The ID scheme is much more than information to help the police
know who we are. If youâre being denied healthcare or a driving license
because youâre not on the national register, is it not really
enforcement thatâs the problem, itâs the whole system. The real issue is
the governmentâs original idea of entitlement and its flipside â
economic discrimination. The global capitalist economy relies on
inequality so our governments are lying every time they say they donât
want migrants working in Britain. They want cheap goods and labour from
wherever they can get it and always have done, whether from the spoils
of colonial rule, raw materials or sweatshop products feeding
multinationals, from migration of workers with lower wage expectations,
outsourcing of manufacturing and services to âcheaperâ countries, or by
the driving down of wages in general.
Running this kind of capitalist system involves managing production and
consumption for the mass of us. An electronic ID database will help to
parcel up the majority of people in our 21^(st) century society into
economic units whose wages or welfare benefits, and the way these are
spent, are tightly controlled. Plus, many workers are already being
tagged and tracked in the workplace â a national ID could help extend
this capability to all of us. All this is going on whilst the rich and
higher-earning middle classes, especially those benefiting from the
property boom or stock market income, can afford private healthcare and
pensions along with the relative anonymity that goes with those
privileges. That leaves those of us who depend on resources like state
or low-paid occupational pensions and the NHS to have our entire life
history put under detailed scrutiny from government bean-counters and
private companies.
ID cards also take away our ability to create our own social and
economic sphere. Labour (and some of the socialist Left who
traditionally love social planning) hate the âGrey Marketâ they canât
track and tax, and so roll out the usual scare-stories of organised
crime and terrorism. No surprise then that we are now seeing adverts
telling us that buying cheap DVDs will buy guns for terrorists! They
want us to feel guilty about everything from biodiesel, media piracy and
cheap booze, while at the same time are promoting free-market policies
for the rest of the world and helping companies make millions from the
poverty of the majority of people on earth.
(from Organise! 64, Summer 2005)
The threat of introduction of a National Identity Card Scheme is still
an ongoing UK government hot potato and almost an obsession for New
Labour. But why? This article tries to wade through the mud of post-Sept
11^(th) paranoia and to counter the fear-mongering coming not only
through the electioneering twaddle of the political parties but even
from anti-ID card campaigns like Libertyâs. What we find is an ongoing
and consistent commitment to enforced citizenship which appears be the
real meaning behind the rhetoric.
In the private sector, especially in retail, market research technology
has provided the means to help companies âunderstand their customers
betterâ thanks to huge databases created from transactions using debit
and credit cards and from store loyalty cards, enabling them to target
their marketing campaigns and in-store product lines. Soon weâll have
widespread use of Radio-frequency identification (RFID) tags that will
help them track goods and clothes we are wearing inside and even outside
of the store with much more sophistication than is currently possible
with bar-codes, and even photograph us when we pick up products. For
consumer goods then, Big Brother is surely here already (see separate
article on RFID).
On the other hand, the public sector has struggled to keep up in
âunderstanding its citizensâ. To push this forwards the Labour party has
actively pursued the idea of e-Government and has attempted to create
and computerise a number of systems such as the Inland Revenue and
Criminal Records Bureau at great cost with varying degrees of success â
the Passport Service and Child Support Agency systems being notable
disasters in recent memory. But in spite of the setbacks and huge
expense, Labour seems to have the will to see through a multi-billion
pound National ID Card Scheme as a semi-public/semi-private initiative
via the Whitehall and Industry Group (WIG) who have held events to
attract a host of telecoms, security and other hi-tech companies, along
with credit-checking agencies and information management consultants
(see www.corporatewatch.org).
This is all happening while the supposed reasons for needing ID cards
are being promoted by the government, and campaigns are up and running
to oppose them. The picture is quite confusing with a host of arguments
coming from both sides of the âdebateâ, and even within the same
political parties. Lest we forget, Tories Michael Howard and Peter
Lilley failed to introduce ID cards during the Major government. Now as
opposition leader Howard is still in favour but Lilley has taken a more
right-wing libertarian position. For anarchists, being against loss of
personal freedoms could be seen as a given but, as we will see, some of
the tactics of anti-ID card campaigning leave a lot to be desired, so it
is perhaps worth a closer look.
Reading through the âFiction and Factâ mini-booklet response to ID cards
from the civil liberties group Liberty you can just imagine their
discussions with a social research consultant. What do the stupid Daily
Mail reading public care about? Oh yes: Terrorism, Crime, Illegal
Immigration, Benefit Cheats, security of their personal information, and
having to pay for the Card, so letâs organise our anti-ID campaign
around the issues and tell them it wonât work. Tell them how terrorists,
bank robbers, rapists and muggers wonât be deterred, street crime is
just as bad in countries that have cards, people smugglers will just
forge them, 90% of benefit frauds involve the cheatâs own identity. Some
of these may be quite true, but talk about playing to peopleâs fears and
forgetting about any kind of social solidarity! When Blunkett or Clarke
go on about organised crime, terrorists and failed asylum seekers, they
are not interested in helping people understand their real agenda, but
rather to market their plans using media-friendly sound-bites. By
concentrating on this divisive catalogue of political issues (that drop
so easily out of the focus-group kinds of methods which are popular for
gauging support or otherwise for schemes that affect voting
populations), Libertyâs campaign misses the point about Labourâs long
term agenda which is all about social control.
So how can we really understand Labourâs love of ID cards and work out
how to oppose them effectively and not at the expense of unwarranted
fearmongering? As pointed out by the altogether more sensible Defy-ID
campaign (see www.defy-id.org.uk), Labourâs ID card bill could rightly
be called the âNational Identity Register Billâ since it is more about
establishing a national ID database than issuing cards. The database, as
currently intended, will contain not just your current name and address
and âbiometricâ fingerprint or iris scan, but will track and record any
address (or name) changes and include your photo, National Insurance
number, driving licence number, passport number, immigration number, and
the number of âany designated document not covered by the aboveâ. The
database would be open not only to the Immigration service and Police
but to public and private sector organisations. These could be the tax
office, employers, banks and credit organisations (including student
loans), utility companies, libraries, dentists etc. Such a database
could be set up quietly without further input from individuals and
without even issuing cards. Blunkett had also spoken of linking the ID
database to the forthcoming NHS one for electronic patient records.
Furthermore, a database for all children under 18 (to include their
school achievements, health visits, DSS and police records) was proposed
last year for addition to the Childrenâs Bill following the Lord Laming
report into the death of Victoria Climbié, which according to minister
Margaret Hodge could âalso be used to support service planning and
deliveryâ (see Direct Action, No.32).
According to the Regulatory Impact Assessment published alongside the
current Bill, a âterroristâ would need an ID card to âstay in a hotel,
rent accommodation, hire cars and generally carry out their activitiesâ.
As Defy-ID astutely brings to our attention, this implies weâd all need
to have an ID card to do these things! This smacks most clearly of
Labourâs original idea of the entitlement card that Blunkett tried to
get through in Feb 2002 on an anti-fraud ticket well before the terror
scare really hit the UK, which gives a much clearer picture of the real
purpose of a national database. Feasibility of entitlement cards was
heavily criticised at the time (see FIPR response to the UK Entitlement
Card consultation â foundation for information policy research:
www.fipr.org/cards/entitlementresponse.html), but still fits well with
Labourâs social control agenda since they came to power which, with a
good dose of religious work-ethic thrown in, has seen the imposition of
workfare schemes through the New Deal and the more recent persecution of
long-term unemployed on incapacity benefit. If retirement age goes up
any further it looks like many more of us will be working until we drop
dead. And Labour despises the black or grey economy they canât get taxes
from, because everyone must be involved in building the Gross Domestic
Product of UK, which is their real meaning of âcitizenshipâ. Blunkettâs
obsession with the idea of a card, continued by Clarke, clouds the fact
that a database system would serve a very heavy state function with or
without the actual carrying of one.
Bringing opposition to ID cards into the arena of social struggle
requires solidarity and we can learn therefore, not just from the
broad-based Australian experience of defeating an ID card scheme in 1987
(see âOn Campaigns of Opposition to ID Card Schemesâ, 01/01/1995, Simon
Davies: www.privacyinternational.org/issues/idcard/campaigns.html) and
other examples in New Zealand and the Philippines, but also from the
Sans Papiers âundocumented workersâ movement in France that has helped
show the way in a country that already has ID. Letâs face it, we already
have a sizeable section of the country that is excluded â the homeless,
travellers, many poor âpensionersâ or younger people unable to work for
any reason, as well as our exploited illegal workers and victimised
asylum seekers. Many people are forced, whether they want to or not, to
live in the black economy or resort to âcrimeâ. These are the groups
that Labour donât want to exist, since it costs them money or denies
them taxes, but they are an inevitable part of a capitalist society that
values only work and profit.
Anarchists, who are not stuck in the mire of moralising about a loss of
GDP that could in any case be recouped in days by stopping war on Iraq
and other military spending, have always worked on and applauded tactics
to elude national schemes, like encouraging the thousands of people who
disappeared from the poll tax registers at the end of the 1980s. By not
caring about the promises of liberal (or âilliberalâ) democracy we have
a headstart in keeping off the electoral role but more importantly we
have been at the forefront of benefits claimantsâ action groups against
Job Seekersâ Allowance (see www.geocities.com/ncajsa/) and other
community-based campaigns. At the hard end of campaigning like-minded
activists have rescued asylum prisoners and seen off bailiffs. This is
the kind of community model being used by the Defy-ID campaign, and one
that should be supported. The solidarity gained in this level of
grassroots activity can help build a sustainable fightback that
appealing to individual self-interest on single issues will never
achieve.
Radio-frequency identification tagging, or RFID, is a technology that
started off in stock control, motorway tollgates, fancy key-fobs and pet
âcollarsâ. Now itâs on individual items in supermarkets for anti-theft
and tracking shopping behaviours. Each tag includes an aerial and an
electronic chip that sends out a code when it is excited by a
transmitter in the shop. Both ASDA/Walmart and Tesco tried them out a
while back on âsmart shelvesâ displaying highly nickable Gillette razor
blade packs, taking your photo when pick one up. Marks & Spencer is now
tagging 3.5 million food trays, and Tesco is selling tagged DVDs in some
stores and is massively expanding its RFID use. Tagged clothes (those
paid for as well as nicked), another big product area for RFID, could
potentially be tracked outside the shop although the cheaply made tags
in common use are fairly large and not very durable. The real danger
will come when these become small enough to remain as part of the
clothing after sale. A proposed European Union âIntellectual Property
Enforcement Directiveâ would actually forbid removal of embedded tags.
Permanent tagging is being encouraged by the EU for limiting global
movement of products, similar to regionning of DVDs, although this has
been criticised by free-marketeers.
There may still be time to act. Gillette and the supermarkets suffered
from bad press when they tried out RFID in razor packs, forcing a
temporary withdrawal in some stores, and many privacy organisations are
fighting RFID expansion. Various groups are supporting a worldwide
boycott of Tesco to test the water in the latest fight against
âspychipsâ. Minimum action is shopping less at Tescos. Other retailers,
with an eye on their profits, are waiting to see what happens so itâs
worth having a go, even if boycotting of one supermarket has its limits
when they are all at it to some extent!
Not surprisingly, the state is interested in the level of control
offered by RFID. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is testing
âVisitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technologyâ (US-VISIT) for
tracking when and where people cross borders. RFID tagging is being
installed in Ohio Stateâs prison system to track its 44,000 inmates, and
some schools are already trying RFID-badges on students.
Other examples of RFID creep are embedded credit cards and mobile phones
â these can of course be linked directly to your personal identity and
location. There have also been a few (over-hyped) reports of
under-the-skin tagging, such as staff in the Mexican Attorney Generalâs
office and punters at a Spanish nightclub. If you are worried about
ID-cards and other forms of control, itâs vital to keep a close eye on
RFID developments.
More info on the web, in addition to numerous reports on Indymedia such
as: âCog in the Machine (tagging & tracking workers â which, and by
who?)â
of ID cards
AF: You have had ID cards for many years. Should anarchists in Britain
be concerned about attempts by the British State to introduce them?
Nicholas: Once the system is in place you cannot go back. The ID card is
an object that identifies you. You have to have it with you at all
times. It makes police control much easier. If you canât establish
identity then they can take you to the police station without any other
reason. Once they have the ID card in place then they can add other
things- like biometric identification e.g. fingerprints. The base is the
card and then they add things. The ID card is the beginning of a general
file on everyone that regroups all other information they have to
identify someone. They can have your whole life in this one file- your
health, civil status etc.
AF: Wonât a lot of people think that it wonât affect them?
This type of measure is done supposedly for safety but it is not benign-
it is a tool of oppression that can be used against militants, the
socially weak and illegal immigrants. So of course anarchists and other
political activists will be affected. But, it is an attack on general
liberty, the basis of a whole system of surveillance. And, no one is
sheltered from control by the police. There are abuses. For example,
someone was just going home from work and was stopped by the police. He
had forgotten his ID card and found himself at the police station for 12
hours. The ID card has become more and more dangerous because all the
information is on computer. For the moment, we can say we are in a
democracy and therefore only a few could be affected. The State could
change and then the system is there to use against everyone.
AF: How will the ID cards link up with European-wide controls?
The Europolice can consult records in different countries and now they
are also working together. They look at you, they donât like your face,
they check. It is easier to stop people just to check identity. You are
obliged to submit.
AF: Is it used as an entitlement card to obtain benefits?
No, in France you have other cards for that.
AF: What advice would you give to anarchists in Britain?
You have to argue that it is a danger for the liberty of everyone.
Terrorism is a pretext. With a different government, then they can
extend it to everyone. You also need to know exactly how the laws are to
be enforced. For example, what happens if you donât have your card. Will
there be fines, how long can you be held by the police etc.
ID cards actually came from Germany- a Prussian invention. It was
designed to control the population, to check out who pays taxes, who
needs to go to military service. They are now beginning to introduce new
ID cards with a special chip. It is possible to check the ID card from a
distance- so you could be just walking by and then could check your
file. So on a demonstration they could use the information to check on
who is there, who walks with whom etc.
Another aspect of the way that surveillance is increasing is the plan to
introduce tolls for every car in Germany which would require each car to
carry a GPS box. With this, not only could they check who had paid the
toll but also check the movements of any car.
This article, edited from a leaflet produced in Manchester, is inspired
by the Panoptican, a reference to Jeremy Benthamâs prison architecture,
having a central vantage point from which guards could watch each cell
unobserved by the isolated prisoner, leading to self-regulating
behaviour, as discussed in Michel Foucaultâs book âDiscipline and
Punishâ.
The first important thing about ID cards is they want a register rather
than a card. Bits of paper or plastic are to a great extent irrelevant.
The old chestnut âif youâre doing nothing wrong youâve got nothing to
hideâ is being aired again by our government. They claim that the
information to be recorded by the scheme (49 items in all) is only the
basic necessary to prove your identity & to fight crime. But we are
talking about âknowledge powerâ here, the Panoptican that shines a light
from which there is nowhere to hide.
One of the claims is that it will be used to stop terrorism, but ex-home
secretary David Blunkett has already admitted: âI accept that it is
important that we do not pretend that an entitlement card would be an
overwhelming factor in combating international terrorismâ. In fact ID
cards could even assist many of the things, like identity theft, that
they are supposedly being introduced to prevent, so why do it?
Bearing in mind the expanding definition of crime is fast becoming âwhat
small minded petty middle class folk donât likeâ the scope for an ID
scheme seems limitless. It appears to tie in nicely with the huge number
of CCTV cameras in this country (the most in Europe if not the planet)
and anti-social behaviour orders (ASBOs), dispersal orders and the other
new powers given to police and courts to penalise people without even
the already dubious âdue processâ of the law. Shopping centres are now
being praised for banning young people in baseball caps & âhoodysâ. How
low have things got when your clothes are the defining mark of
criminality, striking fear even into the heart of mighty John Prescott?
They want to have your iris scan, fingerprint, photo, National Insurance
number (NINO) and other numbers such as immigration number if you have
one. If any detail changes you will be required to tell them & pay for
the privilege of sorting out any mistakes, and bear in mind you may only
find out somethingâs not right when someone else accesses the data and
says you canât have you benefits, or whatever. The state is proposing
that your information will be available, not only to government
officials, but also to others providing âpublic serviceâ. This would
appear to include private companies like banks or credit checking
agencies such as Experian. We hear that: âAs part of this digital
security infrastructure we envision that every constituent will have a
highly secured, multi-purpose, government-provided electronic ID card
that will serve not only for government purposes but also for online
activities in the private sector-the electronic equivalent of todayâs ID
cards, passports, driverâs licenses and social security cards.â
Of course this will all be presented in a way to make you think that
this is actually a blessing, making life so much easier & convenient.
Perhaps it will be, but who for?
The ID scheme is being realised by a variety of information and
communications technologies (ICT) companies including British Telecom
and smaller âcard & card solutionsâ companies like Identix who work on
fingerprint & facial recognition technology. In a lengthy submission to
the Home Office, Atos Origin, one of the main companies involved, has
argued that the Government should introduce an ID Card âliteâ and then
migrate to a full biometric card and detailed population database when
the card is already in use because: âthe well understood sensitivity of
the issue indicates the need to progress gradually rather than by âbig
bangâ. Because of the history and tradition of the British people, we
believe that arriving at a universal entitlement multi-application smart
card may be an iterative process stretching over a number of yearsâ.
The above statement is an example of the greedy cynicism inherent in
this scheme. It is not just a case of the state deciding that we canât
be trusted to live our lives without them imposing even more pointless
rules & regulations. They are also intent on lining their chumsâ bulging
pockets with our money. Thatâs right, make society a semi-open prison
and charge the inmates for the privilege â but at least we get to shop.
With the advent of other monitoring technology it will no longer be
necessary to go through your receipts to find out what you buy as among
other things the clothes you wear will be readable using RFID.
Admittedly the state might not be particularly bothered by what you wear
unless itâs a hoody or hijab, but the companies who are involved in
developing surveillance systems want a little bit more than the millions
they will rake in for their original tenders & the millions more theyâll
get when the job goes over budget. They will happily develop additional
technology which can & will be sold to those interests who wish to
target you for every penny they can get your hands on. People will, even
more than at present, be regarded as economic units rather that
autonomous individuals.
OK so why do we oppose ID?
through the nose to get done over.
reasons including their lack of competence. As for the companies greed:
it will work a bit, but always need a bit more money to fix it. Bit like
smack really.
spectacularly wrong. Over budget, the programmes donât work, the
hardware doesnât work then they start to tinker round with them &/or the
initial plan changes œ way through (if that far on). Everyone a loser.
everyone but vulnerable social groups more. So if you are from an ethnic
minority or homeless for example you will find yourself subjected to
checks more often than those responsible for real offences, like
bringing in this rubbish.
out by a house Committee), though one thing for pushing it may be to go
on the âwe can use finger prints to solve old crimesâ. As we have no
statute of limitations in this country & they got rid of double jeopardy
it looks like when the police are feeling undervalued/funded they can
fill the courts & jails with dubious cases.
inflexible friends as we will apparently need them if we want to work or
get benefits.
ÂŁ2500failure to submit to fingerprinting and biometric scanning =
ÂŁ2500failure to provide information demanded by the government =
ÂŁ2500failure to attend an interview at a specified place and time =
ÂŁ2500failure to notify authorities about a lost, stolen, damaged or
defective card = up to 1yr in prison and/or a finefailure to renew a
card = ÂŁ1000failure to attend subsequent fingerprinting and biometric
scanning when demanded = ÂŁ1000failure to provide subsequent information
when demanded = ÂŁ1000failure to attend subsequent interview at specified
place and time when demanded = ÂŁ1000failure to notify authorities of any
change in personal circumstances (including change of address) =
ÂŁ1000providing false information = up to 2 years and/or a fine
To add insult to injury, many of the offences set out in the Bill are
civil penalties meaning itâs unlikely youâll get legal aid to help your
defence.
So far there have been a few demos, mostly unreported by the mainstream
media. After its re-election the government is set on bringing the
legislation in as quickly as possible. Much of the foundation work has
apparently been done & the propaganda machine has been revving up
waiting for the green light. We cannot (did we ever) rely on
backbenchers or the Lords to save our arses. This one like the Poll Tax
affects everyone, more so as it also includes children, and it up to us
all to fight it before or after the scheme comes in. This may mean
having to set up support for those denied services due to a lack of
cash, raising awareness of what is going on & of those companies
complicit in the development of the scheme. We also have to challenge
the variety of arguments being put forward by the government &
supporters of the scheme on the grounds of public interest.
Clause 1(4) of the Bill defines it as being âin the interests of
national securityâ, âfor the purposes of the prevention or detection of
crimeâ, âfor the purposes of the enforcement of immigration controlsâ,
âfor the purposes of the enforcement of prohibitions on unauthorised
working or employmentâ and âfor the purpose of securing the efficient
and effective provision of public services.â Even if ID cards did
address these issues, which they wonât, it will have to be argued that
the effect on our freedom is not worth the claimed benefits. Some are
attacks on our freedom anyway from the racism of immigration policy to
the âso called prevention of crimeâ measures which we have witnessed
extending throughout the past couple of years. The Government & indeed
the political culture have played along with the media a game of âwho
can scare the shit out of the public the mostâ. In attempting to outdo
each other they have managed to convince many people that what they see
is not real. While there are some unpleasant people in our communities
doing things weâd all prefer them not to, itâs nowhere near as bad as
the exaggerated horror stories that we are fed daily. This is how they
have managed with barely a peep of dissent to the covering of the
country in CCTV & imposing of new social controls such as ASBOs &
dispersal orders. Manchester seems to be the capital of repressive
practice, a willing laboratory for these new toys, happy to have more
CCTV than anywhere else in the country (anecdotally Iâve heard the
planet) & appears to deal out ASBOs like sweeties, very often to
children. If people are happy to accept these measures & the
accompanying rhetoric, they will in the view of the government be
prepared to accept the ID register & cards. Especially if those opposed
can be presented as enemies of the people who support terrorism,
criminality, dropping litter & anything else they heard that someone in
a key marginal might have thought about getting upset about.
Now Labour have been elected again, albeit with a reduced majority &
some backbenchers ready(ish) to challenge their leaders, we can look
forward to an extension of the measures toward a stilted culture of fear
alienation and the âcomfort foodâ of consumption. Already we are getting
signals of this with the inaccurate & unfair stigmatizing of youth,
immigrants & other sections of society. Their confusion of deference
with respect, should worry us all. We need to address these issues
before we no longer can. Remember what that German pastor said?[1]
Like the Toriesâ poll tax, ID cards are Labourâs own version of a âtax
on being aliveâ. We can scupper ID cards as soon as they try and force
us to register, but only if we start preparing now. Once the scheme is
in place it will be harder, although certainly not impossible, to beat
it. We cannot allow the state to get away with becoming more
authoritarian than it already is.
One way to fight the national identity scheme is to get involved with a
local anti-ID group (or set one up) and help get the message out by
producing and distributing information against ID in community & social
centres, libraries, health centres and door-to-door. There is still a
lot to do to explain the basic facts of the scheme, as well as its
likely effects, and to work out effective forms of direct action.
ID will affect different groups in society in many different ways. We
know that applications to the Student Loans Company will be linked to
ID, probably so they can keep tabs on any address changes, and
university students may even need to have an ID card to get a loan.
Ex-Home Secretary Charles Clarke also wanted to gather ID information on
other students and school leavers through the Connexions Card scheme for
13â19 years olds. There are likely be big changes in levels of police
harassment for minority groups, and ID records could easily be used to
control access to benefits or healthcare.
Those in work can try and find out about any ID-related developments
there. Anti-ID groups will be pleased to hear from any council workers
or anyone else who can help the campaign find out when ID data
collection starts to happen locally, especially in areas that may be
chosen as a trial area for ID registration. A word of warning: local
councils, who are likely to be involved with collecting additional
personal data from the electoral role or council tax registers, are in
general very authoritarian against anyone taking autonomous action. They
also hate local people turning up in their cosy council houses to
protest, especially when they would rather maintain the illusion that
they are victims of a scheme instead of an integral part of it. Workers
in companies implementing the scheme, like Experian, may know details
about how their employer is planning to operate their part of it.
Personal information from passport applications will be used to build
the National Identity Register. Some data collection has already
started, taking face dimensions from passport photos. Later on,
applicants will have to attend in person to get fingerprints or eyes
scanned (69 Identity & Passport Service centres will be set-up around
the country from October 2006 for in-person applications). So, for
anyone who needs a new passport, it would be a good idea to get one now
before the new systems are up and running properly, making sure the
photo is not too clear so it is harder for the Passport Office to
extract facial data. One Post Office service for the newer photo ID
driving licence has your photo pre-checked so you can see what you can
get away with (postage is also included which can work out cheaper than
paying for this separately) â this may also be the case for passports.
There must be lots of individual ways to confound the ID scheme and
these can be shared in anti-ID groups, and even better, by telling
friends and neighbours. This will help build a mass refusal campaign,
because a scheme like this wonât be prevented by small numbers of
individuals helping themselves.
Remember that local politicians of whatever colour cannot be trusted.
Under the Tories, Labour council leaders enthusiastically issued poll
tax demands and court orders, sent in the bailiffs and condemned local
and national demonstrations as mindless riots. But as local people, we
supported each other, we defied the courts and saw off bailiffs. We were
angry and we fought back. Many of us disappeared off the registers for
good. There may be a local MP against ID in some areas, but lobbying has
been shown to be useless. We know that governments do not listen and
that ID will be beaten on the streets or not at all.
This is the text of a leaflet produced by Nottingham Defy-ID in February
2007, group in which AF members are involved. It was also reproduced in
the âNo Borders readerâ distributed at the No Borders camp at Gatwick in
September where a workshop was held on ID and Border control. The
leaflet examines the link between the introduction of identity cards and
databases resulting from the ID Cards Act of March 2006, and the British
stateâs intention to introduce much stricter border controls though a
new UK Borders Bill.
Groups and individuals in the Defy-ID network have for the last few
years been campaigning against the introduction of a national ID scheme,
biometric upgrading of passports, and the surveillance society in
general. At the same time, No Borders have been tirelessly protesting
against maltreatment and incarceration of asylum seekers in detention
centres and against repression by government (and privately run)
immigration âservicesâ.
Itâs becoming clearer than ever that these campaigns should be working
closely togetherâŠ
be used first on other âforeignersâ
The Home Office is now much more open about its intended use of a
biometric ID database scheme to control Britainâs borders. This is not
completely new- we know that ID technologies have always been tried out
first on asylum seekers. For example, the ARC âsmart cardâ that is
carried by asylum seekers is used for their regular reporting and to
obtain NASS payments from the post office. It is an ID card which goes
hand-in-hand with their digital photos and fingerprints being stored by
the Home Office. Asylum seekers are fingerprinted when they report to
their reporting centre or police station. Non-European Union visitors
will soon be made to have biometric visas, including those already in
Britain. Plus, the European Commission has already put in place a plan
to require children to be fingerprinted and photographed for passports
from at least the age of 12 years old (EU member states can decide to
make this even younger). What is perhaps less well known is this was
trialed on asylum seekers in Britain. Children as young as five are
known to have been fingerprinted at asylum centres in Croydon and
Liverpool, for example. Plus we are starting to hear about police mobile
fingerprinting units being used to further harass people in cars and on
demonstrations. The plan for a new National Identity Register has also
been dropped in favour of combining three existing databases to create a
âmeta-databaseâ: (1) The Home Office asylum-seeker database (2) The
Identity and Passport Service database, and (3) The Department of Work
and Pensions âNational Insuranceâ database. Although the eventual plan
is to extend ID cards and a meta-database to everyone in Britain, this
change of policy makes it clear that asylum seekers and other
âforeignersâ are first in line for more repression.
The government seems to have put the powers given to it by last yearâs
Identity Card Act on the back-burner (at least for now), whilst
biometric passport and visas are coming very soon. A new UK Border Bill
introduced by Home Secretary John Reid on 25 January 2007 now aims to
formally bring together border controls and compulsory ID. With relation
to Biometric registration the Bill (amongst other things): âconfers a
power to make regulations to require those subject to immigration
control to apply for a [...] âbiometric immigration documentâ; and to
require a biometric immigration document to be used for specified
immigration purposes, in connection with specified immigration
procedures, and in specified circumstances where a question arises about
a personâs status in relation to nationality or immigration.â
The single issue campaign No2ID has previously attempted to keep the
right-wing on board by telling them they can be against a national ID
scheme because it âwonât work to stop illegal immigrationâ. Countering
this, the Defy-ID network has seen that the governmentâs ID system will
work against immigrants. ID cards and databases will be used against
âforeignersâ in general as a central part of the governmentâs plan,
before they extend the scheme to everyone. The fact that ID cards and
fingerprinting technology has been tested on asylum seekers shows that
the state is prepared to impose ID on those people with the least voice
to oppose it, before rolling it out to the whole population. Together,
Defy-ID and No Borders could help get the message across that the
government is trying to get its ID plans accepted by cynical
scapegoating of immigrants and asylum-seekers. This would hopefully make
for a stronger anti-ID campaign that is based on solidarity rather than
fear.
Borders & DefyID
Those involved with No Borders (UK) and other refugee support groups
already have a strong involvement in the emerging network of autonomous
social centres in Britain. Many progressive anti-ID activists are also
involved with social centres. This is true in Nottingham with activists
using the Sumac Centre as a focus for Defy-ID campaigning, for example.
As well as strengthening links between campaigns, social centres could
also help keep an eye on the development of the Identity and Passport
Serviceâs 69 new Authentication by Interview âinterrogationâ centres for
passport (and ID card) applications.
Defy-ID is a national campaign fighting ID, and there are many local
groups who would love to hear from you.
âDefy-ID is not a national membership organisation, it is a network of
groups from around the UK. Local groups form the basis for resistance to
every stage of the introduction of ID cards and could involve all kinds
of campaigning methods. The best way to get involved is to contact your
nearest group. If there is not one in your area perhaps you should think
of forming one. However, the idea is not necessarily that groups would
be formed specifically to protest against the identity card scheme, but
also that existing groups could join the Defy-ID network. Such a group
might, for example, be a community group, anti-fascist, environmental,
animal rights, tenants association or asylum seekers support group.â
You can find out more about Defy-ID on the web and find further ideas
for action at:
or contact the Anarchist Federation and weâll attempt to put you in
touch.
There many groups around Britain opposing ID. Some of the local groups
the AF is involved with are in Liverpool, Manchester & Nottingham.
Haringey Against ID is a good contact in London.
For more Defy-ID groups see:
(although be aware that this list is quite old). See also
with No2ID local groups list. Now the bill has passed No2ID should be
moving away from lobbying towards more grassroots activities.
Group activities might include:
what itâs all about, and build up confidence to refuse
widely
Rather than concentrate only on the negatives (we know it will be bad),
itâs a good idea to get across the message that schemes like these have
been defeated before, and can be defeated again if we resist
collectively, not just as individuals.
The Liverpool and Nottingham groups have their own web presence. Check
these for regular meetings.
Liverpool Defy-ID
c/o News From Nowhere Bookshop
96 Bold Street
Liverpool L1 4HY
Email: mail [at] liverpool-defy-id.org.uk/
Web:
/
Nottingham and Notts Defy-ID
c/o The Sumac Centre
245 Gladstone Street
Nottingham
Forest Fields
Nottingham NG7 6HX
Phone: 0845 458 9595
E-mail: info [at] nottingham-defy-id.org.uk
Web:
/
and
(See Events Diary for meetings)
[1] Martin Niemöller âFirst they came for ...
And when they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out for me.â