Ron’s Blog

Big Brother and the "enhanced" driver’s license

There’s been a good bit of publicity about the new "enhanced" New York State Driver’s license recently. The license, which is available for an extra $30, allows you to cross the Canadian border on the ground without a passport. Of course, you didn’t need a passport to cross the Canadian border until just recently, so that’s a touch fishy. And now the cost of the passport has been jacked up to about $100, so you’re paying an extra $70 to not get the NYS Enhanced ID.

So why the obvious “encouragement” to do this? Because the enhanced license has an RFID chip in it that allows them to tracking and identifying you from a (small) distance and without your consent on a regular basis (and not just at the border). The chip can be activated to send a code identifying you even while it’s in your wallet, and at a distance of up to several meters away or so. They claim that there’s no actual personal information about you coded into the card (at least, not yet), but the card will carry a code that will uniquely identify you, and will be linked in a database available to government and law enforcement agencies who can then look you up on the spot. (And I’m sure nobody else will ever get access to that database, right? Because nobody ever loses a laptop with secure access or anything like that, right?)

Of course, even if you believe that the government and law enforcement would never use this technology for evil, and even if you think there would never be leaks of the database or access to it, you still will be walking around with a card that can be pinged without your knowledge and will provide a unique identifying code for you. Kind of like a number tattooed on your arm, but without being able to see your arm. And how long until non-governmental entities like corporations or identity-theft rings manage to independently build up a database of information about you linked to your code which will be sold to anybody who will pay.

They do send you an aluminum foil sleeve to put the license in if you want to shield it. But they know perfectly that (a) people will find this too much hassle, and not use it; and (b) the effectiveness of these sleeves is pretty questionable.

So here’s how it’s going to go: In step 1 (the current one), they offer this to us as a special enhancement that we can pay a little extra for, but will save us money on our (newly necessary and newly expensive) passport, as well as the big hassle of even having to get a passport for people who don’t have one already. Step 2 is in another year or two, when they eliminate the extra cost, and give it to everybody for free — it’s like a $30 gift from the government! To avoid criticism, they still let the wacky privacy nuts opt out and get the old kind, but they’ll make the option obscure and a big hassle.

Before you know it, everybody has them, they’ll stop even going through the charade of the opt-out and the little foil sleeves and now you’ve got a society where everyone is branded by giving them a chip that they have to carry to do their normal everyday activities (like driving, or writing a check), and branded in a way that allows identification at a distance and linkage to bundles of personal data about you.

Almost all of the coverage of the new license has been the light and fluffy kind — you know "Oh, isn’t this nice an convenient and high-tech — and such a money and time saver, too!" But if this isn’t the encroachment of Big Brother — tracking and identifying us without our consent or even knowledge — then what is?

When your unasked-for and bugged license or ID comes for you, I suggest you join me and stick it in the microwave on high.