Proposals for mandatory digital ID have gained traction with alarming speed, with Keir Starmer now confirming he is considering implementing a digital ID scheme as a supposed means of combating illegal immigration. He is expected to make an announcement at the Labour Party conference set to start on 28 September in Liverpool.
The introduction of a mandatory digital ID for every adult in the UK is now clearly an imminent possibility, despite the government having no clear mandate to implement one. Digital ID was not included in the Labour Party manifesto, there has been no public consultation, and Parliament has been given no chance to weigh in, with Downing Street seemingly barreling ahead without so much as waiting for the findings of the Home Affairs Committee’s inquiry into digital ID.
Big Brother Watch recently published a crucial report, ‘Checkpoint Britain: the dangers of digital ID and why privacy must be protected,’ detailing our extensive concerns over mandatory digital ID proposals. A mandatory digital ID scheme would completely reverse the nature of our relationship with the state, turning Britain into a “papers, please” society and inserting the state into many everyday interactions. Digital ID would usher in a new era of mass surveillance and irreversibly damage our civil liberties.
Further, digital ID is highly unlikely to deliver on the government’s stated promises to tackle illegal immigration. Digital ID simply will not stop small boat crossings or reduce the ‘pull factors’ that encourage migrants to come to the UK. Those who already evade legal requirements when it comes to employment or accommodation are likely to recede even further into the shadows rather than using digital ID to comply with any ‘right to work’ or ‘right to rent’ checks.
Honeypot for hackers
To the contrary, digital ID will place a burden on already law-abiding citizens to go through myriad digital checkpoints in going about our everyday lives, forcing us onto an online system that could prove prone to system failures and inaccuracies, such as those that have plagued the eVisa system. Creating a vast centralised database with troves of sensitive information would be a veritable honeypot for hackers, rendering us all vulnerable to data breaches, hacks, or other compromises of our personal data.
Recent YouGov polling commissioned by Big Brother Watch shows a more nuanced picture than what proponents of digital ID would have us believe. A staggering 63 percent of respondents said they did not trust the government to protect their data that would be captured by a digital ID system. Cyberattacks and the erosion of privacy were cited as the top concerns associated with a mandatory digital ID.
Since the 1950s, the British public has reliably rejected each and every mandatory ID proposal, whether in the form of ID cards or now an even more menacing digital version. The current proposals for mandatory digital ID should be rejected too, and the government must find solutions for illegal immigration and other complex societal issues that do not erode the privacy rights of the entire population. The stakes for our civil liberties have never been higher.
Rebecca Vincent is the Interim Director of Big Brother Watch, a UK civil liberties organisation.
