Surely there will soon be a roaring trade in fake vaccination cards?

[LadyAcony]

Just that really. It seems clear that if so many people don't want to be vaccinated but nonetheless want to do things that require proof of vaccination, there are going to be a lot of fake vaccination cards/certificates around.

If passports can be faked fairly easily, presumably this will be the same.

Yeah, I'm doing a roaring trade in faked red books for babies

Just watched James Cleverley try to avoid Kay Burley’s questions on this topic. WHY can’t we have politicians that have the common decency to respond to the question being asked?

Seems likely. I do wish upon the the government as many obstacles as possible to make C19 vaccines mandatory (either by the front door or back).

I'm not sure passports can be faked easily, but the process of a vaccine card obviously can't be anything like as secure.

@Refractory

I do wish upon the the government as many obstacles as possible to make C19 vaccines mandatory (either by the front door or back)

Already a petition for Parliament to debate this on 14th December

petition.parliament.uk/petitions/323442

I don't think the vaccine card will be any form of immunity pass - this bit is just a record of what you had and when

If they wanted to bring in a pass, it would need to be backed by some sort of central record (a bit like DVLA, proof of licence and car hire)

@Summerstorms

Yeah, I'm doing a roaring trade in faked red books for babies

I don't see how that's equivalent?

refractory yeah I suppose by 'fairly easily' I mean that before passports with chips in them, it apparently wasn't TOO difficult to buy a stolen/adjusted/faked passport that would be good enough to get you in or out of a country. Not that I really know much about it!

In a lot of ways I don't really have skin in the game because I'm able to have the vaccine and I'm planning to do so when it's available to me. It was more a musing along the lines of "well this seems like the logical next step". If I was unable to be vaccinated I'd probably find it a lot more distressing.

With any luck all of this will turn out to have been a huge fuss about nothing and many/most people will be happy to have the jab anyway. It's impossible to figure out much of what's going on by reading the papers these days!

I don't see how that's equivalent?

Because the Red Book contains the basic record of which jabs batch your DC had, which batch and when. This is a new version for adults, who may well not still have their Red Book, or have ever had a Yellow Book (international certificate of vaccination)

There's a big difference between a patient record such as this, and something intended to be used as proof.

I expect your NHS record will be updated (like it is for all immunisations - even if you're done in a pharmacy, if you are getting the jab in the NHS they send off the form so it can be added (whether it actually is, is another question)

It’s going to be a while until the under 50’s are offered vaccinations, so people will be suspicious if someone in their 20’s, 30’s and 40’s has one. Even those over 16 with existing conditions are 6th in line for vaccine.

It hasn't got your photo on though so you would need other proof of ID. It just a record to keep as that is what they think people want. And to piss off the under 50s who probably won't get one anytime soon

that card isn't anything like an immunity passport. It is more of a reminder to come back for the 2nd shot.

Can passports be faked easily? Really? Outside of a Bourne movie?

Well, people can petition the UK government all they want to prevent restrictions but the UK government can't control what other countries do so people need to get used to the fact they may not be able to travel to countries with low or no cases of covid (and rightly so) if they are not willing to get the appropriate vaccinations.

@FourTeaFallOut

Can passports be faked easily? Really? Outside of a Bourne movie?

Exactly. They all have mini microchips in them these days so very very difficult. (they didn't have the microchips issue in the Bourne movies).

These cards will be easy to fake, yes, but they don't really prove anything so all a bit pointless.

Passports cannot be faked easily and haven’t been able to be easily faked for decades. Possibly, while the system is set up there may be a few forgeries. If it’s going to be a long term thing needed for travel then I’m sure they’ll make them harder to copy.

In this modern age, I really can't see that the "certificate" would be a piece of paper. Far more likely to be some kind of database.

Maybe similar to the driving licence system for hiring a car abroad where you go online and get a number which the foreign hire car firm can tap into their system which gives them very limited access to pertinent information about your driving licence.

No need for plastic "ID" style cards, certificates, etc. Just a simple app linked to your GP record (like the new online appointment & prescription ordering systems), where you tap a button to ask for a code. At the airport or wherever, you give the code or show them the code on your phone to scan, they check on their app on a phone or tablet, to confirm you've be vaccinated. Not rocket science. We're already accustomed to bar codes for others to scan for confirming your entry ticket to events, picking up a parcel at an Amazon hub, boarding passes to get on an aircraft, etc.

The "proof of vaccination" may even be part of the booking system for air travel. Like the USA entry visa waiver scheme, where you have to enter your waiver certificate number into the airline system when you confirm your booking.

Probably going to be impractical to implement in any 100% secure way, it just opens up a whole can of worms, how are they going to check who's getting the vaccine the first place without requiring photo ID? A lot of the prime targets for the vaccine like pensioners don't have photo ID. Might be easier if the UK had a standard photo ID card, but it doesn't.

The photos in the media are just a little cardboard rectangle so surely it's worthless as evidence as far too easy to print out with any graphic design software and decent printer.
If they really wanted to have a vaccination passport or certificate, it would need to be more like a bank card with a microchip etc, photo perhaps.
Also the concept makes no sense whilst the majority of the population who want a vaccination can't even get one and won't for months, not even if they were willing to cover the cost.
I think I would boycott any organisation that tried to enforce having a tiny bit of cardboard given after receiving a vaccination that I won't even be allowed to have to months and months.

Here's what our esteemed Prime Minster used to have to say on the matter, the chap who represented the party elected to power:

“If I am ever asked, on the streets of London, or in any other venue, public or private, to produce my ID card as evidence that I am who I say I am, when I have done nothing wrong and when I am simply ambling along and breathing God’s fresh air like any other freeborn Englishman, then I will take that card out of my wallet and physically eat it in the presence of whatever emanation of the state has demanded that I produce it.”

@BlueBrian

Probably going to be impractical to implement in any 100% secure way, it just opens up a whole can of worms, how are they going to check who's getting the vaccine the first place without requiring photo ID? A lot of the prime targets for the vaccine like pensioners don't have photo ID. Might be easier if the UK had a standard photo ID card, but it doesn't.

Yes, if the UK have a national ID card then they could have linked them by the ID number at least, but in the absence of any form of ID that everyone has, there is no way of doing this without setting up a whole government department equivalent to the DVLA or passport office.

Also the concept makes no sense whilst the majority of the population who want a vaccination can't even get one and won't for months, not even if they were willing to cover the cost.

Absolutely - I'm baffled that people think this might become a thing, except possibly for international travel (where there are lots and lots of precedents). What businesses do people imagine are going to be only welcoming people aged over 70 for months on end?! By the time all adults get the opportunity to have a vaccine we'll have been out of a pandemic situation for months if not longer, so no one will then want to suddenly introduce restrictions on their customers.

The photos in the media are just a little cardboard rectangle so surely it's worthless as evidence as far too easy to print out with any graphic design software and decent printer.

I haven't seen the pictures but that just sounds like a reminder card.

@FourTeaFallOut

I understand that the fuss is not about whether it's a card, red book, etc

The issue that people have with them is whether you will have to produce it in order to access services, venues, etc

[quote trulydelicious]@FourTeaFallOut

I understand that the fuss is not about whether it's a card, red book, etc

The issue that people have with them is whether you will have to produce it in order to access services, venues, etc[/quote]
But says who? I've seen a lot of scaremongering on this, but nothing reputable, and it just makes no sense. The options a business who wants to do this will have are:

a) only have people aged 80+ for quite a while, then 75+, then 70+, etc., so spending months having only a tiny proportion of your possible customers
b) shut entirely until all adults have been offered a vaccine and then reopen
c) operate without requiring proof of vaccination for many months and then introduce it as a new requirement despite the fact that by then, since all the most vulnerable will have been vaccinated for some time, deaths and hospitalisations will have been low for months and most if not all restrictions will have been lifted

Do any of these seem like options that many businesses are likely to take?

Sure, I understand that their are concerns about civil liberties for some people and to that extent the format of the evidence is by the by.

But if the concern for others is the ease of replication and the opportunity for fraud then it absolutely does matter if the press is passing off a reminder card as a prototype for this evidence of vaccination.