Do Brits generally approve of the new compulsory national digital ID?

[MsAmerica]

I admit I don't know much about it, but I find it creepy.

Do you think it's in reaction to the immigrant problem, or what?

I have a national insurance number, there's literally no need for anything else.

I don't see the issue or see the slightest thing creepy about it!
Most Western countries have a form of ID and we already have a lot of information on us digitally anyway. HMRC records, NHS records, salary details , passport details NI number, driving licence etc etc.
This just brings it all together and makes it easier for potential employers to prove the identity of people they are employing. I am all in favour.

I hope not. But they have influence and that’s frightening.

They are very worrying, I agree, but hopefully will never have enough power to cause damage.

I'm on the fence about it at the moment. There are pros and cons.

I don't think it's anything like as creepy as what we're seeing going on in the US at the moment.

Surveillance? That's just nonsense.
Do you think the Government's in France , or Spain or most European Countries are spying on their citizens? Why would they?
Are you British? Do you use the NHS or pay taxes? Have a passport? Or a driving license? If so there is already digital information out there about you.

Data and AI, a 2025 system will certainly use these.

But not in one place.
not in one attractive hackable place

and not at an additional cost of billions.

for no gain

I think you have completely misunderstood what the digital id is
You won't have to carry it if you don't want to.. So you won't get fined for not downloading it in your phone.
But Employers will have to check you have it before employing you and it will make it much easier to access services.

Well yes, it possibly can’t right now, but the slow creep of a centralised ID database makes all of these things possible. Finnish citizens have expressed concerns over privacy and security, you might be fine with it, but you don’t speak for the whole country.

Is it true that Finland’s digital ID is entirely voluntary at the moment too?

just this year there is call for more access to data for police and immigration services to have greater access to data for crime/health use cases. Indeed Finnish police have already had their knuckles rapped for using facial recognition software illegally.

More and more of this is likely to happen if all our personal information is accessible via a single ID. It simply provides too much power and will eventually lead to misuse of it doesn’t already. That’s just humans for you.

its a slippery slope.

Mission creep....big brother, beware

It will make a small number of people involved in the tech even richer than they already are while costing the country a fortune. For zero benefit. It won't stop illegal migration which is how starmer is selling it.

It just strikes me as pointless.

There is no compulsory 'digital ID' as such (but compulsory identification numbers that link up everything online) but in practice almost everyone uses digital ID via either their bank, mobile certificate, or an electronic ID card because you need to use them to identify yourself online for things like renewing your passport, booking appointments, accessing health records, accessing benefits portal, registering as unemployed etc. it is possible to do these things by paper forms but that's mostly foreigners who haven't been able to get a Finnish bank account yet, or the very elderly who can't manage online.

Do you mean Clearview? That did not comply with Finnish law, but they used it on advice of Europol, to try and find victims of CSE. Illegal, but not exactly an example of misuse with ill intent. And they stopped using it.

All my personal information is accessible via a single ID, but no single authority can access it all, they can only access information relevant to them, when allowed to do so.

ID cards be useful especially when you are accessing healthcare and education....

But like all these things it's the cost at a time when we are meant to be prioritising.

I'm not worried about surveillance to be honest because that's already an issue with the tech we carry around

"We are not supposed to live like this."

I find myself thinking this exact same sentence on a regular basis these days @MrLarsonsNailGun

"Maybe you could detail all the personal freedoms that people in Iceland, Belgium, Finland or Spain have lost."

Maybe you could consider that for the people who don't want to have a digital ID linked to various aspects of their lives, being forced to by the government is itself a loss of freedom.

Maybe you might also like to consider that Britain is not Iceland, Belgium, Finland or Spain? That we're an entirely different country, culture, government and population and what happens in those countries don't automatically relate to what will happen in ours?

I already did a big post, but think centralised ID is a good thing if managed correctly. To cut down on fraud and benefit fraud, health tourism, illegal working etc. But it needs to be backed up with other processes to actually police this.

Please tell which services and how having a digital I.D will make it easier for me to access those services.

How would it be policed?

Fine with me. Nothing to hide and frankly I find the “oooo no they are watching me” attitude a bit ridiculous. They have all your data anyway!

Always had an ID card in the European country I lived in for decades.

Take your tin foil hats off.

As @Cleo65 says, there are already NI numbers in the UK.

Starmer has said that digital IDs could play an important part in making the UK less attractive to illegal migrants.

How is his scheme different to NI numbers or slightly adjusted NI?

If I were to employ someone illegally in the UK now I would, hypothetically, pay cash in hand and they would pay neither NI nor Income tax, be under the radar, and ineligible for a range of benefits. They are illegal.

Oh no, the Starmer card! I'm going to have to switch from what I am doing (hypothetically) to... oh scratch that.

I feel similarity when reading this but what is good about it? What will it do that’s useful?

Why are so many people so keen to say they have nothing to hide... this is about proving eligibility to work in this country.

Basically Euan Blair couldn't get even our craven and hapless government to pay for his software bootcamp any more so we've got to award him a new beano.

There's already a right to work system www.gov.uk/view-right-to-work

Mine is really useful. I listed above the ways I use it daily. No taking a utility bill to prove ID etc. Everything is joined up. Though I hasten to add (again) not everything is in the same place