Everyone in the UK will already be familiar with this story with the New Labour's plan for biometric identity cards. That plan, which costs billions of pounds and was later shelved by the new coalition government, will now probably never happen in the UK.
Now US President Barak Obama wants to increase Internet Security by creating an "identity ecosystem" for the Internet. The US government is stressing this is not a national identity card system, though it would be hard to see how it would not be used as such by law enforcement and banks.
A spokesperson said "We are not talking about a national ID card, we are not talking about a government-controlled system. What we are talking about is enhancing online security and privacy; reducing and perhaps even eliminating the need to memorize a dozen passwords, through creation and use of more trusted digital identities."
Many banking websites already use your existing card with a chip and pin reader to authenticate your usage. It's not yet know what for such a card would take but, while the US government has stressed that "anonymity and pseudonymity will remain possible on the Internet", this is a move that will be resisted by a great many libertarian Americans and that will be watched very carefully by government s elsewhere in the world.
News Source : Us News
