Snippings

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Patronscan is the leading provider of ID-scanning/verification services to bars and restaurants, and one of its selling points is that it allows its customers to create shared blacklists of undesirable customers who can then be denied services at every other establishment that uses its services.

From Patronscan wants cities to require bars to scan your ID with its service so it can maintain a secret, unaccountable blacklist / Boing Boing:

This is, in essence, much the same as China’s social scoring except that it is operated by unaccountable private companies rather than by the government.

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“It builds on a prior RFID Labs’ initiative, Project Zipper, which studied RFID in retail supply chains, finding that retailers, brand owners and logistics providers all share data in different formats.”

From “Nike and Macy’s tinker with blockchain – Decrypt”.

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“Through adopting blockchain technology, the CHIP initiative enables partners to use a common language for better inventory visibility and data analysis.”

From “Nike and Macy’s tinker with blockchain – Decrypt”.

 

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The UK’s efforts to implement Open Banking have had zero positive impact on innovation in the banking sector, Monzo founder Tom Blomfield has warned.

Mr Blomfield cautioned that the flagship regulation, which was supposed to crack open the software of big banks and make it easier for consumers to switch services, has failed.

“The positive effect of Open Banking on innovation has been nil,” Mr Blomfield said. “I don’t see any businesses based on Open Banking in Europe whatsoever.”

From Monzo boss warns Open Banking reforms have ‘zero benefit’:

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For us the protection of a person’s digital identity is the overriding priority.

From Speech by President-elect von der Leyen in the EP:

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ISO/IEC 18013 establishes guidelines for the design format and data content of an ISO-compliant driving licence (IDL) with regard to human-readable features (ISO/IEC 18013-1), ISO machine-readable technologies (ISO/IEC 18013-2), access control, authentication and integrity validation (ISO/IEC 18013-3), and associated test methods (ISO/IEC 18013-4). It creates a common basis for general use and mutual recognition of the IDL without impeding individual countries/states in applying their privacy rules and national/community/regional motor vehicle authorities in taking care of their specific needs.

From Is a universal digital Driving Licence around the corner?:

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The organisers of Merchant Payments Ecosystem in Berlin this year were kind enough to invite me to deliver the keynote. Frank Meier is kind to say that “the Innovation Director at Consult Hyperion is largely responsible for the organisation and implementation of the MPE and is internationally regarded as one of the leading experts on digital money and digital identity“. 

Well! I’m flattered to be described this way, but the truth is that while I do provide input to Filip and his amazing team, I cannot take the credit for the organisation and implementation of MPE. I hope I can take some credit for framing the issues and setting the right tone for the event (Frank says “in his usual light-hearted manner, the Briton laid the cornerstone for a three-day conference marathon”) which was, as it always has been, excellent.

When I was in New York a couple of months ago I had to visit a couple of different buildings for various meetings. At the first building, I was asked for identification. As I am English and not North Korean, I don’t carry identification papers with me when I walk down the street and my British passport and British driving licence (neither of which the security guard could have verified even if I had shown them to him) were locked up securely back in the hotel safe. I presented my standard US identification document. This an old building pass from the previous Consult Hyperion office in midtown. It expired a couple of years ago, but it has my picture on it and it says “David Birch”. It was accepted without question and I was allowed in.

When I went into a second building on that same day, I was asked to scan my driver’s license! They had a scanner on the counter to read the barcode on the back of US driver’s licenses. Obviously I don’t have a US driver’s license, so I showed them my expired building pass again, I was given entry to the building.

If I did have the US driver’s license, then there’s no way I would have let them scan it.

Apart from the obvious fact that my ability to drive is unrelated to whether I have been invited to a meeting or not, nothing that is on my driving licence (except perhaps my name, which had already told the guy on the desk) is any of their business and by handing over my personal information to yet another random database held by yet another random company, I was vastly increasing the chance of my licence data and my personal details being being stolen.

It’s amazing how the driving licence has become an identity document and how machine-readable driving licences have become a vector for collecting personal information. One of my favourite stories about this relates to an experiment done in Washington state, in which researchers hooked up the driving licence scanner to a display over the door. As patrons entered the bar, their personal data was displayed above them for all to see! I imagine having your name, date of birth, address, height and weight displayed the moment you enter any establishment.

Why is this still going on? We live in a world of laser beams and robots on Mars, a world of digital signatures and blockchains. Why are we displaying data to people who don’t need it (or deserve it) instead of 

The first steps are already being taken. Consider this example taken from the IEEE Spectrum magazine: “A young woman sits at a bar on Bourbon Street in New Orleans and orders a beer. The bartender asks for identification. The bar patron pulls out her phone, clicks on an app, and displays a digital version of her driver’s license showing she is over 21. In response, the bartender pulls out her own phone, clicks on the same app, uses it to scan the woman’s digital license, and verifies that her information is legit”.

(I was beyond excited to discover than Louisiana is implementing a version of the “psychic ID” that I set out back in 2005!. [Here’s a paper about it from 2009.])

All of which explains why I am very interested in machine-readable driving licences (mDLs) and how we might use them to deliver population-scale identity. The ISO standard for mDLs is ISO 18013. It creates a common basis for general use and mutual recognition of the IDL without impeding individual countries/states in applying their privacy rules and national/community/regional motor vehicle authorities in taking care of their specific needs. and it is five parts as follows:

1. Guidelines for the design format and data content of an ISO-compliant driving licence (IDL) with regard to human-readable features.

2. Machine-readable technologies.

3. Access control, authentication and integrity validation.

4. Associated test methods.

5. Global interoperability.

So, ISO 18013-5 is the new global interoperability standard. Could digital driving licenses evolve into one form of global identity? Actually, I think the answer to this is yes, because ISO 18013-5 includes provisions for extensions to the data model to permit specific “regional” additions to the standard data (e.g., REAL ID across just the USA).

The American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators (AAMVA) published a useful white paper on “Mobile Drivers’ License Functional Needs” a couple of years ago.

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AAMVA Director of Identity Management Geoff Slagle said he does not believe there will be wide scale adoption of the digital licenses by either states or citizens anytime soon because:

·    No standards are currently in place for the actual DDL and how it will be used on the smartphone.

·    Equipment capability for law enforcement to use during traffic stops needs to be standardized.

·    Consumer apprehension over technology and privacy concerns will continue.

From Is a Digital Driver’s License in your Future?: NMA Weekly E-Newsletter #476 – National Motorists Association.

 

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The Australian House of Representatives Standing Committee on Social Policy and Legal Affairs meanwhile suggested the DTA come up with “minimum requirements for privacy, safety, security, data handling, usability, accessibility, and auditing of age-verification providers” and use the digital ID solution to implement plans to verify age for pornographic content.

From Australia to roll out digital IDs’ biometric features for public testing in 2020 | Biometric Update:

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As the global reserve currency, U.S. dollars are the most widely distributed notes in the world with around $1.75 trillion worth of cash in circulation globally, according to the Fed. Much that is circulated overseas, particularly in Asia where the dollar is often stronger than local currencies.

From Fed quarantines U.S. dollars repatriated from Asia on coronavirus caution – Reuters:

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One study finds that the productivity slowdown has been relatively widespread, while another has suggested that it was confined largely to two sectors: finance and manufacturing.

From If the UK is high tech, why is productivity growth slow? Economists weigh in | LSE Business Review:

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It is a bit of a puzzle. Why are financial services, which ought to be revolutionised by bots and blockchains, so unproductive? Or, to rephrase, why does the cost of financial intermediation in our economy appear insensitive to technological advancement?

Actually, it’s not that much of a paradox.