Quantcast
Channel: India | Biometric Update
Viewing all articles
Browse latest Browse all 946

Is UK voter requirement an opportunity for biometric ID documents?

$
0
0
New opinions offered on how the UK can deal with the contradiction of a new law requiring ID to vote while the country has no national ID, while Uganda investigates the shortcomings of its own ID system and the Indian city of Mysuru (Mysore) is now requiring ID verification for all tenants.

Voter ID in the UK: exclusionary or an opportunity?

UK residents will have to show photographic identification when voting at polling stations in some elections from May 2023, following April’s passing of the Elections Act 2022.  According to the new rules, supported IDs will include passports, driving licenses, biometric immigration IDs and specific electoral identity documents or cards, as already available in Northern Ireland. LSE law professor Ben Stanford believes that excluding university ID cards and young person’s travel cards from the lists “adds weight to criticisms that the new voter ID requirement is politically motivated.” Writing in a blog post on the LSE website, Stanford adds that the list of acceptable identification has been deliberately limited, ultimately being disadvantageous to younger people and minorities. “Moreover, in contrast to many other democracies, the UK does not provide a free, mandatory national identity card which may help to mitigate some of these problems,” the law expert adds. “Acquiring the acceptable identification may pose a challenge, not just in financial terms, but also practically.” Stanford also argues that while the introduction of voter ID may bring the rest of the UK in line with Northern Ireland and the established practices of other democracies, the process of doing so has raised many problems. “There have been mounting restrictions on the ability to protest, seeming disregard for international law in the context of UK-EU relations, a breakdown of integrity and standards in Government and parliament and a reduction of independence for the UK’s elections watchdog, the Electoral Commission,” the professor says. “In this context, rushing through the introduction of voter ID in Great Britain is more than just problematic. It is indicative of an alarming pattern of recent democratic backsliding.” But although biometric passports can be used as voter ID in the UK, they are technically considered ID documents in the country. More broadly, there is no compulsory ID in the UK, biometric or otherwise. “I would make the UK biometric passport the ID card for all those that have a biometric passport and allow those nationals of countries with a verifiable biometric system that legal right to have their passport as their ID card,” says House of Lords member John Mann, in an editorial for The Yorkshire Post. The MP also adds that such a system would benefit the UK not only in terms of work benefits but also for banking and other areas of society. “Nobody with a biometric passport can legitimately claim that my ID card proposal in any way impacts on them, as they already have a passport,” Mann writes. “Those citizens of other countries with a biometric passport would also be exempt.” Mann adds that he believes biometric ID should be compulsory in the UK, and that under his proposal, 90 percent of adults would immediately have one.

No backup contracted with Uganda’s biometrics registry from Mühlbauer

The cost of national ID registries and the security of the data they collect have both been stumbling blocks in the UK and elsewhere. In Uganda, German firm Mühlbauer told the House Committee on Defence and Internal Affairs that it did not set up a backup system when creating the country’s National Security Information Systems (NSIS) in 2010. According to Mühlbauer’s vice president Matthias Karl Kohler, the backup system “was not part of our contract,” reports Monitor. The testimony was during hearings into the security of the national identity registry and ID card system, following a hack of the National Security Information Systems (NSIS) revealed in October. During the meeting, the chairperson of the House committee, Rosemary Nyakikongoro, said the situation was hazardous. “All the information that we have collected for the last ten years can be lost in case of any outbreak.” The news comes days after the Ugandan parliament announced plans to investigate the problems surrounding the country’s current national digital ID card project, which is run by German company Veridos.

Indian city extends Aadhaar to mandatory tenant registration

Police forces in the Indian city of Mysuru in the southwestern Karnataka State have made it mandatory for landlords to verify the identity of their tenants before the end of December 2022, The Hindu reports. According to the daily, the move follows a recent incident and possible terror attack at a rented accommodation in the city. The new guidelines will require tenants to provide personal information to both the landlord and the police. Accepted documents include passports, driving licenses and, of course, Aadhaar biometric ID cards. Landlords and owners of hotels and lodges who fail to complete the identity verification process will be held liable in the event of a tenant’s involvement in any criminal activity.

Viewing all articles
Browse latest Browse all 946

Trending Articles