We've had plenty of discussions about the Real ID Act here on Politech,
including these:
http://www.politechbot.com/2007/02/09/california-officials-like/
http://www.politechbot.com/2007/01/25/maine-becomes-first/
http://www.politechbot.com/2005/03/24/john-gilmore-on/
But so far it's been difficult to figure out how bad the bloody law will
be in practice. That's because the Department of Homeland Security has
remarkably broad power to come up with regulations, which they finally
did in draft form:
http://www.dhs.gov/xlibrary/assets/nprm_realid.pdf
Here's a summary I wrote trying to put this in perspective:
http://news.com.com/2100-1028_3-6163509.html
Among the outstanding unanswered questions: Will the final rules include
an RFID tag? Will all drivers licenses have a standard design dictated
by Homeland Security? Will the information that has to be stored on the
nationalized licenses (in the form of a 2D barcode) be encrypted?
The deadline extension by Homeland Security was cunning. It's almost
certainly intended to fragment opposition in state capitals. If the
federalized ID card doesn't have to be complete until 2013 -- the
earlier date was 2008 -- state DMVs won't be as alarmed right now and
voters won't be either.
Here's some more background:
http://www.epic.org/privacy/id_cards/
http://www.realnightmare.org/
-Declan
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