This scheme has got everything going for it: large scale public sector IT implementation; overtones of big brother/Gattaca; massive potential for mission creep.
Can’t help but be a massive plus in my book, right?
Except, of course, for the obvious:
- The phrase with their permission is mentioned in the article, and will probably be the rule for the pilot scheme. For the full scheme? Maybe not. And what of people who cannot give legal consent, will they be asked for fingerprints without an appropriate adult?
- Fingerprints won’t be kept, is that how it is? Somehow, I doubt that that little hurdle will stay in place for very long. What with the well documented obsession of UK.gov with gathering fingerprints and DNA from people wot aren’t criminals…
- I’m no expert, so I’ll leave this dangling out there with no commentary: it’s going to be sent (encrypted, granted) over the phone network. Alarm bells are ringing…
Apart from all that, clearly it’s a bad idea anyway. Did nobody watch Gattaca, fer crying out loud?
Heard this on the lunchtime news today. At the moment we’re allowed to withhold our consent but the minister admitted when questioned that that could be changed in a heartbeat.
Of course it’s all about the motoring publics comvenience and freeing up police time. Maybe then they’ll be able to carry out employment police checks a lot more quickly than the current six weeks.
…this stinks worse than the lagan at low tide on a hot day.
“Excuse me sir, I know it’s not mandatory..yet..but would you mind putting your finger on this pad?” “You don’t want to, now why is that, have we something to hide sir?” Officer Reasonable Suspicion then gets the dabs.
For me the alarm bell rang itself of the wall quite some time ago. What are the chances of another political party gaining power and rescinding all this fascist legislation. Did I really type that? My, oh my.
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