Premiership football club Stoke City have used an ID card system that requires all of their away fans travelling to fixtures to carry with them an ID Card to prove their identity. They have used this system since 2003, but they could soon scrap the system.
Tony Scholes, the chief executive of Stoke City, stated:
The away-card scheme is under constant review.
We are looking at it now and considering our options.
Stoke City have been using the identity cards to ensure that no fans who have been banned from attending their fixtures make it into the games. Stoke have a long history of a minority of abusive fans and the ID cards have helped to curb that.
However, due to trouble away at Bolton on the opening day of the season, Stoke are being penalised in two away games that could be potentially contentious. Games away to Wigan and Manchester City have been re-scheduled to combat any fears of crowd trouble.
Scholes says that the thoughts of Greater Manchester Police will be considered when they look at what to do with their ID card system.
The decision to change these kick offs will weigh very heavily in our thought process when we come to decide what to do about the away-cards.
We are very disappointed with the stance being taken by Greater Manchester Police and we feel that we are being fairly penalised based on a historic reputation.
Things like this should be based on our current behaviour, because we now have a very good reputation.
A break-in at a US ID card contractor is being investigated by the FBI. In the break-in, two laptops were taken that are used to process applications for ID cards for workers. The workers have access to the country’s seaports, posing a huge security risk for the United States.
According to the authorities, the computers, and other equipment including a camera and biometric equipment, was stolen from the institution this weekend. The FBI is investigating the theft and trying to assess whether there is any threat to national security.
A Transportation Security Administration spokesman, Christopher White, claims there is no risk as the computers are wiped of their data on a daily basis, and any information that is contained on them is encrypted.
Bennie Thompson, by House Homeland Security Committee Chairman, stated:
Security of personal data is paramount to our national security. The fact that these computers were not secured, is unfathomable and irresponsible.
The ID cards that the computers are used to process have been hugely criticised because the background checks performed are intrusive, and the worker has to foot the bill for the card, which comes in at $132.50
As the launch of the government’s identity card system looms ever closer, the last thing they needed was another embarrassing loss of personal data. Sadly, that’s just what happened, as 50,000 data records for current and former RAF staff have been lost by the MOD.
The MOD is investigating the data loss, which is believed to be linked to the disappearance of three portable storage devices from the Innsworth RAF base in Gloucestershire. Two of the three drives reportedly contain 50,000 personal files on RAF personnel, though the MOD doesn’t think that the data is being used for fraud.
An MOD spokesman stated:
An urgent assessment is underway into the detailed nature of the data that was on the drives.
The theft of these hard drives from a secure location, where they were subject to physical protection standards consistent with the Data Handling Review, is being treated with great seriousness.
This is the latest high profile blunder that has seen government bodies lose personal data, including the 330,000 criminal records that were lost on a USB stick and the 25 million child benefit records that were lost by the HMRC last year.
Public trust in the government with the ID card system imminent is very low.
Home Secretary Jacqui Smith has unveiled the new design for the government’s national identity cards. The ID cards will be issued to all foreign nationals who intend to stay in the UK, either for work or for education. The ID cards will contain personal data such as biometric fingerprints, a photograph and the card holder’s name and date of birth.
In addition to that, the biometric chip will contain a digital image of the holder’s face.
Jacqui Smith stated when she unveiled the new design for ID card:
ID cards for foreign nationals will replace old-fashioned paper documents, make it easier for employers and sponsors to check entitlement to work and study, and for the UK Border Agency to verify someone’s identity. This will provide identity protection to the many here legally who contribute to the prosperity of the UK, while helping prevent abuse.
It is hoped by the government that the cards will help the security efforts of the UK and that they’ll assist in ensuring that illegal immigrants are unable to enter the country.
The official who lost data documents on a train in Waterloo station this summer is to be charged with breaching the Official Secrets Act. At the time the documents were left on the train, containing the data of millions of UK citizens, the man was on secondment from the MOD.
Luckily for the MOD, and the people who’s details were in the documents, someone found them on the train and handed them into the BBC, before they were then passed on to the police.
The man who lost the documents, which represent a serious breach of security and a potential identity theft risk, is being charged with clause 8.1 of the official secrets act.
Frank Gardner is the defence correspondent for the BBC. He claims that the news will be a surprise for many at Whitehall.
They will have thought this was being dealt with internally at the MoD and Cabinet Office.
The CPS recommended that the man be charged by the police.
Information on the documents also contained info on the movements of terrorists and deployment in Iraq.
According to an expert in biometrics who has worked first hand on the government’s ID card scheme, the scheme will have a very high failure rate. The ID cards will contain data that is held on a central database, and will prevent anyone from holding two identities as the fingerprints held on the cards will be unique; in theory at least.
John Daugman is a biometrics expert, and was part of the Biometrics Assurance Group who worked on the ID card scheme. He claims that the system’s dependence on matching fingerprints and photos in order to form a positive identification will cause the system to fail as it mismatches identifications.
According to Daugman, the 45 million population in the UK do not all have distinctive enough fingerprints for the scheme to work. Even if one in a million errors occurred, Daugman claims that there will still be one billion false matches.
The use of fingerprints will cause deduplication to drown in false matches.
The government was badly advised by its internal scientists in the Home Office when it took the decision to base the biometric system on fingerprints instead of iris patterns,” said Daugman. “Only iris patterns have enough randomness and distinctiveness to survive so many comparisons without making false matches.
However the Home Office denies his claims, stating that two schemes already in operation that are larger than the national identity card scheme have been working fine, including the FBI’s fingerprint database, which has over 50 million personal records on file.
Could the government’s £34 billion national identity card scheme be doomed to failure before it even gets underway? Just what is the future for the ID card scheme, that is scheduled to launch in the UK in November?
The identity card scheme was intended to be a major part of national security in the UK, helping to keep track of foreign nationals, aid in the fight against terrorism and become a compulsory requirement for every UK citizen.
The ID card scheme has already had six votes within the House of Commons, and has been defeated five times by the House of Lords. This has lead to a watered down version of the scheme being passed through.
As a result, what was intended to be a compulsory scheme is now only going to compulsory to foreign nationals. They cards are expected to cost £30 each. As a result of the cards not being compulsory, there is no need for any citizen in the UK to fork out the money for one.
The government’s ID card scheme is set to launch next month when cards are made available for airport workers and foreign nationals, however the much criticised scheme suffers from the major complaint that the cards won’t have any impact in the way in which they were intended.
There is an estimated 500,000 illegal immigrants in the UK at present, and even going by the government’s own estimate, it be at least another 5 years before even 90% of those immigrants are added to the ID card scheme.
Many workers who are working illegally in the UK already have National Insurance numbers which are incomprehensible to most UK employers. The government has already come down hard on employers stating that anyone who employs an illegal immigrant could receive a £10,000 fine and potentially face a prison sentence.
It is thought that with so few migrants actually going to be holding ID cards, they won’t be able to help curb the influx of illegal immigrants working in the UK.
If you’re a foreign national student looking to attend college or university in the UK, from November this year you will need to apply for a national identity card. To obtain one of these cards you’ll need to attend any one of the six centres around the country, located in Croydon, Cardiff, Birmingham, Liverpool, Sheffield and Glasgow in order to have your fingerprints taken and your photo taken.
When you have fingerprints and photo recorded, it’s known as the biometric information.
Once you have applied for an identity card, and assuming your application is approved, you’ll be issued with an ID card. This card will be used instead of the stickers that were previously added to passports for foreign nationals who are staying longer than normal in the UK.
You can make your application in person at Croydon, but you will have to have had your fingerprints and photo already recorded.
