Digital ID back on the table in UK as a way to manage migration

Digital ID programs have a patchy history in the UK. First pushed by Tony Blair’s Labour government in the mid-2000s, it faced sharp criticism and public pushback, and was scrapped in 2010 by the coalition government of Prime Minister David Cameron.

Now, the government of PM Kier Starmer is considering issuing digital ID cards as a way to manage migration. In comments made during the Five Eyes Summit, UK Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood reiterates her longstanding support for digital ID, and notes that she supported the Blair government’s initial introduction of ID cards.

“Those who are familiar with my political track record will know that is something that I’ve always supported,” Mahmood says in an interview with CNN.

The Home Secretary does little to assuage concerns about digital ID being used as a tool to consolidate government control, suggesting it could be used to dissuade migrants from coming. “As home secretary,” she says, “I’m very clear we do have to deal with the pull factors that are making the UK a destination of choice for those that are on the move around the world. I want to make sure that we can clamp down on that.”

“I think that a system of digital ID can also help with illegal working enforcement of other laws as well. So there is a broader piece of work here to be done by government.”

Asked by a reporter just how broad that work could get – specifically, “could we be in a situation where everybody would be compelled to have a digital ID at some point?” – Mahmood answers that “the government’s position at the moment is to look at digital ID further rollout.”

It also has a familiar booster: the Tony Blair Institute has once again joined the chat to advocate for a national digital identity scheme.

Problem is not identity, but authorization: David Birch

The big question then is, can the UK get it right this time? What went wrong, and what’s changed? This is exactly what When Technology Goes Wrong asks David Birch, global authority on digital identity and fintech, in a recent episode.

Birch begins by unpacking the language of digital identity. “A lot of people use digital identity as essentially quite a generic term – they just mean some form of ID that works online,” he says. “Whereas to me it’s a much more specific thing: digital identity is essentially the relationship between online and offline identity.”

Birch identifies three building blocks for his concept. “One is the identification itself. Is this digital identity linked to you. The second thing is the authentication. Is the person using this actually the person it was linked to. And the third thing is the authorization, which is okay, what are they allowed to do, now they have this?”

Birch argues that a key problem is a tendency to focus on identification (who are you) when the actual issue is authorization (are you permitted to do this).

“In our mental model of where we should be building digital identity infrastructure, we need to get away from this thing about proving who you are. That’s how you see it in a lot of the sort of media commentary on it: ‘it’s my right as an Englishman. It’s in the Magna Carta. Why should I have to prove who I am?’”

“Well, I agree. You shouldn’t have to prove who you are to people. That’s not the issue. The issue is what you are. Are you over 18? Do you have a ticket for this event on this day or whatever?” – i.e., are you a legitimate customer?

A focus on proving who you are is loaded with associations to authoritarianism and state control, whereas permissions are a common experience of everyday life in both the physical and virtual worlds. To underscore the point for “the young people,” Birch looks to resurgent British rock band Oasis.

“It’s 2025. You should not be in the position where you can buy a counterfeit Oasis ticket. It should simply not be possible because a ticket should be a cryptographically certified credential, an authorization to go to this event, this seat, this night, you know, whatever. There should be no such thing as a counterfeit one.”

“I think a potential way of framing this to move it forward would be to stop talking about some sort of national identity scheme card, and talk instead about a national entitlement scheme. You know, what we’re trying to do is find ways to make it easy for people to demonstrate what they’re entitled to.”

Promise in framework model that enables multiple providers

To the paranoid set who fear that digital ID might lead to the government putting chips in their head, Birch has a hard truth: “basically, you’re not worth chipping, is the response to that.”

Social attitudes may have tanked a UK digital ID scheme the first time around, but Birch points out that the technology has developed radically.

“We have new cryptographic techniques available to us that are now tried and tested. We now have zero knowledge proofs and cryptographic blinding and homorphic encryption. We can now have security at scale and privacy at scale. That’s changed.”

“I think an older generation is thinning who associate identity with the war and Nazis, and you know, if you say to them we should have some sort of ID card then they see it as an expression of continental tyranny. And then the sort of more modern discussion, which is basically a generation of younger people now who are like, why am I sending a PDF?”

Regarding the migration issue, Birch points out that a digital ID card likely wouldn’t have a significant impact on many migrants who are coming illegally, anyway, and that it could be a catalyst for government action on digital identity beyond that use case. He notes with interest “places like Australia, New Zealand, Canada, places where they they’ve started to look at this more framework-based approach – which is where the UK is going as well at the moment where the government creates a framework for all of this, but it’s actually private companies that that populate that framework and make it all work.

“I think this kind of idea where you have a much richer infrastructure, you have more providers. to me seems more appealing. I quite like the idea that in the same way that you have four or five credit cards or four or five payment cards in your wallet, you would have like four or five identities. You know, if I’m talking to my financial advisor or I’m trying to buy some shares or, you know, whatever my insurance company, then I should be using my bank ID or my financial services ID. But that’s not the ID that I want to use for my Man City supporters group. It’s not the ID that I want to use for my Dungeons and Dragons gaming association.”

The idea that my one ID is me in all circumstances and can be tracked and traced, that’s not quite right. I think we should allow people to have a handful of different identities that they use.”

We binned digital ID before, we’ll bin it again: Big Brother Watch

Not everyone is convinced. A piece in Big Issue argues that the migration issue is an obvious pretense. “The proposal for digital IDs shows how performative the scheme really is, because the truth is that a system is already in place for millions of us migrants in the UK.”

“It’s called the eVisa system, and since January of this year, it has transitioned more than four million people to a digital-only immigration status. Before that, more than five million EU citizens have been using this system to prove their rights after Brexit. Every migrant in this country is required to navigate this system to access any service. Whether it’s opening a bank account, securing a job, or renting a property, we must prove our immigration status.”

“It’s now looking like we’ll all be burdened with another expensive shiny project purporting to fix the government’s political problems on immigration.”

On a similar theme, a new report from Big Brother Watch warns that a UK with mandatory digital ID is destined to become “Checkpoint Britain.”

“Within days of coming to power after the last general election, Keir Starmer’s government committed to not implementing a digital ID scheme,” says a release from the group.

“Unfortunately, the government now seems to be on the brink of reversing course and forcing every adult in the UK into a mass surveillance infrastructure that will gather troves of sensitive information and insert the state into everyday interactions – all in the name of tackling illegal immigration.”

The report cites independent polling commissioned by Big Brother Watch through YouGov, showing that a clear majority of people (63 percent) do not trust the government to keep their digital ID data secure.

Interim Director of Big Brother Watch Rebecca Vincent says “the notion that digital ID will provide a magic-bullet solution for unauthorised immigration is ludicrous. It will not stop small boat crossings, and it will not deter those intent on using non-legal means of entering the country from doing so. But digital ID will create a huge burden for the largely law-abiding 60 million people who already live here and insert the state into many aspects of our everyday lives.”

“The British people have a long and proud history of rejecting mandatory ID, and we shoud reject this one too. The stakes for our privacy rights have never been higher.”

Article Topics

Big Brother Watch  |  biometrics  |  David Birch  |  digital ID  |  identity management  |  UK  |  UK digital ID