National ID Card
- Thread starter THENASH
- Start date
invention_45
New member
Odd Job:
If I didn't know better, given all the things we use a SSN for, I would have also assumed it to have at least a photo if not more security features. I blink my eyes in disbelief every time I look at it.
Mine is on a powder blue card, about the size of a business card. There doesn't seem to be anything special about the paper. No flecks of color. No threads. Printed, in red, I think, is a standard border with "Social Security" at the top (I guess so that a thief can readily identify it). On the back are some instructions, like what to do if lost or something like that. And the number itself is typed, as if with an old typewriter, in black in the middle of a blank field. As issued, it isn't laminated in plastic, just plain paper.
A few years ago, at least in Florida, credit card theft was so rampant that it became illegal for a merchant to require a credit card as a form of ID. So, in its place, a lot of people started using their SSNs. Now it's become a de-facto ID number for things like your college student ID number, your health care insurance ID number, your basic identifying number at the bank, even though you can change your accounts to be named with an alias.
If you are arrested you have to give your SSN. I know this because I did a search on myself and, to my surprise, found that I'd been arrested. Well, it wasn't actually me, and from the record it is obvious what happened. The idiot picked four sequential SSNs and gave them to the police, one being mine. I haven't bothered to get it corrected because it's so obvious from the file what happened.
This sloppily-secured number, once obtained, can be put to a lot of misuse. If you are willing to stick your neck out a little (like a criminal would be) you can get my credit report, including my credit card numbers and other account numbers. You might be able to start collecting social security in my name. I'd then have to defend that with a lawyer. You could open a checking account using it and write a load of bad checks. I would find out about this next time I went to use a check. As long as I filed a police report, the bank would clear that account, but it would be a pain. You could get a house loan or car loan in my name.
All these things can be fixed, but it takes forever on the phone and by mail, and often requires a lawyer and takes a couple years.
You can sometimes convince the SS department to issue you a new SSN, but then you have to go through making sure everything you want linked to the new one is handled. I have heard you can have trouble getting jobs because employers might have trouble doing background checks or getting college records.
I can only speak for around here (FL) but I suspect that most places are the same, in that the driver's license is the main form of ID used in the US. That has a photo and, in FL, has some sort of holographic security thing and a magnetic stripe (if memory serves). It's what is required when you write a check to someone you don't know. The SSN doesn't get involved.
So the DL is a very important piece of ID.
Now get this one. In FL the DL number is made up of simply-coded information about you, like your birth year. So I'm not so sure that it couldn't be synthesized from other information. Back in the old days, before it had a photo, my brother gave my DL # and name when stopped to get out of a traffic ticket. My mother found out and raised hell and made him go downtown and sign an affidavit clearing me. I never even knew until I came home to visit.
So I'd say the state of having secure ID here in the US is pretty crappy.
Somebody said we can use our passports. While that's technically true, most people don't. Since most sales clerks aren't the most dedicated or experienced employees, a lot of them will just look at it and wonder what it is. Then you'll have to wait for a manager to show up and they'll probably accept it reluctantly.
If I didn't know better, given all the things we use a SSN for, I would have also assumed it to have at least a photo if not more security features. I blink my eyes in disbelief every time I look at it.
Mine is on a powder blue card, about the size of a business card. There doesn't seem to be anything special about the paper. No flecks of color. No threads. Printed, in red, I think, is a standard border with "Social Security" at the top (I guess so that a thief can readily identify it). On the back are some instructions, like what to do if lost or something like that. And the number itself is typed, as if with an old typewriter, in black in the middle of a blank field. As issued, it isn't laminated in plastic, just plain paper.
A few years ago, at least in Florida, credit card theft was so rampant that it became illegal for a merchant to require a credit card as a form of ID. So, in its place, a lot of people started using their SSNs. Now it's become a de-facto ID number for things like your college student ID number, your health care insurance ID number, your basic identifying number at the bank, even though you can change your accounts to be named with an alias.
If you are arrested you have to give your SSN. I know this because I did a search on myself and, to my surprise, found that I'd been arrested. Well, it wasn't actually me, and from the record it is obvious what happened. The idiot picked four sequential SSNs and gave them to the police, one being mine. I haven't bothered to get it corrected because it's so obvious from the file what happened.
This sloppily-secured number, once obtained, can be put to a lot of misuse. If you are willing to stick your neck out a little (like a criminal would be) you can get my credit report, including my credit card numbers and other account numbers. You might be able to start collecting social security in my name. I'd then have to defend that with a lawyer. You could open a checking account using it and write a load of bad checks. I would find out about this next time I went to use a check. As long as I filed a police report, the bank would clear that account, but it would be a pain. You could get a house loan or car loan in my name.
All these things can be fixed, but it takes forever on the phone and by mail, and often requires a lawyer and takes a couple years.
You can sometimes convince the SS department to issue you a new SSN, but then you have to go through making sure everything you want linked to the new one is handled. I have heard you can have trouble getting jobs because employers might have trouble doing background checks or getting college records.
I can only speak for around here (FL) but I suspect that most places are the same, in that the driver's license is the main form of ID used in the US. That has a photo and, in FL, has some sort of holographic security thing and a magnetic stripe (if memory serves). It's what is required when you write a check to someone you don't know. The SSN doesn't get involved.
So the DL is a very important piece of ID.
Now get this one. In FL the DL number is made up of simply-coded information about you, like your birth year. So I'm not so sure that it couldn't be synthesized from other information. Back in the old days, before it had a photo, my brother gave my DL # and name when stopped to get out of a traffic ticket. My mother found out and raised hell and made him go downtown and sign an affidavit clearing me. I never even knew until I came home to visit.
So I'd say the state of having secure ID here in the US is pretty crappy.
Somebody said we can use our passports. While that's technically true, most people don't. Since most sales clerks aren't the most dedicated or experienced employees, a lot of them will just look at it and wonder what it is. Then you'll have to wait for a manager to show up and they'll probably accept it reluctantly.
@ Invention 45
Thanks for the great post, that clears many things up for a foreigner like me. I have one more question, would you say that most people in the US have a driver's licence (apart from those adults who may not get one for medical reasons) ?
My drift is that those in favour of the new IDs may say that there isn't a standard ID document available to all US citizens at the moment and the ID card will fit that purpose.
Thanks for the great post, that clears many things up for a foreigner like me. I have one more question, would you say that most people in the US have a driver's licence (apart from those adults who may not get one for medical reasons) ?
My drift is that those in favour of the new IDs may say that there isn't a standard ID document available to all US citizens at the moment and the ID card will fit that purpose.
Rich Lucibella
Staff
Odd Job-
I think what you need to understand is how "foreign" and innovative our form of government is to citizens of Europe, for instance. Our Framers were basically against everything "Federal". The political power in this Nation was designed to rest with the individual States. There was a reason for this: they learned the hard way that distant National Seats of Government soon became unaccountable for their actions.
Local governments, OTOH...with those an individual stood a chance of making a difference.
And so they formed the United States, not the Federation of America. And they took pains to limit that Federal Government and to assure that each of those United States honored the rights of citizens of each of the other States.
IMHO, the single largest calamity in this nation was the fact that the North won the Civil War. Slavery notwithstanding (it would still have disappeared in the South), that war was about the Sovereignty of each of these United States.
It is from that perspective that many of us bristle at the thought of National ID. And our Framers had the exact same concerns.
Rich
I think what you need to understand is how "foreign" and innovative our form of government is to citizens of Europe, for instance. Our Framers were basically against everything "Federal". The political power in this Nation was designed to rest with the individual States. There was a reason for this: they learned the hard way that distant National Seats of Government soon became unaccountable for their actions.
Local governments, OTOH...with those an individual stood a chance of making a difference.
And so they formed the United States, not the Federation of America. And they took pains to limit that Federal Government and to assure that each of those United States honored the rights of citizens of each of the other States.
IMHO, the single largest calamity in this nation was the fact that the North won the Civil War. Slavery notwithstanding (it would still have disappeared in the South), that war was about the Sovereignty of each of these United States.
It is from that perspective that many of us bristle at the thought of National ID. And our Framers had the exact same concerns.
Rich
Wildalaska
Moderator
Give me a freaking break. Jews lived everywhere in Europe on sufference no matter how "comfortable" and "proserous" they were. You wanna use the Jewish experience and the Holocaust to make your sound bite political points, at least learn something about it.
Mazel tov bubbeleh, I got relatives buried in Baba Yar, and I fear the US government far less than I fear my fellow gun owning Americans.
WildnowexcusemeimgonnagoandhelpcontrolthemediaAlaska
Rich Lucibella
Staff
Yet you profit from selling guns to them, WA.
I'll get back to you on that just as soon as I can figure a way to compliment you on the ethics of it all.
Rich
Wildalaska
Moderator
Then again, I've 86'd a whole bunch, at least those who have been honest about their beleifs...
Wildsimson&suhlAlaska
leadcounsel
Moderator
There are things that concern me much more than a national ID card.
As WA pointed out (and I believe I did earlier too) most of us already have a national ID card- A US passport.
I don't see microchips implants in our future. An ID is a relatively harmless tool to immediately determine who is who -- lest the good guys get mixed up with the bad guys. We've always used IDs and we always will.
The idea of the States control is great when people aren't traveling across the nation in a few hours and committing sophisticated crime unknown to our forefathers. The Constitution has great ideas and States should have control, but that doesn't mean that a national government shouldn't know who is who...
I am not conviced that this is a step in the wrong direction. I'm not normally one to shout "paranoia" but I think I may have to play that card here....
As WA pointed out (and I believe I did earlier too) most of us already have a national ID card- A US passport.
I don't see microchips implants in our future. An ID is a relatively harmless tool to immediately determine who is who -- lest the good guys get mixed up with the bad guys. We've always used IDs and we always will.
The idea of the States control is great when people aren't traveling across the nation in a few hours and committing sophisticated crime unknown to our forefathers. The Constitution has great ideas and States should have control, but that doesn't mean that a national government shouldn't know who is who...
I am not conviced that this is a step in the wrong direction. I'm not normally one to shout "paranoia" but I think I may have to play that card here....
I believe the biggest downfall to this ID is that it makes Identity theft %1000 easier. One ID to rule them all. Passport. DL. Credit cards. Soc Sec. card. Voter Registration Card. I got enough id's. I don't need one to encompass them all. It provides easy access to those that would misuse the information.
steelheart
Moderator
Nicotine says it was in April of 2006. 2006 + 14 = 2020. So the "S" is going to "HTF" in 2020, according to the NSA guy.
2020 - nice round number. I wonder what's going to happen...
Wildalaska
Seriously. You fear your govt less than gun owners?
I like this quote best about the holocust. It just wasn't the Jews that were persecuted. It was anyone who disagreed with the Nazi party or impeded their progress. Hence:
"In Germany they came first for the Communists, and I didn't speak up
because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't
speak up because I wasn't a Jew. They they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came
for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then
they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak up."
- Martin Niemoeller, on the Nazi Holocaust
Seriously. You fear your govt less than gun owners?
I like this quote best about the holocust. It just wasn't the Jews that were persecuted. It was anyone who disagreed with the Nazi party or impeded their progress. Hence:
"In Germany they came first for the Communists, and I didn't speak up
because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't
speak up because I wasn't a Jew. They they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came
for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then
they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak up."
- Martin Niemoeller, on the Nazi Holocaust
invention_45
New member
OddJob:
I can't speak for other states, but in Florida you can get a State ID that looks like a drivers' license but, of course, doesn't license you to drive.
Years ago there was an attempt to unify traffic laws throughout the US. I can't say I know whether that was actually ever realized. So I wouldn't be surprised to find out that there are states that won't issue State ID cards.
I can't speak for other states, but in Florida you can get a State ID that looks like a drivers' license but, of course, doesn't license you to drive.
Years ago there was an attempt to unify traffic laws throughout the US. I can't say I know whether that was actually ever realized. So I wouldn't be surprised to find out that there are states that won't issue State ID cards.