I.D. Cards- A Global View

[Seahawk100 Profile]

I found this article in the current issue of Nexus Magazine- and found that it is on the web as well, (published in August of '09.)

There is some interesting info., regarding this subject, that I was unaware of, and I wanted to share with those who are interested. I hate this subject, as most probably do, but is it inevitable that it will come to this- eventually?

I will include but a portion of the text. Please follow link for the rest of the article- if interested in the topic.

I.D. Cards- A World View

by Nathan Alonby- Global Research.Ca
Center for Reasearch on Globalization

Electronic ID cards have made alarming progress towards becoming universal, around the world. Already, over 2.2 billion people, or 33% of the world’s population, have been issued with ‘smart’ ID cards. Of those, over 900 million have biometric facial and fingerprint systems. On present plans, over 85% of the world’s population will have smart ID cards by 2012. Most of the remaining population won’t have escaped - largely, they are already enrolled in earlier generation ID systems, often in repressive states, such as Myanmar (Burma)

Understandably, campaigns against the introduction of ID cards have tended to play up the problems with ID systems, presenting them as being unworkable and creating unmanageable problems with privacy invasion, fraud, unauthorised database access, organised crime, reliability of biometric recognition, etc.. As a result, a substantial number of people believe mandatory ID cards ‘just won’t happen’.

It’s long past time to stop burying our heads in the sand. There are no obstacles to the worldwide introduction of mandatory, electronic ID cards.

All those problems with ID systems may be real, but they are not enough to stop implementation, primarily because these are problems that will affect people as individuals, not their governments - our problem, not theirs.

There has been hardly any meaningful debate about one of the biggest issues of our time. Most ordinary people don’t like the idea, but project goes ahead anyway.

It’s also time to look at what ID systems are really intended to do, not the public justification. Since governments probably always knew that ID cards wouldn’t stop terrorism, organised crime, ID theft, fraud, etc., there has to be some other reason for their introduction - and it appears to be a reason that governments don‘t want to own up to, in public........

A Coordinated International ID Agenda?

Perhaps we can learn more if we look at what is going on around the world.

Interestingly, nobody seems to have published a comprehensive or reliable survey of world ID schemes, so a survey had to compiled for this article (see table as appendix). This survey has necessarily been fairly brief and incomplete - it is not easy to find good data sources about every nation, so apologies for any inaccuracies, misclassification of certain nations and complete omission of lots more. (If anyone has any links to published data, that would close the gaps, please could they send these as ‘comments’).

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14992