REAL ID Backlash

Mar 1, 2008 12:00 PM, By Sandra Kay Miller

Transitioning driver’s licenses into smart cards raises privacy concerns, but creates opportunities for a new functionality.

           

For private companies as well as the government and education sectors, using smart cards as a means for identification and authentication has been routine since the early 1990s. IMS Research Group (www.imsresearch.com) predicts that by 2010, more than six billion smart cards will be deployed globally and smart cards will become the most commonly used secure method for identification throughout the world.
method for identification throughout the world.

After the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and the formation of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the government set out to make changes that could help thwart future attacks. One of the vulnerabilities identified was the lack of a unified identification system within the country.

Out of this realization, the REAL ID Act of 2005 was passed in an effort to make state-issued driver's licenses and ID cards more difficult for illegal immigrants and terrorists to obtain. Brian Zimmer is president of the Coalition for a Secure Driver's License (www.secure-license.org), a non-partisan, not-for-profit, grassroots organization whose mission is to raise public awareness about the critical need for secure driver's licenses. He says the 9/11 terrorists held more than 30 valid driver's licenses and ID cards issued by five different states, thus making them appear legitimate.

To reduce such circumvention, states would be required to authenticate original identification documents, such as Social Security cards and birth certificates, through their issuing agency. Additionally, states would be required to maintain an electronic database that could be accessed by other states to verify that duplicate licenses have not been issued by multiple states. The REAL ID laws also establish standardized security features for both the issuance and the physical card itself to further prevent counterfeiting and tampering.

Americans born after Dec. 1, 1964 should begin receiving driver's licenses meeting the REAL ID criteria within the next six years. Older drivers would have until 2018 to comply.

When the final ruling for the REAL ID Act of 2005 was issued in January 2008, public privacy organizations, watchdog groups and many individual states reacted sourly. Citing violations of constitutional rights and cost issues, REAL ID began building up to a showdown between the federal government and individual states' rights.

American Civil Liberties Union spokesman Jay Stanley warned citizens of the impending “red tape” and referred to REAL ID as the federalization of state-issued identification. Similarly, Jim Harper, director of information policy studies at the Cato Institute (www.cato.org), told a Senate Committee, “Having a national ID would promote a surveillance society that we should all dread.”

“Smart cards for driver's licenses are a relatively new idea, and what's going to be put on the card hasn't been well articulated. The public is unsure of how they are protected and unconvinced of the value it will bring to their daily lives. If they saw a little more of the value and knew about how secure the cards are, it will lead to increasing acceptance of the use of smart cards,” says Rob Brandewie, senior vice president of ActivIdentity Inc. (www.actividentity.com), Fremont, Calif., provider of digital identity assurance systems for the enterprise, government, healthcare and financial services markets.

Randy Vanderhoof, executive director of the Smart Card Alliance, a non-profit, multi-industry association working to promote the understanding, adoption, use and widespread application of smart card technology, believes the backlash is coming from people who don't want to change anything about driver's licenses that's going to cost them money. “Any proposal that includes putting more cost and money into driver's licenses was met with opposition by those who felt that it was an unfunded mandate by the federal government and that states shouldn't be required to fund these projects out of their own pocket if the federal government wants to increase or improve the security of the nation,” Vanderhoof explains.

The estimated national cost for implementing REAL ID is $4 billion. States will be able to use up to 20 percent of a state's Homeland security grant program funds for REAL ID compliance projects. Additionally, Congress will have the authority to appropriate additional funds to aid states enacting REAL ID. DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff has also promised that his agency will provide more than $360 million to help states implement REAL ID. By Chertoff's estimate, the extra $8 per license will greatly aid law enforcement in their fight against forged documents and identity theft.

Brandewie believes that the public would be willing to help foot the bill if it reduced the chances of falling victim to identity theft and fraud, one of the fastest growing crimes in the country. Despite the additional costs, he sees smart card technology as a valid and affordable solution. “There's no way around it, it is more expensive. Driver's licenses now typically cost less than a dollar, but good smart cards aren't going to hit that price point yet. Although, they may as volume increases. I think the price has come down on very capable smart cards to the point where they've become affordable,” says Brandewie, who also points out that the increased costs are spread over the life of the license.

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