NSTIC: Not-So Trusted Identity in Cyberspace

According to recent reports, the Obama administration is making a new DHS national identity authentication program a high priority. The National Strategy for Trusted Identity in Cyberspace, expected to be signed by Obama this winter, is another program in a string of recent government attempts to centralize human identity in the US and abroad.

Immigration regulation and environmental disaster management are only a few of the scenarios driving demands for nationalized identity in government. India, a nation with a history of using emergency population control measures [1] recently adopted a national biometric identity system for it's burgeoning 6.2 million people [2]. Germany, the nation most associated with the phrase "You're Papers, Please?", debuted another national identity program using RFID tags, a commercial pallette tracking technology,[3] November 1st. Even the UK, a nation whose ministry retracted plans this year for a national ID program, multiplied efforts [4] to bring about another ID card program through the national health care system.

In the US, national identity proponents continue to lobby proposals using a broad interagency strategy under Homeland Security. The increasing number of proposals range from emergency management, cybersecurity, immigration reform, healthcare reform, education reforms and even environmental policy. Contractors, like Boeing and Lockheed Martin, are lining up to negotiate bids with legislative bodies over a national cybersecurity bill, the Federal Information Security Management Act. A bill weighing heavily on presumption and another ID card program (a).

The National Strategy for Trusted Identity in Cyberspace or NSTIC[5], "focuses on the protection of the identity of each party to an online transaction and the identity of the underlying infrastructure that supports it. This Strategy seeks to improve cyberspace for everyone – individuals, private sector, and governments – who conduct business online."

It appears the business of data authentication is considered a recession proof boom when the government is buying. L-1 Solutions is a biometrics start up still living on the promise of State budget endorsements for the Real ID Act (b). Special interest groups like Coalition for a Secured Drivers License [CSDL] and private contractors pitch legislative candidates on many points of adopting regulated technologies. These include: convenience, a futurist amenity, identity security, and national security right up to population control[6] in the events of environmental or, as DHS defines, man made disaster.

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