Pre-Snowden/NSA News Story: "Obama Eyeing Internet ID for Americans"

[WinkyDink]

From 2011:

STANFORD, Calif.--President Obama is planning to hand the U.S. Commerce Department authority over a forthcoming cybersecurity effort to create an Internet ID for Americans, a White House official said here today.

It's "the absolute perfect spot in the U.S. government" to centralize efforts toward creating an "identity ecosystem" for the Internet, White House Cybersecurity Coordinator Howard Schmidt said......

What we are talking about is enhancing online security and privacy, and reducing and perhaps even eliminating the need to memorize a dozen passwords, through creation and use of more trusted digital identities." ...

Schmidt stressed today that anonymity and pseudonymity will remain possible on the Internet. "I don't have to get a credential, if I don't want to," he said. There's no chance that "a centralized database will emerge,"...

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-501465_162-20027837-501465.html
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"No chance....."! Bwahahahahaha!
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The government is allotting up to five years for the “standardization of policy and technology” to come together. Implementation of the plan, the government said, “will not occur overnight.”

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/04/obama-online-security/

[Recursion]

1. Tell me what you think is wrong with this

I'm a techie, and I know what this means. I really love finding out what people think this means.

[moondust]

2. Maybe something like this?

Danish police proposal: Ban anonymous Internet use

[Recursion]

9. And making it mandatory is bad. making it available is good.

OTOH they keep coming up with new ways to make it available and people can't be bothered despite the fact that it makes communication more secure.

[DisgustipatedinCA]

3. I'm a techie who still wants that $500 bet

You know, the network topology that you claimed was impossible, the same topology I'm intimately familiar with? I'd dearly love to take your money solely because you're too stubborn to admit you didn't know what you were talking about. Alas, in the end, you,we're too smart to lose that money. Nonetheless, baseline established.

Here's what's wrong with this program (no technical skills required!!): it's Orwellian, and it makes Big Brother's job that much easier when every tcp session is tagged with your government ID. It also goes very much against the freedom and spirit of the Internet. Call that an intangible if you want, but it means a great deal to a great many people. The government has no business regulating Internet users.

[Recursion]

7. I said I agreed it's possible if you tap every edge of the graph

We had started out saying the tap was inside my network

[Bluenorthwest]

4. Define 'I'm a techie' and then tell us why you adore this idea.

What is your professional standing, and why not speak your mind instead of playing passive aggressive 'I know and they believe' status attempts? Post your cv if you want standing.

[Recursion]

8. I don't adore the idea. We tried this year's ago with the CAs

It's yet another way to get public money to big companies

[WinkyDink]

6. Well, as the proposal claims, this will be for consumer purchases. One need not be a

"techie" to see how our grocery-store "courtesy cards," our giving our zip-codes and phone numbers to stores (even SS numbers, to get the store credit card), all tie in with our e-mails, phone numbers, etc., that will be stored in A MASSIVE NEW FACILITY in Utah, will be used to track us.

But of COURSE, the govt isn't going to say "This is so we can track you more easily." DUUUUUH.

But if you, as a "techie," think this proposal is merely for our "convenience" (OH, SOOOOO many passwords to remember! I guess the Obama administration has never heard of a tablet and pencil next to a computer), a fab solution to a "problem" not only is not a single citizen griping about, but ALSO none of the govt's G-D business (it IS rather of paltry significance on the world's stage)---well, then, I have some very low-tech land in FL...........

[Recursion]

10. I like any public advancement of crypto

This is an example of that.

[usGovOwesUs3Trillion]

12. We already have secure means of making purchases online and have for more than a decade

If anything, business should be required to encrypt their user data or face heavy penalties.

[Recursion]

14. But not individuals?

Why the distinction?

[usGovOwesUs3Trillion]

17. Individuals are what have put internet companies like amazon on the map

Individuals already have tools to encrypt their hard drives, the real problem is the corporations who have massive amounts of sensitive user data who do not encrypt it and then we read about some hacker gaining access to all of it.'

centralizing the data is a bad idea to begin with, but they should not even be storing it, and giving the government a centralized, and digital ID to your identify is the worst idea of all.

Are you going to address the issues raised or just stick to your recursion routine?

[usGovOwesUs3Trillion]

11. I'm an internet software developer, and I am against the idea due to privacy + eff.org concerns

https://www.eff.org

Once this system is put in place, the gov can then require that all ISP's require their users to use these gov ID's before they are allowed to access the internet.

If we can not surf the web anonymously then you do not have privacy, simple as that.

As a 'techie' this should be easy for you to understand that that would destroy your privacy.

[Recursion]

13. Then you know they can require that right now. Client certificates aren't popular, never have been,

and should be more popular than they are. Crypto is your friend.

[usGovOwesUs3Trillion]

15. If that were true why the need for this?

Because there is no easy way to implement it, not to mention it is easy for anyone with a little tech knowledge to create anonymous self signed certs. (there are apps for that)

Now why don't you acknowledge the concerns that have been pointed out in this thread?

just repeating 'crypto' like a parrot says nothing.

[Recursion]

16. What concerns? That a non-mandatory technology might some day become mandatory?

Sure, that's a problem. It's a problem whether good certs are easily available or not.

not to mention it is easy for anyone with a little tech knowledge to create anonymous self signed certs. (there are apps for that)

Sure, I do that all the time. But it's got huge man in the middle vulnerabilities.

[usGovOwesUs3Trillion]

18. giving gov a central database of real identities for ALL your online activities, mandatory or not

don't forget that one, too. (PRIVACY - but we know you don't have many concerns about that, though many others do)

and you keep talking about 'certs' like that has something to do with this proposal, which is does not.

and do you know what you are talking about when it comes to certs?

there is a big difference between client, and server certs... to remind you, we were talking about client certs, and there is no 'man in the middle' vulnerability with them, since YOU are the 'man-in-the-middle'.

the more we interact, the less confidence i have that you are an honest broker, let alone someone who actually know what they are talking about.

[RC]

5. A major flaw in the plan

But he cautioned that there’s a risk in consolidating online credentials.

“If that gets compromised, that’s like losing your whole wallet, instead of just losing your driver’s license or credit card,” Rotenberg said.

I agree, this is the start of another database that will be merged with the other, already existing ones. We will be so observed in everything we do, we might as well live naked and live in transparent houses. "Privacy" will become a dirty word, not used in public.

[roamer65]

19. I'm sure the Chinese will line right up after them on this one.

They nor our government can stand the "wild west" nature of the Internet. I'm sure it drives these control freaks crazy. The last fight for freedom will be on the net.

[woo me with science]

20. K&R