Editorial Proof of ID to buy a UK Mobile Phone

[Bassey]

Editorial: UK government to insist on passport to buy phone?

I saw this article today on Register Hardware and felt compelled to comment on it. In short, the UK government is shortly to put before the commons legislation that will require anyone who purchases a mobile phone within the UK to provide ID in the form of a passport or National ID Card. This will then be registered on a government held database linking that person's ID to the phone's IMEI number. The government states that this is on order to help its communications monitoring and allow it to link intercepted communications with specific individuals.

This proposed legislation has many, many potential consequences but not one of these involves tightening up security or clamping down on crime - quite the opposite, in fact, in the case of the latter.

Lets start off with, the most obvious problem with this new law. No criminal above the level of 14-year-old happy-slapper is going to be stupid enough to use a mobile phone linked to their ID in order to communicate about their ill-gotten gains or to plan crime (and in the case of the 14-year-old they’ll be posting the vids on You Tube anyway so PC Plod has all the evidence he needs without an IMEI database). This leaves the criminals and potential terrorists with a fairly easy to overcome problem. How to get hold of phones not linked to their ID.

So, the government is about to introduce new legislation that seems to have been purposefully designed to increase the black-market in stolen mobile phones and therefore make it MORE likely that you will have your phone nicked! Which brings us to problem two.

Mr Terrorist now has YOUR mobile phone, linked to YOUR ID via its IMEI number and is using it to plan terrorist activities. Meanwhile, MI5, safe in the knowledge that is “infallible” database has all the details it needs, is waiting outside your front door with a knock-knock at 2am. And why is this? Because you didn’t bother to report it when it was nicked. Which brings us to problem 3.

Everyone in the UK knows the police don’t have time to fight actual street crime like theft and burglary – the stuff that bothers us – because they are too busy filling out paper work and increasing the treasury coffers to pay for their 3-year pay-deals with their speed traps. Because everyone knows this most people don’t bother reporting it when they get home and discover their £20 Nokia 1110 is missing. However, because of this new law, unless you want the aforementioned 2am visitation you are going to HAVE to report every mobile phone theft. And remember, there will be more thefts because there is more incentive for people to steal them. So, the police are now going to be inundated with crime reports they don’t have the resources to record, never mind investigate.

And yet this is supposed to IMPROVE CRIME FIGHTING?

And this is before we consider;

· What online retailers are supposed to do - are they meant to ask you to fax in your ID, in which case we increase the size of the market for stolen passports etc?
· What we do about non-UK phones roaming on UK networks?
· How do you sell-on your mobile phone without selling on your ID?

The whole thing is a complete farce with no criminals actually being impacted but everyone else suffering. Please, please write to you MP and ensure this nonsense gets thrown out when it comes before parliament in the next session.

[firstbuddha]

Very interesting article. I saw this in the Metro.

The article was also stating that the UK government is wanting to log ALL calls, SMS and email. It would not contain any content of email, but the time it was sent and the sender and recipient details.

That's going to be a huge database to handle, so I'm guessing they'll need more of my taxes to waste on IT consultancy firms that can go over budget and over time and simply have the system scrapped after years of waste. (Libra project anyone?)

I know at the moment stores such as Argos restrict sales of PAYG phones to a maximum of three per customer. This was to try and stop people buying the devices and sending them out of the UK to friends and family abroad. The operators weren't happy as they were losing money on the subsidised handsets.

But imagine trying to sell a phone on ebay (and trying to buy it too). It is almost like we need a new government organisation, a la DVLA, for the sale of mobile devices.

This is laughable to be honest. Can anyone recall the UK government asking people to "shop in" people they saw carrying more than one mobile phone? The idea was it was to report "potential terrorists" who usually carry two or more mobiles. This was the brain child of a civil servant who didn't consider people sometimes have more than one phone (personal phone and work phone??).

I'll stop ranting now...

[The Mailman]

On first read of the article in the Sunday papers I was inclined to agree but even I could see the issues with on-line stores straight away.

And it does nothing to stop imported phones.

Another case of gut reaction legislation on the part of our current nanny state Government. They don't seem to think about anything before opening their mouths - though I do believe the media have a major role to play in this fault. As soon as anything happens it's "What is the Goverment going to do about it?"

Mind you it would be a great way to get everyone to have a passport or ID card - or am I being cynical here?

[waveydavey]

I know where you're all coming from with this, and agree totally, but consider using your mobile to buy and sell stuff, i.e. without credit cards. Wouldn't this help on security? Also, if the major networks buy in all you do is not allow unregistered mobiles on the networks. Job done. They can do that easily. Like I said, I don't agree, but a couple of things to think about.

Blimey, think about all the paperwork Jim would have to do!

[tonybro]

Interesting article - should it be promoted to an Editorial?

[Bassey]

Originally Posted by waveydavey

...if the major networks buy in all you do is not allow unregistered mobiles on the networks

Which would prevent anyone coming into the UK with their own mobile phone from using it! Given how much the UK SP's make from termination charges on their roaming agreements there is no way they would ever agree to that. In any case, the UK is trying to attract foreign investment, not send them all elsewhere.

[waveydavey]

I didn't say it was perfect, or that I thought it would happen, but technically it's easy peasy.

[windows]

Agree with all the thoughts above I can't see it working at all, and I for one feel it is in breach on my civil liberties to be monitored in that way!

[Wirral Bagpuss]

What annoys me is the excuse being given. To prevent terrorism. oh really. We had 25-30 years of the IRA bombing campaign. Thankfully a politcal settlement has hopefully seen an end to this. But did we need ID cards, passports and monitoring of phones then? No ! It was good old fashioned Police work, intelligence, and getting field agents on the ground that was most effective. I cant see how applying restrictions on our civil liberities is going to make the task of stopping future attacks in the UK any less likely. I hope we never see another attack, but terrorists will always find a loophole or a way round things like it has already been mentioned.

So yes i agree we should lobby our MPs about this!

[cyclist]

The biggest lobbyists on this one are going to be the networks and companies selling mobile phones. About 80% of UK citizens residing in UK hold passports, but mobile phone ownership is higher at around 95%. How are those people who want a mobile but not a passport going to be able to get one in the future? They are probably exactly that section of population tending to be old or poor who will not want to get an ID card. The loss in sales will be unacceptable.
I see this whole thing as yet another way in which the government is trying to coerce the population into accepting ID cards as 'necessary'.