The decision by the government to radically simplify the
technology behind biometric ID cards will not reduce the cost of
the £5.4bn programme, a senior official has disclosed.
The government has postponed plans to build a dedicated computer
system to hold biographical details of the population and has
dropped plans to record iris scans of the population, it emerged
last month.
But James Hall, chief executive of the Identity and Passport
Service, said in an interview with Computer Weekly that although
the project would now be technically much simpler, the costs were
unlikely to come down.
“Although this is a technology-driven programme, the technology
is a fairly small part of the total costs. A large part of the
costs are around card production, the network of offices to enrol
people, the set-up costs and operational costs over 10 years. This
is not going to make a dramatic impact on the total costs,” he
said.
The news drew criticism from Liberal Democrat shadow home
secretary Nick Clegg.
“Whichever way the government attempts to reorganise this vast
project, it is clear the expense to every member of the public will
remain astronomically high. It is time for the government to face
up to the massive problems in this project and scrap it
altogether,” he said.
The Home Office’s original plan was for a dedicated population
database, storing fingerprints, iris scans and biometric
photographs; and mass roll-out of biometric ID cards to the
population by 2008.
But Hall said the original proposals “represented a higher level
of risk” which it made little sense to pursue after the Home Office
had identified simpler alternatives.
Under the revised plans, published in a low-key report just
before the parliamentary recess, ID cards will not be rolled out to
the bulk of the UK population until 2010 – two years later than
originally announced – although the government plans to issue
biometric documents to foreign nationals in 2008.
Plans for biometric iris scans of the population have also been
dropped, and it is likely that the ID cards will store only two
fingerprints of the card holder, rather than the 10 originally
discussed by ministers. The full set will still be held on a
central database.
The Home Office plans to use existing government computer
systems rather than build a dedicated system to store biographical
and biometric details of the population.
“I think we have a very sensible, pragmatic solution, which can
continue to deliver the levels of security, confidentiality,
privacy and information compliance with the Data Protection Act,”
said Hall.
www.computerweekly.com/IDcards
How ID cards will promote data sharing
- The revised ID cards scheme is central to government plans to
share data across government departments
- The Identity and Passport Service is planning a series of joint
ventures with government departments to share identity card
data
- ID card data will first be shared with the Criminal Records
Bureau, the Immigration Department and local governments to create
new services, such as employment vetting
- The government published a Serious Crime Bill last week that
lays the groundwork for large-scale data matching across
departments
- The plans follow a cabinet decision to drop the data protection
principle that data collected for one purpose cannot be used for
another.
Related article:
U-turn cuts ID risks
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