The Digital ID Revolt: Why Nearly a Million Brits Are Saying No
Nearly a million people have signed a petition against the UK’s proposed digital ID scheme, and frankly, I’m not surprised. What started as half a million signatures has exploded past the 800,000 mark and keeps climbing. When you see numbers like that, you know something has struck a nerve.
The whole thing reminds me of conversations I’ve had with mates here in Melbourne about the MyGov digital services rollout. Sure, it’s convenient when it works, but there’s always that nagging feeling that you’re handing over more control than you’re getting back in return. The UK situation feels like that, but dialled up to eleven.
What’s particularly telling about this petition is the breadth of concerns people are raising. It’s not just the usual suspects worried about government overreach. You’ve got people genuinely concerned about practical issues - what happens to elderly folks who can’t navigate smartphones? What about people who simply don’t want to be forced into owning a device that requires agreeing to Google or Apple’s terms of service just to be a citizen?
One commenter made an excellent point about the “old dear over the road who has dementia and anxiety” - these are real people who get forgotten in the rush toward digital everything. We’ve seen this pattern before with banking services going digital-only, leaving vulnerable populations struggling to access basic services. Now the government wants to do the same thing with identity verification?
The technical concerns are equally valid. The UK government’s track record with IT projects is, to put it mildly, woeful. Remember the NHS patient records system that cost billions and barely worked? Or more recently, the Post Office Horizon scandal that ruined hundreds of lives because of faulty software? Now they want to create a centralised digital identity system that will be a prime target for hackers and state actors.
What really gets under my skin is the way this is being sold as a solution to illegal immigration. It’s classic misdirection - create fear about one problem, then propose a solution that conveniently gives the government sweeping new powers over everyone. Illegal immigrants aren’t exactly queuing up to register with government databases, are they? The real impact will be on law-abiding citizens who suddenly find themselves needing government permission to prove they exist.
The surveillance implications are staggering. Combine this with facial recognition cameras, the Palantir contracts someone mentioned, and you’ve got the infrastructure for a surveillance state that would make Orwell weep. The fact that the government promises there’s “no requirement to carry ID” but then makes it “mandatory for proving your Right to Work” shows exactly how these things expand. Today it’s work, tomorrow it’s healthcare, next week it’s accessing any government service.
Living through COVID taught us how quickly “temporary” measures become permanent and how readily people accept restrictions when they’re scared enough. The digital ID scheme feels like the next step in that process - normalising the idea that you need government permission to participate in society.
The petition signatures keep climbing because people instinctively understand something crucial: once you give up privacy and autonomy, you don’t get them back. Digital ID isn’t just about proving who you are - it’s about creating a system where every interaction with government, employers, and increasingly private services gets logged, tracked, and stored.
Maybe I’m getting cranky in my middle age, but there’s something fundamentally wrong when a government’s response to complex social problems is always “more surveillance, more control.” Instead of addressing the root causes of issues like exploitation of vulnerable workers or inadequate immigration processing, they want to tag everyone like cattle.
The good news is that nearly a million signatures show people aren’t buying it. Democracy might be messy, but when it works, it works. The government has to respond to petitions over 100,000 signatures, and they’re going to have a hard time dismissing this many voices.
Whether you’re in the UK or watching from afar like I am, this petition represents something important: ordinary people pushing back against the relentless march toward a surveillance society. That’s worth supporting, even if you’re sipping your morning coffee 17,000 kilometres away in Melbourne.