A news story today in the Daily Telegraph in London "DNA Database should include all" quotes Tony Blair as saying all UK citizens should be in the database.
"Downing Street said later that no thought had been given at this stage to requiring everyone to give a DNA sample, although they will have to give scans of their eye and fingerprints for a passport and eventually a national identity card. At this stage, the Prime Minister believed it was a "personal matter" whether people, including other Government ministers, should volunteer their DNA."
This is exactly what I am very worried about! It is government creep on indexing pieces of an identity for which there are no laws in place:
* protecting the identity from mis-use of it's biological information
* guaranteeing an identity's privacy
* requiring specific processes to collect the samples
* requiring strong security around the data
* requiring specific legal approvals from the identity for a search to be made on their sample
* no idea on differentiating identitical twins
etc.
This past spring I wrote a draft white paper "The Challenges With Identity Verification". In it I called for a national DNA database where the user has almost full control over when their data can be searched.
Let me state that my preference is that there be no national biological identity registry. However, if there is going to be one, then let the identity have control over their biological identity and strictly govern how the data is collected, how it's stored and how any search can be made against this. I wrote the white paper as I feared government creep on DNA.
If you're reading this blog and you're worried about what the government knows about you, then it's time to take action. Let your politicians know your concerns. Otherwise, government creep will put in place systems that erode the basic biological definition of you. In the not so distant future, a DNA sample will allow others to clone you or pieces of you.
Guy
www.authenticationworld.com
guy.huntington@authenticationworld.com
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