
How to Create the Perfect Fake Identity (Bruce Schneier) - bdfh42
http://www.wired.com/politics/security/commentary/securitymatters/2008/09/securitymatters_0904
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jrockway
I don't really see the point of identity. Why do I need a social security
number to have a driver's license? Why don't they just photograph the person
who shows up and passes the test? Why does my name need to be on my passport?
(What difference does it make? If I am a threat to the free world, why am I
not in prison?)

~~~
mechanical_fish
_If I am a threat to the free world, why am I not in prison?_

Oh, man, we've got enough indefinite imprisonment without charges going on as
it is. Please don't _encourage_ it.

Once upon a time, people's "data shadows" were very thin indeed. In _The Fatal
Shore_ , a truly awesome history book about Australia, they talked about
policing in Georgian England. The identification of criminals relied primarily
on verbal descriptions of their looks:

 _Official crime records and registers of criminals were primitive, and there
would be no fingerprinting until 1885. Artists made sketches, for popular
consumption, of famous offenders... but one could no more recognize a felon
from such semi-devotional effigies than pick St. Paul from a crowd by
consulting a Byzantine icon. Identification of wanted men had to be made from
verbal descriptions in the police gazettes, circulated to mayors and
magistrates after the early 1770s... Sketchy as they were, such descriptions
did produce some arrests, mainly in villages where people noticed strangers.
Some officers of the law had long memories. Henry Fielding's sightless half-
brother John, a magistrate known in Bow Street as the "Blind Beak," was said
to be able to identify 3000 different malefactors by their voices alone. But
on the whole, it was easier for criminals to escape scot-free in the 1780s
than it would ever be again._

This meant that, once you had caught a suspected criminal, there was no way to
release them temporarily without them disappearing, quite possibly forever. So
a lot of crimes were punishable by fines (which could be collected on the
spot), or by immediate imprisonment (which is what you got if you couldn't pay
the fine), or by death. You couldn't really put people on probation, or
parole, or release them on bail.

The result, in practice, was that every person who stole a loaf of bread
risked indefinite imprisonment or even death. It was so inhumane (and so
expensive -- there weren't enough jails) that the English legal system leapt
at the opportunity to solve the problem in a novel way: Transport criminals to
the colonies, where they would never bother homelanders again even when they
were freed. Until 1776 the favorite colonial destination was the American
colonies, but after that the English had to invent the Australian penal
colonies...

~~~
anamax
> Some officers of the law had long memories. Henry Fielding's sightless half-
> brother John, a magistrate known in Bow Street as the "Blind Beak," was said
> to be able to identify 3000 different malefactors by their voices alone.

How did they know that he was correctly identifying them?

~~~
wildwood
Well, these were old-timey bad guys. Maybe they all said something like
"curses! foiled again!" when identified? :)

~~~
mechanical_fish
Perhaps they had a second blind person to check on the first. Then it would be
a double-blind test!

<rimshot />

In all seriousness, though: Once they'd caught their suspect and thrown them
in Newgate Prison, the authorities could always summon people from the
suspect's hometown to ID them more precisely. In theory. In practice, that
would surely have been very expensive and slow, and I have no idea how
diligent they really were about all that pesky "legal procedure" stuff,
particularly if the prisoner didn't have the money to hire a lawyer. Back then
they charged prisoners for everything: you had to pay room and board in
prison, so if you hadn't managed to hang onto your money (which was probably
pretty difficult when you were being arrested by freelance thief-takers...)
and you didn't have local friends to look you up in prison and help pay your
bills, you could be stuck in there for life, like Charley on the MTA.

------
ph0rque
Hmmm, if one could write programs to manage these data shadows, then this
would be a perfect startup opportunity...

~~~
jonknee
Except that it would be illegal. There are a lot more profitable illegal
"startups" out there.

------
boredguy8
"twenty-five years is too distant a payoff horizon"

And -this- mentality is what's disastrous to security planning. I hope people
actually inside NatSec / InfoSec take a long-term view of things.

~~~
ivey
I trust Schneier's take on this type of calculation more than I trust the
people inside NatSec/InfoSec.

------
dkokelley
Why not just link link our identities to DNA, thumb prints, and other unique
features of us? You want to withdraw money? Scan your eye here. You would like
to apply for a driver's license? Spit into this jar. Someone will contact you
in a week (or however long it takes to process DNA samples).

That way, the shadow can never really be separated from the person (or at
least the difficulty increases). BTW, I recommend watching the movie Gattaca
for an interesting take on identity theft of the future, when people are
engineered and DNA is checked everywhere you go.

~~~
blurry
If someone wants to rob me, I'd rather they take my id than my thumb...

~~~
ryanmahoski
If someone wants to rob you, they too prefer your id to your thumb. The
average sentence for aggravated assault in the U.S. is 30 to 90 years per
count. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assault#Aggravated_assault>

------
sammyo
Me and my shadow Strolling down the avenue Me and my shadow Not a soul to tell
our troubles too

And when it's twelve o'clock We climb the stair We never knock For nobody's
there

~~~
run4yourlives
I suppose there aren't any Frank or Sammy fans on this board.

Nice try though.

------
maxklein
How do you fake your photograph though? All these fake identity scams fall
through as soon as you have to show a photograph of yourself. And considering
how good software is getting at recongizing faces, soon it will be near to
impossible.

~~~
aneesh
> "All these fake identity scams fall through as soon as you have to show a
> photograph of yourself."

Because no one's ever used a fake _photo_ ID to, say, get into a bar.

~~~
staunch
How many people would get into the bar if US Customs was running the door?
Certainly some would, but probably 98% less. Most of the time the reason fake
IDs work is because bouncers just don't care. As long as you give them
plausible deniability they're happy enough to let you pay them money.

------
dangoldin
Reminds me of Shawshank Redemption. If he can create a whole new identity for
himself from prison using mail I don't see why we can't using our freedom.

