Paving The Road To The Coming 'Mark' And The Tribulation

‘Paving a Digital Road to Hell’: Digital ID Systems Could Lead to Severe, Irreversible Human Rights Violations

Suzanne Burdick, Ph.D.

The authors of a new report on digital identity systems warned “the actual and potential” human rights violations arising from the digital ID model can be “severe and potentially irreversible.”

The 100-page report — “Paving the Road to Hell? A Primer on the Role of the World Bank and Global Networks in Promoting Digital ID” — published by New York University’s (NYU) Center for Human Rights and Global Justice urged human rights organizations to heed the threats posed by a global push for digital IDs.

The NYU researchers said many proponents — including the World Bank — portray digital IDs as a means to achieving greater inclusivity and environmental sustainability when, in fact, the systems are likely to do just the opposite.

According to the report, the digital ID has been dressed up as an “unstoppable juggernaut and inevitable hallmark of modernity and development in the 21st century,” causing dissenting voices to be “written off as Luddites and barriers to progress.”

The authors argued for open debate “with full transparency and involving all relevant stakeholders,” including the most marginalized and most vulnerable.

The authors, who include Christiaan van Veen, L.L.M., special advisor on new technologies and human rights to the United Nations, urged the human rights community and related civic society organizations to ensure that global decisions about the adoption of digital ID systems are not hastily made but are based on “serious evidence and analysis.”

Where digital ID systems threaten human rights, the NYU researchers said, such endeavors should be “stopped altogether.”

“Governments around the world have been investing heavily in digital identification systems, often with biometric components,” the authors said in a statement.

Digital ID systems that frequently collect biometric data — such as fingerprints, iris or other facial feature recognition — are being adopted to replace or complement non-digital government identification systems.

According to an Access Now special report, in India in October 2021, digital ID systems — or “Big ID programs” as Access Now called them — are being pushed by a market of actors who sell and profit from digital ID systems and infrastructure, often while endangering the human rights of the people they’re supposed to benefit.

The NYU researchers reached the same conclusion:

“The rapid proliferation of such systems is driven by a new development consensus, packaged and promoted by key global actors like the World Bank, but also by governments, foundations, vendors and consulting firms.”

Digital ID proponents argue the systems can contribute to inclusivity and sustainable development, with some going so far as to consider the adoption of digital ID systems a prerequisite for the realization of human rights.

But the NYU researchers said they believe the “ultimate objective” of digital ID systems is to “facilitate economic transactions and private sector service delivery while also bringing new, poorer, individuals into formal economies and ‘unlocking’ their behavioral data.”

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