It should have been the government providing an identity verification API, like they already do in the physical world with physical IDs. Governments dropped the ball, and so now Apple and Google get to be infrastructure.

▲

coldacid 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

"Don't worry! I'm from the government and I'm here to ~~help~~ identify you to everyone else on the planet."

That's no better, and in many ways far worse, than the corpos doing it.

▲

lotsofpulp an hour ago | parent [-]

Do you think identifies never need to be verified? Seems like a central function in operating an accountable society, hence birth certificates, passports, etc.

There should not be a requirement to verify identity, but if a website owner only wants to provide access to their website to people with verified identities, why is that not their right?

	▲	Dylan16807 an hour ago \| parent [-]
		> Do you think identifies never need to be verified? Seems like a central function in operating an accountable society, hence birth certificates, passports, etc. Verifying identity for specific services tied to your finances or body is a whole different topic. > if a website owner only wants to provide access to their website to people with verified identities, why is that not their right? I like the GDPR's general point of view that the right to privacy is more important than the right to trade privacy for access. An anonymous verification might be fine, but this system is not, and random websites needing your specific identity is not.

▲

vinyl7 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

The US government is a feckless facade, the US is a corporation run economic zone. The nice thing about being corporate run is that the rulers are unelected and unaccountable!