With the Digital ID Bill passing through the Senate, the bombardment of promotional material has begun – even ahead of the Lower House rubber stamping the Bill in May.

Government services have moved to drown-out serious safety, privacy, and liberty concerns with a cascade of puff pieces. No doubt private companies will follow, reaching out to customers to encourage them to sign up to Digital ID as soon as possible – on-boarding the public on behalf of the government.

‘A faster, easier way to prove your identity!’ ‘You are in control!’ ‘Private and secure!’

These are the mantras cooked up by Labor Party think-tanks and tested in focus groups. Instead of telling the public the truth and being transparent about the extent to which Digital ID will permeate their lives, Labor has printed what people want to hear to alleviate their fears. It is the digital world’s equivalent of ‘if you sit at the bar instead of standing, the virus won’t find you’.

This is what we mean when we say government is the largest source of misinformation in the country. It lies by omission and conceals with a honey trap of soothing words.

Labor’s duplicitous pitch to the public about the virtues of Digital ID may well succeed.

Through its own failures and mismanagement, government bureaucracy has made itself famously difficult to deal with – borderline incomprehensible. As a citizen, attempting to submit documents, change details, or register for services has become a nightmare. There is no need for this to be the case except for the quagmire of incompetence inherent in the matrix of Canberra. We have entire bureaucracies dedicated to unpicking the mess made by bureaucracies, all of which circles back to the same automated call centre that puts you on hold.

Labor’s answer? ‘If you hate dealing with the government, give us absolute power and authority over your lives and we’ll make things “easy”.’

Trusting the creators of Canberra’s monstrous digital shambles and colossal stuff ups with the private fine-print of your life is not only a folly, it is dangerous. It is dangerous from a purely technical perspective, let alone the possibilities unlocked by a government obsessed with micro-managing society for the benefit of State power.

As swiftly as your private paperwork rushes through on the wings of Digital ID, your life can also be stopped with the click of a mouse.

Did you say something that contradicts the activist agenda on social media?

That can be shared with your bank, your phone and internet service provider, your real estate agent – everything and anything connected to the Digital ID system can be controlled by the system. Perhaps not today, but once those pathways of information exist it is only a matter of time. Even a simple technical error with Digital ID could bring your life to a standstill.

‘It’s like the online version of showing someone your passport or your driver’s licence to prove who you are, but it’s not giving them your licence to hold on to, or to scan and store on an unknown server or photocopy,’ said Senator Gallagher.

Her comment is vacuous to the point of being misleading.

When a citizen ‘flashes’ their passport, they present their ID. An ID devoid of other personal information. An ID that knows nothing about their banking situation, their social life, their purchase history, and medical status. Traditional IDs are exactly that, passive declarations of identity. Digital ID is specifically designed to create an intimate picture of a citizen – akin to a CIA file or a profile put together by the world’s most dogged stalker.

Political parties, commentators, human rights advocates, and citizens are not protesting against a proper centralised ID – digital identity in its basic sense is a way of life – they are extremely concerned about Digital ID policy as a domino in a sequence of events designed to revolutionise society, transforming it into a copy of communism with progressive characteristics.

For those who doubt the government may misuse Digital ID in the future, we already have a precedent.

The consolidation of private health records into government databases made available on secure phone apps facilitated Covid-era policy which saw private health data used as a government check, controlling access to work, travel, and basic services including food.

Human beings were given ‘ticks’ and ‘crosses’ by the government.

Locking citizens out of the economy and turning them into prisoners under house arrest for months was made possible through government-held health records. A government denied access to this information could not have actioned such measures.

This was a misuse of private data. It was a violation of human rights. It saw businesses and government services collude to criminalise the behaviour of those who refused to partake. While the fines are quietly disappearing, the social harm cannot be undone.

‘Health Passports’ became mandatory by default, even if not in law.

The government was not punished for this extraordinary violation of trust and dereliction of duty. Instead, public apathy taught a power-hungry political class that the masses will comply if enough pressure is applied.

It has already been admitted, after the fact, that a person’s Digital ID could be violated by hackers through third-party providers and participants – but don’t worry, they say… This is more serious than critics let on. While previous security violations granted access to bits and pieces of a person’s identity, the very nature of a consolidated Digital ID means a hacker can take the lot in one go – every piece of your life tucked away in a government pigeonhole where once it was separated and protected by privacy laws, anonymous data, and disconnected databases.

Not only can nefarious parties steal information, the government has been given information it was previously unable to see. Whether by intention or accident, Western democracies such as ours valued the privacy of the citizen from the State. Only certain pieces of information were collected and only for specific and transparent reasons. What happens when the government can see a detailed digital picture of a citizen that spans their political views, purchasing choices, biometric data, health care, and financial status? It is not a small question. Hackers are nothing compared to the danger of an all-seeing government.

The solution to a cumbersome and outdated government system is not to install a China-style, World Economic Forum-designed system of control – it’s to hire some decent programmers to upgrade the system within existing privacy laws.

You do not solve incompetence with tyranny.

With the same dubious ‘vibe’ of Anthony Albanese and Chris Bowen landing their private jets in remote communities to promote Net Zero, Senator Gallagher rushed to Twitter to celebrate the win.

Senator Pauline Hanson was quick to reply:

‘This legislation harbours significant issues that Labor and the irresponsible Senators who endorsed it have concealed. They have passed this Bill without proper debate or questioning in Parliament, effectively silencing any opposition and all legitimate criticism.’

The Digital ID Bill was one of nine laws rushed through by the increasingly secretive and opaque Labor Party which has gone to extraordinary lengths to hide the content of other Bills.

One of the chief promises of Digital ID was that it would be voluntary, but state governments are already unrolling their beta versions – which means that work on these projects was begun before it was passed. Did Labor treat this legislation as a foregone conclusion? Did it develop systems and spend public money before it went through the Senate? It is almost as if there is no possibility of democratic refusal. No expectation of democracy.

Once Digital ID is embedded in state government processes, it will become mandatory by necessity – which means the Labor ministers and senators knew they were lying.

How long before the Four Big Banks refuse service without a Digital ID?

How long before telecommunications giants make it impossible to on-board without one?

How long before renters are pushed to the bottom of the pile if they fail to provide a Digital ID?

This is how Digital ID becomes mandatory without law. It’s the same way the country’s largest retailers are turning their back on cash while banks close thousands of ATMs in a year.

Choice simply vanishes.

And instead of defending citizen rights, the government smiles.

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