The Death Star, no longer theoretical, is here, and it’s nearly operational.
Via Global Government Forum, March 1, 2023:
Following a meeting of data and digital ministers in Melbourne on 24 February, it was announced that various cross-state jurisdictions had agreed [to] a “nationally coordinated approach” to digital ID credentials. This common goal would give Australian citizens “access and control over the use of digital IDs, making it easy for [them] to deal with government”, a communique said.
Victor Dominello, Australia’s minister for customer service and digital government, hailed the meeting as having identified a “true North Star… when it comes to digital identity and standards around credentials”.
“This means as each state and territory works towards more mutual recognition, e.g. an electrical licence in Queensland is accepted in New South Wales – it will also be seamlessly recognised across states and territories when that licence is in digital form,” Dominello said.
The corporate media in Australia — which functions in very much the same way as American corporate media, as the mouthpieces of the corporate state — has been marketing the technological terror as the “digital holy grail” — or, if you prefer a metaphor of the fantasy genre, the one ring to rule them all.
NO.
— Melinda Richards 🇦🇺🇺🇸 (@goodfoodgal) March 6, 2023
And the United States is not far behind:
The US federal government’s Login.gov digital identity service could be expanded nationally, according to the terms of a draft executive order…
The draft US White House order obtained by federal technology title FCW tasks the General Services Administration (GSA) with scaling up its Login.gov identity verification and authentication service – which enables users to access numerous government services using a single login – increasing its reach to the whole country…
Pledged during Biden’s State of the Union address last year, the order is part of the federal government’s ambition to reduce instances of fraud in its benefits system. The Government Accountability Office has made a conservative estimate that in the 18-month period from April 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the US unemployment system lost at least US$60bn to fraud.
Barring effective resistance from the largely feckless American GOP — the Democrats are all-in on the budding techno-tyranny — the forces currently besieging Australia will soon assail the Land of the Free.
Related: Social Science Research: Is Localization the Only Way Out of Techno-Hell?
To add insult to injury, once the digital plantation is fully operational, there won’t be any way to vote our way out of the mess, as our voting privileges will be tied to our digital ID.
Via InnovationAus:
“Verifying the government-issued digital identity credentials of voters before they cast an electronic ballot is now “entirely appropriate”, according to the architect of the now-abandoned iVote platform, but any move to do so would need to be tested extensively.
One-time New South Wales Electoral Commission chief information officer Ian Brightwell, who was at the agency when iVote was first introduced in 2011, also believes the evolution of technology-assisted voting (TAV) in the state is being held hostage by a “very active anti-TAV lobby”.
The comments are in his submission to the ongoing review into the appropriateness of TAV for future elections, launched after technical glitches prevented an unknown amount of people from using iVote to vote in the 2021 local election.” [emphasis added]
So if you’ve been a naughty boy or girl — for instance, if you’ve refused your monthly mRNA gene therapy injection or you’ve criticized the Brandon administration on social media — your digital ID just might “glitch” come voting time.