Editorial – Is Big Tech Getting a Free Ride from Physical ID?

Over the past few years, debates around civil identity have regularly predicted the demise of physical documents and their inevitable replacement by the massive investment of tech giants in digital, and then virtual ID. I think something else is going on.

From a security point of view, what Apple and Google are doing with identity in their eWallets is not fundamentally different from what they already do for concert tickets, boarding passes and stadium passes. In each case, the phone stores a digital pass and presents it at the right time. The real work of proving who someone is – and of making that proof hard to copy or alter – still happens in government systems and in the design and construction of the physical document.