this post was submitted on 08 Dec 2024
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Privacy

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In my (European) country now we can have a digital copy of the driving license on the phone. It specifically says that it's valid to be presented to law enforcement officers during a check.

I saw amazed in the beginning. They went from limited beta testing to full scale nationwide launch in just two months. Unbelievable. And I even thought "wow this is so convenient I won't need to take the wallet with me anymore". I installed the government app and signed up with my government id and I got my digital driving license.

Then yesterday I got stopped by a random roadblock check and police asked me my id card. I was eager to immediately try the new app and show them the digital version, but then because music was playing via Bluetooth and I didn't want to pause it, i just gave the real one.

They took it and went back to their patrol for a full five minutes while they were doing background checks on me.

That means if I used the digital version, they would had unlimited access to all my digital life. Photos, emails, chats, from decades ago.

What are you are going to do, you expect that they just scan the qr code on the window, but they take the phone from your hand. Are you going to complain raising doubts? Or even say "wait I pin the app with a lock so you can't see the content?"

"I have nothing to hide" but surely when searching for some keywords something is going to pop-up. Maybe you did some ironic statement and now they want to know more about that.

And this is a godsend for the secret services. They no longer need to buy zero day exploits for infecting their targets, they can just cosplay as a patrol and have the victim hand the unlocked phone, for easy malware installation

Immediately uninstalled the government app, went back to traditional documents.

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[–] [email protected] 113 points 2 weeks ago (6 children)

Pretty sure they're not supposed to take your phone. The point of a digital document is that you don't have to hand in anything. Scan the QR code and they can run as many background checks on the data they want. You'll still have your phone.

[–] [email protected] 100 points 2 weeks ago (5 children)

Not supposed to != wont. Police regularily do things that they arent supposed to and as long as people naively consent by giving their phone they can get away with whatever they want i would think.

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