What Do Activists Need To Know?

What Do Activists Need To Know?

Thursday 12G

Convener: Carolyn Tackett

Notes-taker(s): Elizabeth Stephens

Tags for the session - technology discussed/ideas considered:

Discussion notes, key understandings, outstanding questions, observations, and, if appropriate to this discussion: action items, next steps:

1. Notes received from Ellie Stephens:

Access Now introduction

Coalition building process. Working in local contexts in countries where national ID systems have already been put in place or where these systems are being considered. Why is there this sentiment that this type of digital ID system is inevitable? Do we accept that as a premise?

Is it all good governance? Estonia vs. India example. Why is it working in some states and not in others? Does it just come down to good governance?

Even if you have good laws but no accountability or regulation scheme

Having it be decentralized as opposed to one national ID. The China system - they know everything about you and when you jay walk you can’t rent a car. The decentralized approach. Our card that’s for driving and passport. It can integrate around me it doesn’t have to integrate at the governmental level. Technically that’s what I think in general. But they love these experiments — Adhaar. 1.2 billion people experiment. There were only 4 data points and then the government got involved and added so many more. Work with ID2020 and Omidyar Network and the question is, is how the small countries…they want to be one of the big boys. Our country’s smaller and they want to copy the work of the bigger companies, buying off the shelf eIDs that they can just deploy. They can’t build a decentralized thing and these things are chaotic and right now we are both too early and too late at the same time.

Consolidated ID for Canada across Canada. You want a government to be efficient. They collect taxes and enforce laws. Services should be insanely efficient. It’s more important to have a non police state than for things to be efficient. You want to promote anonymity if you don’t trust the gov, if you do…

You can trust a government in that current moment but there needs to be accountability under any circumstances. If we think they won’t exploit it now, then why not build a decentralized system that can’t be exploited.

I can be different “identities” for different purposes. Those bits of information don’t need to talk to one another. Why do we want a single unified thing? So it can keep track of you.

We don’t want everything to be efficient. And if everything is too convenient and the speed…we can’t get both.

Separate identities for separate interactions. Person 1,2,3 is entitled to vote. If that could be done really cheaply and efficiently. There are coordination costs. The illusion of economies of scale.

If you weren’t a bad actor before, you might become a bad actor. How do we explain to them that the costs will be better, that people will be happier. They’re looking for the UN to say these are the ones that are good to use and

All of these international players are part of the problem. They’re selling the idea that these centralized models are useful. Conversations in UNCHR.

We’re missing the refugee gang (those working in eID in development settings) We have a working group called ID for all working on decentralized ID use cases how to make eID more accessible — refugees, old ladies who can’t use phones — across the world. We have to start our identity somewhere. We have to start decentralized.

All these little technologies are deployable. Something will run on a 5 dollar PC that has a scanner and a cryptographic thing in it that issues tokens with a QR code, then all I have to show is my little QR code that’s cryptographically sign. Even if it’s a biometric click at the end and a cheap little system to run it, you could give them away.

Very anti UN being the golden standard setter. Highly controlled (government funding)

Like the idea of these cheap hardware device. Anything else you have interoperability issues.

Here’s the 25 buck phone and it does need to connect. Facebook decides to make it free and then FB is suddenly the internet. Where do you go with these ideas? You start in the places without laws so you don’t have to tear down any infrastructure. Why Jeff Airies wants to work only in places where this infrastructure doesn’t exist.

Democracy.earth - it’s about identity. I don’t necessarily approve of the approach you prove your identity via video. I think that ideas like this are out there. Aragon is another one. It’s about governance and organization

Digital Life collective is another one talking about governance. Working with a leader making an interactive map for this community so that any community can map themselves. Connecting tool builders and apps together. Tech we Trust. Spent 2 months in India. Interested in sharing.

Working with governance Medici Land Gov where governments aren’t that strong and people want to assert their rights especially when there are mining cos coming in. We want to find ways - videos, pictures - where we can start recording them now so that they can say 10 years from now that they were here and this is their land.

History of the Alaska Native Land Claims. When land was taken from Americans Russians, the natives had remarkable informal systems of land ownership. Here is the evidence that every fall I went fishing here. US government had them arbitrate. This is about establishing after the fact those claims.

If you read the Mystery of Capitalism, chapter 5 talks about how the US started this way.

Serving communities that already aren’t integrated into a broader system. They don’t necessarily want to be part of the formal system, but maintain theirs. T

One of the things I’d like to see is this community getting some pilots done — any institution can issue an identity to anyone. Communities that have identities within themselves can issue credentials within themselves. Ethiopia has an in tact local registry system that’s all on paper. All you have to do is digitize it using decentralized registry but the World Bank is pushing them to create a centralized digital ID. The World Bank is funding over a billion dollars in loans to implement Aadhaar systems in 10 African countries. We have to move faster, and we can with the help of the big companies Microsoft, etc. We have to get the consultancies involved. Deloitte is working with one of the companies in this community. Centralized systems cannot scale for the complexities of the whole society.

SSI is one of the options. Not the option, is what these consultancies’ papers are saying. Subsidiarity is that decisions should be made on the lowest possible level. The higher level the decision making is done the more unrest is trickling down. There’s more business for everybody if everybody has to duplicate various processes. To me this concept of subsidiarity really works as a philosophical conclusion about how decentralization in the technology could work for humanity. People designing things get the idea that they should just design the whole thing, but the interfaces are so important.

I think to have the option is best. Liquid Democracy.

James Scott’s work is really important. Seeing Like a State. How land tenure and identity registration systems. The Art of Not Being Governed. People who left the plains. Who got out of where you could be governed and got out and went to the hills so they could be ungoverned (self governed). I have a real problem with the concept that 1.1 billion people without identity is a problem. For people in cities yes, it can be a problem.

What is the issuing of that “identity” credential for?

We’re at the beginning stages, access now. Here are the reasons why this is important to present to decision makers.

How do we know we’re the good guys and how do we differentiate ourselves from them? How do you educate and build consent?

Need to involve the local populations, raising issues, not imposing solutions.

Human centered design focused?

Yes.

Start to develop resources for civil society people so that they can accurately assess when government wants to impose systems of any kind.

Who owns the future by Jaron Lanier Universal Basic Income project