The Trump administration is building a national citizenship data system
text.npr.org

The Trump administration has, for the first time ever, built a searchable national citizenship data system.

The tool, which is being rolled out in phases, is designed to be used by state and local election officials to give them an easier way to ensure only citizens are voting. But it was developed rapidly without a public process, and some of those officials are already worrying about what else it could be used for.

NPR is the first news organization to report the details of the new system.

For decades, voting officials have noted that there was no national citizenship list to compare their state lists to, so to verify citizenship for their voters, they either needed to ask people to provide a birth certificate or a passport — something that could disenfranchise millions — or use a complex patchwork of disparate data sources.

  • sbv@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    81·
    10 hours ago

    See the UK Post Office accounting scandal, in which a persistent computer error went unfixed for decades and caused hundreds of post office employees to be fired and dragged through courts for corruption that never happened. A good chunk of them committed suicide.

    The database is the least important part of the system: the organizational structure, rules, and procedures are way more important, because they actively help or harm people.

    • voracitude@lemmy.worldEnglish
      9·
      8 hours ago

      That’s a really weird way of looking at it. Without the database, there’s no central ledger to consult as to whether or not you’re legally a person. Like @atrielienz@lemmy.world said:

      The database is the backbone of them being able to hurt or harm

      Without that starting point, “the organizational structure, rules, and procedures” that rely on the data from the database are impotent.

      • sbv@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        21·
        6 hours ago

        That’s a really weird way of looking at it.

        That’s how I roll.

        Without the database, there’s no central ledger to consult as to whether or not you’re legally a person.

        We’re already seeing them do that without a database. 🤷‍♂️

        Other countries are able to maintain internal databases without using them to screw over their own citizens (except when they do). The problem isn’t the database.

    • atrielienz@lemmy.worldEnglish
      14·
      9 hours ago

      The database is the backbone of them being able to hurt or harm so I’d say it’s pretty important. Here’s the other problem though. The federal government under Trump is having a really difficult time protecting the personal identifiable information of the citizens. Not only have they allowed private companies to access that data (palantir etc), but they are also having a lot of difficulties with cyber attacks. Part of the reason those cyber attacks haven’t been as effective as they could be is because the data isn’t localized in one place. Now that’s exactly what they’re trying to do with this.