On Fri, Dec 23, 2022 at 7:59 AM tom petch <daedulus@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On 23/12/2022 12:50, Alessandro Vesely wrote:
> On Fri 23/Dec/2022 10:29:33 +0100 tom petch wrote:
>> On 23/12/2022 08:22, Alessandro Vesely wrote:
>>>
>>> I think, by now, the concept of digital signature is understood by the
>>> majority of the people, isn't it?
>>
>> No. Tech wizzies may be but the people I work with in a scientific
>> institution, no. They have heard of encryption and know that it is a
>> good thing and that accessing a website with encryption is safe (the
>> poor deluded fools) but hash, signing and such like no way.
>
>
> Don't they own an identity card with a chip on it, which can be used for
> online identification on gov sites as well as for signing docs?
No.
There was a proposal for the country to have identity cards but the
Liberal Democrats, part of the then ruling coalition, opposed it so no
identity cards. The cost to the country in the hoops that citizens must
jump through in order to authenticate themselves in whatever setting is
enormous and gives rise to much criminal activity.
No, that is not what happened.
Identity cards were the personal pet project of Tony Blair. Which of course guaranteed that everyone else would make sure it died. The Labour Party under Gordon Brown delayed implementation until after the election they knew they were likely to lose (having been in power for 12 years). Then Cameron's government cancelled it as a manifesto commitment.
