Power coincides with control. Power needs to exercise control. It’s hard to digest, but that’s how it is. We can sweeten the pill by evoking the thousand guarantees flaunted by the constitutions, but to the point, we are always talking about control. Power has always transformed every technological innovation into a tool for perfecting control. Our digital identity, electronic identity card, social number, social identity card, IT wallet, and our digital twin, Avatar, will be subject to limitations and coercion.
Our entire experience on the web is nothing more than an incessant asymmetrical practice carried out between freedom and control. Technology has changed and advanced our lives positively in many aspects. But technology has also had negative impacts on people and environmental effects. Changes in technology impact democracy and citizens. With AI-powered technologies, governments can seamlessly extract information from documents, automate data entry processes, and accelerate the processing of crucial information.
From AI-powered mass surveillance to censorship at scale Autocratic governments are increasingly employing technology to repress their citizens and control critics at home and abroad. The U.S. government agencies have untold surveillance power over their citizens (and non-citizens) in the name of ‘national security’. For example, the U.S. government has been involved in many scandals related to mass surveillance, collecting data from major internet companies (Google, Meta, and Apple) using facial recognition technology to identify and track (protesters, activists, and journalists), without the knowledge of users from all around the world.
Companies that exploit citizens and their data: Google, which agreed to pay a million dollars in fines for illegally collecting data from children on YouTube, faced lawsuits for tracking users location even when they turned off the setting. Meta – the social media giant involved in data breaches, harvesting the data from 87 million users, for political purposes without their consent. Verizon, the telecommunications company, was fined for using its customers’ personal information. Amazon, the e-commerce giant, violated the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation by processing data without the consent of its customers. Equifax, the credit reporting agency, affected 247 million Americans exposing their names, addresses, and social security numbers.
Instagram: the photo-sharing The app failed to protect the privacy rights of its young users. California, for example, established a new law, the California Privacy Rights Act (CPRA), that will strengthen consumer rights and protections in information systems.
The Chinese government is using big data to violate human rights by spying on its people, censoring online content. China has also given the authorities sweeping power to access and seize personal data from anyone suspected of endangering national security in Hong Kong. Here, we need to say more about the Chinese Social Credit System. It is, first and foremost, an important tool for the Chinese socialist market economy, as it aims to achieve a level of financial reliability for individuals and companies, allow them to safely evaluate their loans, investments, and credit worthiness, and create order in the market economy through the collection and classification of data.
The Chinese Social Credit System aims to strengthen and innovate the management of Chinese society according to the values of honesty, credibility, good faith, and integrity. And all this by encouraging with rewards and discouraging with punishments the behaviour of the population they adopt and the data they share online, considered legally and ethically correct, according to the morality proposed by the political power. The China Social Credit System isn’t new that they came up. They adopted the US’s system that has been used for decades, so China implemented their version. The plan of the People’s Republic of China for the implementation of SCS includes the achievement of social and commercial integrity, honesty in government affairs, and judicial credibility through the collection of financial information, taxes, bank statements, transition and employment, loans, education, criminal record use of social media, etc.
The collection of this information is done by all dimensions of society, such as the People’s Bank of China, private companies, an example of Alibaba’s Sesame Credit (which uses a scoring system for its customers that is similar to the American score and measures customer trustworthiness), or regions or municipalities that act as pilot areas for the implementation of the SCS. And in some of them, a points system has been put into practice. Whoever had obtained more points based on their conduct would have access to the category of exemplary citizens, while whoever had lower points was relegated to being a dishonest citizen (for example, for non-payment of taxes, non-compliance with the highway code, etc.). And also, ‘black lists’ have been created, where individuals and companies are classified as unreliable based on their conduct. And so, millions of people haven’t been able to buy an airline ticket or travel by train, due to their presence on the black lists.
Inability to access a public job, exclusion of students from certain schools, because they are children of parents with low social credit, frozen bank accounts, and slow internet connections are just a few consequences that the smooth institutionalisation of the SCS could bring. The population in fact lives in a reality where they are constantly monitored and forced to share their most intimate data, from personal to financial information. All this in order to avoid incurring sanctions and to return to the ‘orderly and harmonious’ system proposed by the Party, which however hides a total lack of freedom, privacy, and electoral consensus.
The direction of the Chinese government and party is to build an organic system for collecting and classifying data from a strong surveillance system combined with control of online behaviour. It is a personal credit score system that grades you based on your credit history, and your credit system can not be affected. And people believe this system is rather effective at its job, and most people support this system. The government social credit system and a private firm’s Sesame credit score system are not the same thing, and this is the root of all confusion in most western media stories. Now, three years later, Chinese people believe it’s a great system. The opinion is that the market economy should be regulated by the government, which has the ability to enforce a person’s social responsibilities. Human rights organizations have accused China of building a surveillance and security system to monitor their population. And many other countries have a credit score and a national police check.
India – The Indian government has been criticized for its Aadhaar project, a biometric identification system that collects iris scans, fingerprints, and photos of billions of Indians. The Aadhaar data are linked to various public services, such as banking, welfare, taxation, and also data breaches, identity theft, and exclusion. The Indian government has authorized agencies to intercept, monitor, and decrypt data on any computer, and the Ministry of Home Affairs requires that each case (of interception, monitoring, and decryption) be approved by the competent authority, the Union Home Secretary. Russia has enacted laws that require internet service providers and online platforms to share user data with the authorities and to block access to websites.
The official debut for European Wallet is scheduled for 2026. How do you prepare and react? The European Commission will propose a secure European identity. An extreme and very refined form of control. Satellites of the 5Eys and social networks collect data, forward it to their Secret Services, and also sell it to multinational and pharmaceutical companies. The European regulation of privacy doesn’t care. They collect the data, too. Every European state can develop ‘Electronic Identification Systems’. The ID Wallet will be available to everyone (private companies or public services) to keep track of our identities.
Thanks to the IT Wallet, it is already possible to access a series of personal documents via smartphone (identity card, health card, driving license) via an app. So, if you want: trust, security, guarantees…accustom yourself to control, limitations, and obligations. The new European Digital Identity Wallets (EDIW) will enable all citizens to access online services with their national digital identification (Italy’s SPID), which will be recognized in all other member countries.
Digital identity: a digital identity is an electronic way of identifying someone. It allows you to send information that can be trusted by the recipient. A digital identification can be issued by a government or an organization and needs a secure identification system to support it. On the Web, browsing data, shopping behavior, and other activities are used to assemble a digital identity without the inclusion of any personal identifiers. Data is used to track activity within or across sites. Digital identity has expanded to allow users easier access to services offered by the government, banks, and mobile phone operators. Digital ID involves the identification and authentication of people.
Technologies applied in ID include biometric data (iris, earlobes, fingerprints, and face photos). Some countries (China, Estonia, Ghana, and the Philippines) issue cards that contain information about the person, while others are using mobile phones and apps. National digital ID programs that use biometric data require algorithms to match people with their stored credentials. And some countries (Kenya, South Africa, and the UK) attempted to collect DNA. AI, or facial recognition software, is used to process the collected data, and GPS is used to track people’s locations.
China’s social credit system is built on digital ID. High-income countries (UK, US) have adopted a decentralized digital ID system, which is used in internal population management and also in migration management. Decentralized identity systems give users control and enhance privacy and security without relying on authority. This is enabled by the self-sovereign identity concept. Users store their identity information on a personal device (smartphone, PC) and choose when and how to share it. The EU, UK, and USA use biometric identification in visa applications. On the other side, with the data collected when people seek services from government agencies, governments can better understand and anticipate people’s needs and direct resources to where they are most needed.
The data can be applied to building new economic activities. Digital ID can be a socially enabling force and act as information control. There are fears that the government will acquire more data on citizens, and the risks of misused data will increase. Digital ID increases government surveillance capabilities to monitor and politically manipulate the population. The World Bank and partners have published ‘Principles on Sustainable Identification’. These principles call for the removal of barriers to acquiring official ID and also call for open standards ensuring data privacy, technology neutrality, financial and operational sustainability, user rights, and security. It is believed that digital identity and the way identity is used in the world of digital technology have the potential to empower citizens and give them more control over their data and information. Governments are also considering revolutionizing travel and adopting digital travel credentials supported by biometrics. The government will adopt this technology for secure, efficient journeys.
Artificial intelligence is turning the passenger journey digital. Surveillance tools and software have turned our smartphones into 24-hour surveillance devices. The UN reported that privacy is threatened, as more governments use spyware to monitor their citizens. Governmental authorities often falsify their reasons for acquiring digital spyware technologies. While they deployed spyware tools to combat crime and terrorism, they often used omnipresent cameras and other spy tools for illegitimate reasons (on those who express critical views, including journalists, opposition political figures, and human rights defenders). By integrating advanced technologies, web and mobile applications, artificial intelligence, and digital twins, governments should be poised to offer more accessible, responsive, and personalized services and provide better people, business experiences, and support. Urgent steps are needed to address the spread of spyware and stop the abuse.
