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Ask HN: Why there’s no info about people declining fingerprints in EU id cards?

by szastamasta on 2/4/23, 8:04 AM with 6 comments

So EU has mandated that all id cards have your fingerprints in it. Thus requiring to scan your fingerprints and store it in digital form.

My id card is going to expire soon and I feel very unease that my country treats me like a dangerous criminal. I did nothing to justify that. Also I don’t believe anybody that they won’t store them in their databases nor that they are safe. There is no 100% safe system in the world and history teaches us, that if someone has your personal data, he will keep it as long as he can.

So, to the point. I was searching through the web if there’s any way to decline providing my fingerprints or any stories of people who did this. And there’s nothing to be found. Is this possible? That no one has tried that and written about it? Or do we live in such Orwellian world, that information like that is not allowed to be found or submitted to any major site?

  • by qb on 2/4/23, 8:17 AM

    Of course some people declined providing fingerprints and currently there is a European Court of Justice case regarding this issue: https://digitalcourage.de/keine-fingerabdruecke-personalausw....

  • by gardenhedge on 2/4/23, 2:46 PM

    In Europe (maybe not every place but enough of them), within the last 3 years we were locked down to our home and specific distances from them. We were forbidden access to public areas.

    If we didn't push back on that.. I don't think there's much chance of pushing back on ID cards.

  • by patrick451 on 2/4/23, 2:44 PM

    > Or do we live in such Orwellian world, that information like that is not allowed to be found or submitted to any major site?

    If covid taught us anything, it's that there is massive collusion between governments and tech to push a specific narrative.

  • by notaigenerated on 2/5/23, 3:08 AM

    I'm not sure if there are/were cases you're asking about, but tech companies like Google do have policies that don't allow "harmful" information to get through and be found.

    It started in 2016 when Trump got elected after launching multiple successful online campaigns.

    It was tested and improved during the covid outbreak and the latest US elections.

    Now it's a huge gatekeeping machine that "protects you from mis- and disinformation online".

    One of the criteria for allowing information on Google is "consensus". I assume legislation is considered consensus too.