In China:

Starting this month in a port neighborhood and then spreading across Shenzhen, a city of 12.4 million people, residency cards fitted with powerful computer chips programmed by the same company will be issued to most citizens.

Data on the chip will include not just the citizen’s name and address but also work history, educational background, religion, ethnicity, police record, medical insurance status and landlord’s phone number. Even personal reproductive history will be included, for enforcement of China’s controversial “one child” policy. Plans are being studied to add credit histories, subway travel payments and small purchases charged to the card.

The article also discusses the use of cameras with face recognition systems. The company putting together the ID is, of course, American. New York is vastly expanding its use of cameras. The British have so many cameras that their own privacy comissioner has said they are a "surveillance state" and they have considered adding listening devices to the cameras.

I'm going to stake out the position of liberty on these issues - with only a few exceptions I don't believe in cameras in the commons. I also don't believe in universal ID cards at all - they are the first step to a totalitarian state and no state which requires people to carry and show ID to police on demand can be considered a free state. I also don't believe in "no work lists", which despite the defeat of the immigration bill, continues on, and continues to not allow much appeal to the courts for damages when they get it wrong.

In fact, in the American context, the employment verification system is the wedge into universal id, since it is moving towards storing pictures and biometric data. Soon enough you won't be able to work if the government doesn't like you - I mean, I sure trust the people who run the no-fly list, a list with nuns on it, retired colonels on it, and so on, to run a "no work" list. I'm sure it would never, ever, be used for political purposes.

Oh, and about that bridge. You really need it, and I have a bridge in Manhattan that's suprisingly affordable. Let's talk.