Through the setup process, you’ll be asked to take a picture of your passport, as well as to use your iPhone to read the chip embedded on the back of your passport. Then, you’ll take a selfie for verification and complete a set of facial and head movements to further confirm your identity. Within a few minutes, your verification should be complete and your Digital ID will appear in the Apple Wallet app on your iPhone.
Apple also touts that all of this is done in a secure and private way. This includes the process of adding and verifying your Digital ID, as well as actually using that Digital ID.
Like all IDs in Apple Wallet, Digital ID takes advantage of the privacy and security features already built into iPhone and Apple Watch to help protect against tampering and theft. Digital ID data is encrypted. When users create a Digital ID, their passport data is stored on the device. Apple cannot see when and where users present their ID or what data was presented. Biometric authentication using Face ID or Touch ID also ensures that only the owner of the Digital ID can present it.
Only the information needed for a transaction is presented, and the user has the opportunity to review and authorize the information being requested with Face ID or Touch ID before it is shared. Users do not need to unlock, show, or hand over their device to present their ID.
Curious to see whether anyone here would actually use this Digital ID feature.
Personally, I don’t THINK this could be exploited given the security features implemented in Apple Wallet, but it’s is completely understandable to not want to take a photo of your face.
What do you think about digital IDs anyways? Assuming that they will spread like a plague across the world, would you prefer an on-device implementation like this?
People should remember to never handover your phones even to show your ID to police officers. You run a risk of they running off with it to do what they want before handing it over. You’ll then lose all device integrity. iPhone 17 (and onward) + Lockdown Mode + Updated OS is best to mitigate if this ever happens.
This should only (if at all and really need be) accepted at airports for quick ID checks.
I don’t need or want Apple to store my passport on my phone. I only need it for out of country travel. I used one-time government issued apps when I went to the UK and back those can be removed after travel. I don’t think I’d want that kind of personal information on my phone.
Important to note that this isn’t a passport and has nothing to do with travel at all really. It just happens to use a passport in the United States as its source of truth, and it just happens to be valid for domestic travel in the US in some cases, but neither of those things make this inherently anything to do with a passport. This digital ID doesn’t even store all the information from your passport anyways.
It’s not a “digital passport,” it’s a “digital ID” and its primary use will be to verify your ID on apps and websites and perhaps someday IRL payment terminals.
I don’t see much wrong with this specific implementation from a privacy perspective, except for the fact that any form of digital ID will eventually lead to mandatory government censorship on the internet, which is why people need to speak out against this technology, contact their lawmakers, and not encourage its use. The technical implementation details of age verification don’t matter when centralized age verification mandates themselves are the crime against humanity at play here
Not to mention it’s only a matter of time before platforms like Facebook and Twitter start requesting the name from your digital ID to enforce their real-name policies.
Couldn’t said it better myself. I just wish there is a way we can avoid age verification laws besides moving somewhere.
There is the argument that age verification will happen anyways, so we should figure out how we can prevent data breaches from becoming even more worst than they are now. I know that is very defeatist of me, but have we actually noticed a strong grassroots movement against age verification? As in, burning cars level?
I mean, most of the public will say “Of course”, when they get asked questions on whether they support scanning of CSAM or age verification requirements for adult websites. Who wouldn’t want to protect the children? They don’t know about the horrible security and privacy drawbacks, but should we blame them?
Ohhh thanks for clarifying! I’m grateful (for the time being) having a digital ID is not necessary where I live - but it is certainly a concerning trend and I’m against mandatory government digital ID and age verification to use the internet! [EDIT: clarified my position in last sentence]
