The government’s digital ID consultation misses one crucial thing

Since the hamfisted launch of the no-longer-mandatory new digital ID scheme in September, Keir Starmer’s government has taken an important note on the optics. Immigration talk is now nowhere to be seen.

The character of yesterday’s consultation is instead all about inclusion. How do we make it quicker, easier and safer to access public services?

This vital correction puts us back in step with similar digital ID pushes around the world rather than a crypto-fascist outlier.

So if inclusion is now the stated goal, how will it be solved in practice?

The consultation asks what alternative routes should exist for people who don’t have strong photo ID.

For years, the digital identity inclusion problem was a policy problem. The officially recognised ways to prove someone’s identity assumed they already had a passport or driving licence. There was no good answer for the 11 million Brits in ID poverty.

That’s not the case any more.

Vouchsafe has been helping people prove who they are with the help of a trusted referee for over two years now. We do it in a safe, compliant and fully digital way. It works in tightly regulated environments like lending and banking.

We have done it despite the fact that the current guidance on how to do it is widely agreed to be not very good. We worked closely with our design partners, the Scottish Government, to make sure it could actually work for their use case.

But last week, the government also dropped new rules for verifying identity. They intend to follow those rules themselves, as well as holding companies like Vouchsafe to them.

The section on vouching has been properly fleshed out. It now reads like something that can be done securely, digitally and at an enormous scale. We’re glad to see that many of our recommendations have now been implemented.

This is the obvious answer to the inclusion problem.

Vouching has excellent precedent. It is an open source version of what the Home Office does when they issue your first passport, free for anyone to implement rather than hidden in a secret manual.

Vouching is better than the alternatives. We see better first-try completion rates with it compared to providing birth certificates or other, even more arcane paperwork.

So the shape of the problem is now purely one of resources.

Will the government put the necessary money behind providing first-class vouching fallbacks for those without passports, driving licences or good data trails? Or will they leave it to companies like Vouchsafe to fill the gaps?

Is anyone willing to take that bet?

Vouchsafe helps firms replace legacy document checks with safe, easy and compliant digital ID acceptance, with fallbacks for those without.

You can get a free 14 day trial of all features, with no credit card needed. Claim it here or book a free consultation.