Controversial UK digital ID card sparks mass surveillance concerns

On Wednesday, more than 2.8 million Britons signed a petition calling on the UK government to cancel its mandatory digital ID system, fearing it could lead to “mass surveillance and digital control”.

The identification scheme, dubbed “Brit Card” and announced last week by British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, is expected to be rolled out by August 2029 in the Labor government’s bid to crack down on illegal immigration, as it would ban anyone without a digital identity from working in the UK.

But criticism of the plan argue that its effects on illegal immigration will not be large enough to outweigh the privacy concerns they pose.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer delivers his speech during the Labor Party conference at ACC Liverpool on September 30, 2025 in Liverpool, England. (Ian Forsyth/Getty Images)

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The White House confirmed to Fox News Digital that the controversial measure to curb immigration is not currently being considered by President Donald Trump, despite his commitment to combating illegal immigration and his security measures in U.S. cities.

But according to one security expert, digital ID is actually not as much of a concern as most opponents of the system think.

“When the government issues a digital ID, they issue it to the individual. What that means is that just like your paper identity is in your physical wallet, your digital identity is in your digital wallet, it’s not stored in a central location,” Eric Starr, founder and CEO of Ultrapass Identity Corp, told Fox News Digital.

“When you transmit your digital ID to a relying party, the relying party does not ping a central database,” he continued. “They look at the digital identity you presented and, through cryptography, can determine the authenticity of the digital document.”

Starr, whose company works with governments around the world to provide decentralized digital ID options, said the controversy around digital ID comes down to poor design and a lack of understanding.

The tech guru said he believed the UK had poorly deployed its digital ID system by making it mandatory and disclosing few details about the system itself.

Starr argued that governments have a right to know who their citizens are and that countries, including the United States, already have systems in place that track their citizens, including issuing Social Security numbers — a system the United States has relied on since 1936.

Asked about concerns about a government’s ability to impose mass surveillance through the ease that technology could provide, even if that’s not the original intention, Starr said it’s about establishing those privacy protections up front.

A Harmons grocery store employee demonstrates scanning a QR code (R) on a customer’s (L) phone to verify their age while purchasing beer at a Harmons grocery store on August 4, 2021, in Salt Lake City, Utah. (George Frey/Getty Images)

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“We care deeply about personal liberty in a way that other countries don’t, and generally speaking, individuals don’t want the federal government to be in charge of their day-to-day affairs,” Starr explained, referring to the American public. “People’s fear about digital identity is that it is an opportunity for surveillance.”

Starr explained that some worry that every time a digital ID is used, it will alert or “phone in” to a government tracking system — a concern that privacy advocates like the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Electronic Frontier Foundation have. ACLU reported.

“It’s not about technology, it’s about managing fear and managing what’s actually deployed,” he added, emphasizing that safeguards can be put in place to address these concerns.

Although there is no federal version of a digital ID, more than a dozen states have already started issuing mobile driver’s licenses.

In theory, a federal version of a digital ID would simply include personal information that the government already has access to, including details such as passport information.

But there is another major concern that people are reporting when it comes to digital IDs: how to ensure personal information is protected against identity theft, which has become a major concern in recent years amid massive cyberattacks.

A person scans and downloads an app to start the process of converting their physical driver’s license into an official digital version to be stored on a mobile phone at a Harmons grocery store on August 4, 2021 in Salt Lake City, Utah. (George Frey/Getty Images)

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Starr says the “digital identity architecture” is different from centralized databases used by institutions like hospitals, which have found themselves vulnerable to cyberattacks and data breaches.

Decentralized systems, such as digital ID, make hacking “almost impossible” because “the only way to hack a million identities is to hack a million phones,” he said.

“There are solutions. It’s not a technology problem, it’s an education problem, it’s a fear problem,” Starr said. “They are also poorly designed solutions that open the door to bad behavior.”