So you lot finally admit, in a round-a-bout sort of way, that this has been and continues to be a complete waste of everyone's time and money!

Flicking plastic cards is the best you can come up with? So you lot don't reckon that a reasonable back-street forger knows where to get blanks that are identical in sound to the genuine article? Christ on a bike, the average flea-market DVD pirate knows where to get holograms made up dirt cheap, let alone bits of plastic cut out of buckets and tupperware pots!!!

On my ID (driving licence) the only way of chekcing it is to look at the picture and then my face, much better to roll out a whole new system costing billions that no one wants so that the unreliable way of looking at a picture of me is removed and replaced with a chip that'll be hacked and cloned in months.

Surprised they don't just stamp a SID onto everyones forehead and have done with all this.

They cannot be serious. Thats no better than just asking the bearer if he's lying.

I can see it now.

"Are you a terrorist sir?"

"Certainly not officer, this bag merely contains plant food and old electrical wire. And a clock. ".

"Well, your ID card makes roughly the right pling, so you must be telling the truth. Off you go."

It is not enough for the our next Prime Minister to promise to scrap the scheme; what about promising a wide ranging public enquiry into the links between the present Government and the companies already taking taxpayers' money on this pointless scheme? With a promise to jail the guilty and recoup the money for the nation?

AC for a reason.

"Anyone using the card to identify someone is advised to flick the card to check how it sounds"

Anyone that says government IT projects are a waste of money is a born cynic. I applaud the government, David Blunkett and Jacqui Smith in particular, on their continuing success with this project. I wish them strength in their tireless fight to improve our collective safety, for which we should all agree that no price is too high.

More of this great work, please!

Happy Voter

Maybe I'm missing something here?

The uselessness of the scheme without card (and biometric) readers has been well discussed.

But, if the biometric parameters are sufficiently unique to identify a person, then surely once you have the person's characteristics (retina scan, fingerprint etc) then you can do a lookup in the central database and work out who they are.

So, what's the bit of plastic card for?

I'm slightly hard of hearing. If I were to employ someone with a dodgy ID, would I be excused any legal penalty on the basis that the only checking mechanism apparently available (yes it is also speech I have trouble distinguishing in some environments, so thats the phone line check out as well) is no good to me or some of my friends?

Next they'll be suggesting a marginal reduction in the TV licence for the blind.

Oh, wait.....

An excellent example of a low-cost, reliable, fault-tolerant technology with built-in redundancy - other fingernails.

I assume there's been a multi-million pound study to ascertain the MTBF & MTTR of a fingernail, plus the rates of false positives and false negatives which arise?

Is there now a Government-standard fingernail which has to be used?

Paris can FLICK me any time she wants.....

I am not sure about the purpose of this, and it isn't really my concern due to the fact that I am from Norway where I by chance happen to live as well. However since you have mostly been very good to us over the years, I'll give you a free advice that will resolve this.

Your government should hand out passwords to all their citizens with exception of the terrorists. The type of challenge - password they use in war from time to time. May I recommend a classic:

"Flash!" "Thunder!"

Should do the trick. No, no need to thank me. What was that? My coat? Sure, I'll get it. And you want to put my name down on a list, you say? A not wanted list...

"Official advice is to flick the cards with a fingernail because they make a distinctive noise." - if I'd have been drinking tea, you would owe me a new keyboard!

If you wanted proof that the whole ID card system is a complete waste of space, this is it.

Wonder what sort of advice you get from the phoneline? "Give the card a scratch 'n' sniff - does it smell of bovine excrement? If so, it's genuine."

Tuning Forks are now banned as "equipment that could be of use to a terrorist".

So you flick the card next to the phone, and someone in an Indian call centre tells you if it sounds right?

I am now petrified of my government.

This seals the deal; I'll vote Tory just to get rid of this scheme. I don't care what else they do.

So if it makes 'the wrong sort of noise" is that the ID equivalent of the "the wrong sort of snow" ?

"a distinctive noise"? Kinda like laminated plastic? I have a wallet full of cards that all make the same or similar noise when flicked with a fingernail.

"Anyone using the card to identify someone is advised to flick the card to check how it sounds"

I haven't laughed so hard in days. That's amazing.

I swear they should appoint me as the Czar of stupid pointless government projects, with the power to overrule anyone in government.

I could save the tax payer a few billion on the first day of my job.

Wind power. Out.

Solar. Out.

ID cards. Out.

DNA database. Out.

Central or decentral email tracking and all that jazz? Out.

Then I would direct the billions saved from all those useless pissing in an ocean of piss projects into nuclear power. We're too reliant on foreign power.

The problem with these stupid projects are that they're the pet of the very person who has the say in if the project continues. They almost have an emotional attachment to them.

They can't step back for a second and look objectively at how shit their idea was.

So instead of doing the right thing by resigning for being so stupid and writing off the money spent, they plough even more money into it in a retarded attempt to justify their spending.

I'll get my coat. Im too good for this countries government.

"Please flick your card after the beep."

*BEEP*

*FLICK*

"thank you, please hold the line and the cardholder whilst we analyse your sample. Our current waiting time is..... forty.....two.....days.....thankyou"

*MUZAK*

"Surprised they don't just stamp a SID onto everyones forehead and have done with all this."

Ah! You haven't used a pair or mirrors recently. I've discovered that our overlords have tattooed a "best before" date on the back of my neck.

The data encoded on the chip means that the noise each card makes is unique, so the skilled listener can tell if the ID is fake or not by flicking it.

If that's inconclusive, weighing the card will be the back up as '1's are heavier than '0's.. It can't give a positive, only a negative however.

Featuring Sir Flickalot and his quest to find the

It was actually the wrong type of snow. Below -10c snow forms a finer form of crystal which was making its way into the engines via the cooling duct (through the air filters) and melting in the electric engines. :)

i.e. that one must use the middle finger to get the proper flicked-off sound.

is this inept government (and their advisers) not aware of the fact that:

a plasic object will sound different when 'flicked' (har har), when it is at different temperatures?

this will be a problem, especially in england during the winter when it's freezing outdoors and hot indoors..

IDIOTS. the lot of them !

You're missing the point. The ID card is irrelevant, that's why they don't care if there are no readers.

It's the DATABASE that they want.

I want to know where all these fingernails come from that are to be used for card flicking.

Oh!

I've just realised. Of course. You 'donate' them while answering questions about your identity.

Mine'e the one with the thumbscrews in the pocket.

but you wouldn't print that.

But is it possible, somehow, to communicate to this bunch of dangerous idiots, that if they were merely all feathering their nests at the taxpayers' expense, we wouldn't be nearly as angry as we are. Twenty grand p.a. times four years times 600 MPs ... that's a mere 48 Million quid harmlessly spent. (Even some benefit to those in retail trades).

It's things like these ID cards that reallly make my blood boil, and constitute a reason why I won't ever vote Labour again as long as Jackboot Jacqui and her ilk are still party members. They are spending many *billions* of our taxes on a project that will make every last one of us hostage to the good intentions of all future governments. Our children and many future generations as yet nor even conceived as well.

If you haven't already worked out the full possible implications, find a German Jew (if you can) and ask him.

OK, we've all - including myself - had a laugh at the "official advice" to flick it with a fingernail.

But is there any evidence anywhere to show that this really is the official advice? Even by the standards of this pitifully inept Government, this is hard to believe.

Show me, and I'll laugh even more.

Paris because she swallows everything....

There is no budget for rolling *new* card readers, including Manchester and London City airports. Good so far.

But are there not card readers *already* in place at passport desks to read the RFID tags on passports? The ones with the unsecure crypto.

In which case this is a software upgrade, not a new hardware job.

Like incorporating Oystercard travel functions and Barclaycard on one card and upgrading the barrier readers in the London Tube.

You remember what happened during that right?

Thumbs down for the whole project.

"Then I would direct the billions saved from all those useless pissing in an ocean of piss projects into nuclear power. We're too reliant on foreign power."

So ... your solution to the problem of relying on a finite material sourced mostly from abroad for all our energy needs is to rely on a finite material sourced mostly from abroad for all our energy needs.

The Stupid Czar was always going to be foist by his own petard and that right quick.

Paris, because commas are for girls.

I'd imagine an MU home game to provide about the same amount of background noise as is on Oxford Street W1, except slightly different in character - buses & taxis y'see

So the plod stop & search in a crowded area - perfectly normal, & to a certain extent justified - & try to hear a distinctive 'ping' from the ID card amongst all that noise..

With luck it'll be tested in Scotland soon (apologies to my Scottish associates, but that seems to be where crap UK Parliament ideals seem to be tested before ignoring the results & rolling out anyway) & the new Scottish Parliament will laugh their socks off & throw it out ASAP

Back in the 1950s (or maybe slightly earlier) we got rid of ID cards for a reason. Is that reason not valid anymore?

Paris, because she may be more intelligent than our curent government

You know, a bit of stiff paper with a photo stuck to it, a signature and an official stamp. And maybe a drop of sealing wax to make it obvious when it is tampered with.

Just as easily forged as the hi-tech version but much cheaper. And without the pretence that it will stop crime[*], illegal immigration, sunspots, etc, there will be less incentive to fake them. So they might actually be just as reliable...

[*] I'm still fuming that, years ago, Blunkett said on the Today program that the ID card+db would "stop terrorist attacks". And bloody John Humphries didn't challenge him on it.

"Back in the 1950s (or maybe slightly earlier) we got rid of ID cards for a reason. Is that reason not valid anymore?"

It was 1953. The argument was that WWII ended 8 years previously. Why should we still carry a card to tell some busybody that you are who you say you are.

The ID card excuses have shifted over time. From TWO T to streamlining service delivery. I repeat. The IRA were a serious force throughout the 1970s,80s and early 90s at least. If Margaret Thatcher did not think ID cards were necessary to defeat them (and she certainly would have bought them in if she did) the fact that she did not suggest we think very carefully out about any more limited threat. In 4 years they this assorted bunch of twonks have killed 57 people (including 1 South American electrician) and severely injured one special needs type who blew himself up. Mind you they have released a lot of depressing video. I don't think 600m down and £400m a year (at least) is a good use of my money.