UK Plans Database For All Children, Except Powerful And Influential Can Opt Out

The United Kingdom is set to begin its massive children’s database, called ContactPoint. However, celebrities, politicians and other well-known people will be able to opt-out of some of the requirements.

This privilege effectively creates two classes, one for the average citizen and one for the influential and powerful.

The purpose of the database is to aid authorities in child neglect and abuse cases. The database will hold the name, address, date of birth, parents’ details, doctor and name of school for 11 million children. Any children with special educational needs will have a special notation next to their names.

Many British are concerned that the database is not secure. The government estimated that 390,000 people would have access to the data. Those having access include local officials, charity workers, youth workers and careers advisers.

The government has stated that the system would be password protected, but confidential information in the hands of so many people does little to relieve the concerns.

“Either large numbers of people who are supposed to have a ContactPoint password will not have one, or the ContactPoint password will be on a yellow Post-it note stuck on the receptionist’s computer for all to see. It speaks of bad security engineering,” said Ross Anderson, Professor of Security Engineering at Cambridge University.

Now the authorities have all but admitted that the database will not be secure. The powerful and influential can apply to have all data omitted except for the child’s name, identification number, sex and date of birth. As on local council put it, shielding may be needed to protect some parents from “a hostile adult.”

If there is the possibility of “hostile adults” having access, how is the system going to protect children and families who are not high profile?

It is hard to know what is scarier: the government collecting a database of all children, hundreds of thousands of people having access to that information or creating a two-class system in an otherwise free and equal society.

Governments like to copy each other’s successes. If this database establishes itself, there will be attempts to replicate it worldwide.