Home Affairs wants to start collecting and selling your personal data â€" and charging for it

Source: Business Tech, 26/06/2017

On 30 June, the ANC’s National Executive Committee will meet to review
ANC policy and makes recommendations on amendments or new policies to
the National Conference.


As highlighted in an analysis by the Daily Maverick, one of the key
policies will be the the party’s “Peace and Stability” discussion
document . The majority of this 31-page discussion document seeks to
group together national security, managing identity, and the economy
under a single Home Affairs umbrella.


This new restructuring would include Home Affairs taking steps towards
becoming completely self-sustainable â€" raising its own funds through
an increase in fees currently charged for IDs, passports, birth and
death certificates as well as a new nation-wide form of identity
“vetting”.


These will be collected under a formal umbrella known as the National
Social Security Fund (NSSF).


This vetting will see you charged for some day-to-day transactions
requiring proof of identity, which are then verified biometrically
through Home Affairs to confirm legitimacy. According to the
discussion document, the charges themselves will be minor, but when
the millions of the hits to the system are added up, could “grow to be
very large”.


As highlighted by the Daily Maverick, the types of transactions you
can expect to pay range anywhere between a R1 and R4 a charge and can
be attached to anything from bank transactions to airline tickets,
school registrations, hospital check-ins and social grant
collections.


The go-ahead
While the NSSF had remained purely in the realm of the discussion
document, it took a major step towards reality during President Zuma’s
parliamentary questions and answers session on 22 June.


During the session, President Zuma directly tackled the proposed
National Social Security Fund, revealing more about how government
plans to tackle the subject.


The proposed National Social Security Fund (NSSF) will operate as a
national fund responsible for administering mandatory contributions
from all workers for the provision of retirement, death and disability
benefits, Zuma said.


“The fund will serve as a single platform through which all workers
can make regular social security contributions while they are still
working to avoid falling into poverty in the event of retirement or
disability.”


“All income earners will be required to participate, and this will
foster social solidarity and the sharing of risks among all workers.
Furthermore, the Fund will provide an income to the dependants of all
contributors who happen to die before retirement.”


Zuma said that the NSSF would bring with it a number of benefits,
“guaranteed to protect contributors and foster social
solidarity”.


This will include a contribution subsidy to support low-income earners
and reduce the burden on their disposable income.


“At present, the existing retirement benefit schemes are based on
defined contributions rather than defined benefits,” said Zuma.


“This means that the contributors have no guarantee of how much their
benefits will be, and they face the risk of losing their savings in
the event of poor market performance.”


“In contrast, the Fund will carry the risk of poor investment
performance on behalf of individual contributors, and thus provide
assurance of a guaranteed benefit to all workers and their
households.”


Privacy
While the majority of the document is primarily monetary focused,
there is also a number of key paragraphs surrounding the use of
private information.


“The operational model proposed has a back office where decisions are
made in respect of the service applied for and which can lead to a
change of civic or immigration data. Key components of the back office
will be a rules-based risk engine that will quality-assure, verify
data and investigate exceptions,” reads the discussion document.


“Policy, legal, research, statistical and analysis units will support
this work and draw tactical and strategic lessons that will be used to
mitigate risks, counter threats and address systemic faults in
partnerships with relevant departments.”


“Applications will be made through various front-office channels that
are user-friendly and fully digitized, with clear security protocols
and escalations. Channels might be online or provided by third parties
trained by the DHA, such as other departments or banks.”


As such there is now a tacit understanding that government will have
access to your most personal data and use said data to help
streamline service delivery, expand outreach and aid those most in
need.


It will also become a key source of revenue, according to the
document, with “the sale of identity services and products (being)
another large revenue stream, with potential partners including GPW,
the CSIR and private sector companies.”


“Policy, legal, research, statistical and analysis units will support
this work and draw tactical and strategic lessons that will be used to
mitigate risks, counter threats and address systemic faults in
partnerships with relevant departments,” said the document.