Warning over IT upgrade costs
Andy McCue writes in Silicon.com about the so-far uncounted cost of modifying existing government IT systems to support ID cards:
The Home Office claims in its own benefits overview report that many of the strategic benefits of the ID card scheme will derive from the use of a unique Identity Registration Number (IRN) “unequivocally linked to an individual”.
But one ID card expert told silicon.com this raises the spectre of huge system costs as government IT systems are rewritten to incorporate and recognise the IRN. “Think Y2K but worse,” he said.
No figures have yet been produced on the costs to individual government departments and other public sector authorities and bodies that will need to use the ID verification service provided by the National Identity Register.
