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| Gartner Reports Strong Opposition to a U.S. National Identity Program |
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STAMFORD, CONN., March 12, 2002 -- According to Gartner, Inc. (NYSE: IT and ITB), 41 percent of U.S. citizens are opposed to the creation of a national identification database to identify citizens and visitors to the United States. Only 26 percent of U.S. citizens agreed that such a database should be established. Opposition to such a database was particularly strong in the southern, western, and midwestern regions of the United States.
Overall, if such a database were created, survey respondents ranked private institutions -- especially banks and credit card companies -- as more trusted than any government agency where national ID administration is concerned. Among government agencies, according to the Gartner survey, the FBI ranked as the most trusted to manage a national identity database, followed closely by the Social Security Administration. Least trusted of the agencies suggested were state motor vehicle departments and the Internal Revenue Service. Interestingly, an overwhelming majority of adult Americans already have a national identifier with those agencies in the form of a taxpayer ID number and a driver's license. "The technology is ready now. Public opinion is not," said Richard Hunter, GartnerG2 vice president and research director, security. "Our survey shows that the public supports a national ID only for very specific, limited purposes, and people are quite suspicious of what governmental agencies might do with it." Gartner's survey shows overwhelming support for the use of national IDs at airports and as a means to gaining entry to the United States, for example, and much less acceptance of national IDs as a means to controlling access to healthcare and banking services. "People fear what they don't know," Hunter says, "and it's clear that many U.S. citizens fear the worst where national ID is concerned." "The distrust of public institutions as keepers of a national ID database that we see in our study tells us that the public is worried about the potential for abuse," Hunter says. "The government hasn't done a good job of explaining to the public how it's going to protect from misuse all the information it gathers about them. If there's a plan, the public doesn't know about it." Hunter is internationally renowned for his expertise on security, criminology, technology, cyberterrorism, and privacy. A keynote speaker at this year's Gartner Spring Symposium/ITxpo and a frequently quoted analyst in the print and broadcast media, Hunter's advice is regularly reviewed and adopted by government agencies and business leaders worldwide. Hunter's third book, "World Without Secrets," is an eye-opening, consumer-oriented primer on security and privacy in our networked global community. It will be published in May 2002 by John Wiley & Sons and Gartner Press. "World Without Secrets" is available for pre-order at Amazon.com. To visit Gartner's Web site specifically dedicated to security, please go to www.gartner.com/security. Gartner will provide additional analysis on security during its upcoming conference, Information Security: Combating Enterprise Espionage and Protecting Corporate Assets, which will be held May 15-17, 2002, at the Sheraton Chicago Hotel and Towers in Chicago. Gartner analysts will advise attendees on appropriate architectures, policies, procedures and technologies to minimize risk from data loss, data theft, malicious alteration, inadvertent disclosure and unforeseen disasters. For more information on this conference, please go to www.gartner.com/us/infosec or call 1-800-778-1997. About Gartner, Inc.
Gartner, Inc. is a research and advisory firm that helps more than 11,000 clients understand technology and drive business growth. Gartner's divisions are Gartner Research, Gartner Consulting, Gartner Measurement and Gartner Events. Founded in 1979, Gartner, Inc. is headquartered in Stamford, Connecticut, and has 4,300 associates, including 1,200 research analysts and consultants, in more than 90 locations worldwide. The company achieved fiscal 2001 revenues of $952 million. For more information, visit www.gartner.com.
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Contact: Danielle Westling Gartner 203-316-6754 danielle.westling@gartner.com |
