Dec 18 2008

Maryland Seeks to Change License Policy on Immigration In Order to Implement REAL ID System

Maryland’s governor and transportation secretary have announced that they will seek legislation to change the state’s long-standing policy on driver’s license registration and require proof of legal residence before issuing the cards to state residents. Maryland is hoping to make this change as it begins implementing the federal REAL ID national identification system. The governor had rejected a previous proposal for a two-tier system that would have allowed the issuance of a lower-tier license to individuals unwilling to show such proof.

According to the Maryland Motor Vehicle Association’s site, REAL ID implementation means that. “Effective January 1, 2010, individuals applying for a new license will be required to show documentation to prove that they are in the United States legally.” Driver’s license applicants will have to show “Documents such as Social Security Card, U.S. Birth Certificate, U.S. Naturalization of Citizenship, Valid U.S. Passport, Valid Foreign Passport with Visa, U.S. Permanent Residency Card” or other documents to prove their legal presence in the United States.

We have previously detailed the many privacy and security problems that arise from requiring such documentation for a state driver’s license, but let’s focus on the immigration issue that Maryland is attempting to address. Read More

Dec 18 2008

DHS extends travel permission requirements for international visitors and general aviation

Continuing its “lame-duck” promulgation of rulings that will tie the hands of the new Presidential administration — or at least delay any efforts to reform DHS rules by requiring a new rulemaking process, or legislation, before they can be withdrawn — the DHS has published two new rules that will extend requirements for individualized pre-departure DHS permisison to international visitors seeking to enter the USA under the Visa Waiver Program (VWP) and to passengers and crew on international general aviation, private, non-scheduled, and non-airline flights to and from the USA:

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Dec 18 2008

US-EU agreement to disagree

Over the weekend Stewart Baker of the DHS posted an entry in the DHS “Leadership Journal” blog entitled U.S. and EU Agree on Data Protection Principles.  Readers unfamiliar with the “back story” might conclude from this — as Baker and the DHS no doubt hope they will — that some sort of formal negotiations have been concluded, and that the USA and the European Union have actually worked out their differences on privacy and data protection.

Not so at all.  Many details remain unclear, as has been typical of DHS international diplomacy. All the meetings of the previous so-called “EU US High Level Contact Group on information sharing and privacy and personal data protection” occurred in secret.  But the joint statement by a new group of selected officials from US and EU executive agencies, released as an attachment to Baker’s blog post, indicates essentially the same impasse remains as existed when the “High Level Contact Group” made its final report in May 2008:

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