“19741234-1231″

This little number holds a lot of power. (This one is fake, though. And invalid.)

In Sweden, during the build-up of the national computer databases such as SPAR (Statens Person- och AdressRegister, i.e. Government Register over People and Addresses), the brains behind this chose to assign each person a special registration number, composed of the birth date, three additional digits, and a check digit. This number is similiar to the social security ID in other nations, but it’s more pervavise: The Personal Registration Number is a unique identifier, shared among most payment systems, public databases, banks and government agencies. It tracks you from birth to grave; and no matter if you change your name, if you move from one end of the country to the other (or overseas), this little number will identify you and know your whereabouts.

As everything, it is both good and bad.

The good thing is that every person can be uniquely identified. There is no need to parse names and addresses computationally; there is a nationwide register of all citizens; and data lookups are as easy as ever. There is no need to provide electric bills for identification (like in France), or driver’s licenses (like in the USA) or any other form of proof. If you have a personal registration number, you’re legit.

Mostly the benefit of this registration comes to us software developers. We’re the ones having to match different records together. And instead of trying to match names, addresses, phone numbers, birth dates and so on, we just match the personal registration numbers. Endless hours of tears and sweat are reduced into a single SQL query. At least, inside Sweden – we’re not so lucky when it comes to building computer systems for other countries.

The bad thing – aside from possible security implications – is a non-tangible loss of freedom, in the sense that it’s impossible to relocate without informing a large computer about your whereabouts. Because if you don’t, none of the social services work. You won’t get mail. Forget about your paycheck. Everything is channeled through this little number, and that number needs to know where you are.

I think maybe Solzhenitsyn put it best:

As every man goes through life he fills in a number of forms for the record, each containing a number of questions . .. There are thus hundreds of little threads radiating from every man, millions of threads in all. If these threads were suddenly to become visible, the whole sky would look like a spider’s web, and if they materialized as rubber bands, buses; trams and even people would all lose the ability to move, and the wind would be unable to carry torn-up newspapers or autumn leaves along the streets of the city. They are not visible, they are not material, but every man is constantly aware of their existence…. Each man, permanently aware of his own invisible threads, naturally develops a respect for the people who manipulate the threads. (Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Cancer Ward, 1968, via Bruce Schneier)

In the over-digitalized society in which we live, imagining life without a serial number attached to you becomes more and more impossible. We will probably never be able to back to the Wild West, where people lived and died and no-one in the government knew about it. So it seems we’re stuck with it, for better or for worse.

Once thing is clear, though. We software people like it. A lot.