Technology –
Digital Drivers License?
We are living in the digital age — digital phones, digital photos, even digital airline boarding passes.  So, why not a digital drivers license?
Technology
The plastic driver’s license has been a standard for decades, serving as positive proof that you could you drive and to verify your age and identity. But with modern technology, is this ancient piece of plastic still necessary?
“The world is changing, and a lot of transactions and activities that people do are now done in digital formats,” said Mike Williams, chief of communications for the Department of Motor Vehicles in Delaware. “You can do so much with your smartphone. You can pay at the gas pump. You can go to the grocery store. You don’t even need a debit card sometimes anymore. So this is just a movement in that direction.”
Delaware, California and Iowa are just 3 among several US states considering digital driver’s licenses.  In fact, prototypes will undergo pilot tests later this year. If those tests go well, the first virtual licenses could be offered to the public as early as 2016.
A digital license on your smartphone would resemble your printed license, including your name, address and date of birth, along with a photo. Just as your printed license contains a scannable barcode for machines to read the information, so too would the digital version.  Your digital license would also be a full-fledged mobile app with security protection and potentially real-time data downloaded directly from your state’s Department of Motor Vehicles.
Software development company MorphoTrust is working toward a digital driver’s license app and is collaborating with Iowa and Delaware on their pilot programs. It already has a history of providing driver’s licensing systems to the DMVs in 42 states, and began considering digital versions of the driver’s license a couple of years ago.
With many retailers offering apps that incorporate digital versions of their reward and loyalty cards, and several insurance companies offering digital versions of auto insurance cards, the digital drivers license seems to be the next natural step.  A digital license could also be updated more easily than a plastic one. Go online to change your address, your married name or other pieces of information, and the DMV changes could take effect almost immediately and without waiting.
Technology
However, what happens if your phone loses its charge and you can’t turn it on to access your driver’s license? Or what if you’re  stopped by police in a dead zone and your phone can’t connect to the DMV’s database?
Although the concept of a digital drivers license on our smartphone has intrigued a tech savvy world, not everyone is enamored with the idea.  Critics of the proposal have asked a very valid question:  When a cop pulls you over, do you really want to hand him your smartphone instead of a plastic license to take back to his vehicle?  If the officer could look at your license, what else would be accessible, and what would be off-limits?
“We have a number of serious, unresolved concerns about how the use of the smartphone as a driver’s license may implicate privacy rights,” said Rita Bettis, legal director for the ACLU of Iowa. “These include the rights to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures of one’s phone and its contents during traffic stops.”
Nationwide acceptance of an electronic version of your license is something that’s likely to take years.  States would need to launch campaigns to spread the word among businesses, law enforcement agencies and other parties that digital driver’s licenses are legitimate identity documents. Even then, you’d probably run into a dozen restaurants, bars and other businesses that would question the validity of a driver’s license on your smartphone.
