Greg Broiles wrote:
On Thu, Nov 16, 2000 at 03:53:28PM -0800, Ed Gerck wrote:
http://www.anu.edu.au/people/Roger.Clarke/II/PKIMisFit.html
Public Key Infrastructure: An Artifact Ill-Fitted to the Needs of the Information Society
Abstract
It has been conventional wisdom that, for e-commerce to fulfill its potential, each party to a transaction must be confident in the identity of the others.
This is the law for commerce, except for cash transactions of non-controlled goods. Firearm sales usually require proof of identity (at least) even for a cash transaction.
That's a matter of state law - Federal law doesn't (yet) regulate firearm transactions between two residents of the same state where neither is licensed federally as a firearms dealer, so long as the firearms themselves aren't specially controlled (like Class 3 full-auto weapons, or short- barreled rifles/shotguns, etc).
That is why I wote "usually" -- it may vary.
Nevertheless, the main point above is wrong, too - commercial law certainly does NOT require parties to be confident about the identity of counterparties.
So, you think that credit-cards deals would not need names or any real-life id, just assets? Surely, the merchant gets paid regardless, even if you use a false name. But this is not the end of id fraud. The bank still goes after the money...and uses the law against fraudulent practices to enforce the cardholder agreement, or criminal statues. If Mr. X uses his wife's credit-card, Mr. X is technically committing id fraud, and wire-fraud. Of course it works most of the time... But when it does not, and someone comes enforcing, someone will ask, did you Mr X, uses Mrs X's credit-card, and represent yourself thereby as Mrs X? Cheers, Ed Gerck