OneID's view on Government Digital ID: Protecting What Works and Strengthening the Future

OneID® welcomes the renewed public interest in the UK about a national digital identity scheme and offers our perspective that’s grounded in what already works, what must be protected, and how we can build a robust future.

Our view:

We believe digital identity is a foundation for the public good. It won’t solve every challenge on its own. Still, when designed with privacy and trust at its core, it enables a wide range of secure, inclusive services to be built on top — benefiting individuals, businesses, and society. If the government proceeds with a “Government Digital ID Card” system, OneID is ready and willing to participate in a plural, interoperable ecosystem — accepting the government-issued credential as one valid input among many. Our priority is ensuring the system is built on principles of trust, choice, security, and leveraging existing capabilities rather than reinventing the wheel.

Key points:

1. Digital identity infrastructure is a national infrastructure and will benefit the country
   OneID supports framing identity as part of the digital public fabric — akin to utilities like transportation, electricity, or broadband: necessary for modern government and commerce.
2. A mature UK framework already exists for public and private sector use cases; we don’t start from zero.
   We stress that public discourse often ignores what is already live or in flight: 
   
   
   1. One Login (Citizen Access Gateway): Citizens already have a gateway into government services under the “One Login” vision (e.g. via GOV.UK accounts).
   2. eVisas (Immigration/identity integration): As of January 2025, the Home Office has introduced eVisas as part of managing immigration identity credentials.
   3. Data (Use and Access) Act: The passing of the act earlier this year gave legal credence to Digital Verification Services (DVS).
   4. The Office for Digital Identities and Attributes (OfDIA) launched the DIATF Gamma version, paving the way for identity wallets and interoperable credentials.
   5. DVS in the private sector use today: The DVS is already used in identity verification tasks — for example, right to work checks — at no direct cost to taxpayers, in a privacy-preserving way.
      The drift of current proposals sometimes ignores these capabilities. The government doesn’t have to start from scratch. It’s a risk and a mischaracterisation.
   6. The Open Data Institute (ODI), in its review of UK identity, describes how past proposals (Blair’s original ID card scheme) failed partly because they disrespected the messy, incremental nature of identity infrastructure in practice.A mature UK framework already exists for public and private sector use cases; we don’t start from zero.
      
      In short, the UK already has building blocks. Any national scheme must interoperate, not sweep them aside, and more importantly, not ignore the fact that there are numerous Digital ID solutions and companies in the private sector that the government can utilise for things such as Right to Work at no additional cost to the taxpayer.
3. OneID® looks forward to accepting the Government Digital ID Card (if enacted) as another valid ID credential.
   1. If the government’s consultation concludes it will proceed, OneID® is ready to treat the Government Digital ID Card as one credential among many — interoperable with our wallet, verifiers, and identity flows.
   2. Our priority is not monolithic lock-in, but an ecosystem approach. Citizens, banks, and employers should be able to choose which credential(s) to use.
   3. We can help ensure the technical and privacy interfaces are trustworthy, standardised, and consumer-friendly, rather than having to “bolt on” integration after the fact.

Key considerations for the Government:

• Civil liberties, data protection, and inclusion must be front and centre: digital exclusion, privacy, redress and appeal mechanisms, audit, and revocation — all must be baked in, not afterthoughts.
• Guard against Tower-think / think tank capture: The Tony Blair Institute is a vocal advocate, and its influence is visible in the current framing of the policy. But its reports often gloss over existing infrastructure and the friction in implementing a single ID system.
• Legacy, transition, and migration paths matter heavily — any scheme must work with existing identity tokens (e.g. passports, driving licences, bank KYC, mobile network IDs) during the transition period.
• Open standards, interoperability, and competition must be structural to prevent lock-in or dominance by a single vendor.
• Public narrative and trust will matter more than tech. Given the legacy of past failures, public suspicion of “Big Brother”, the government’s ID scheme should be incremental, opt-in (where possible), citizen-centric, transparent, and secure.

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About OneID®

OneID® is the only UK Identity Service that uses bank-verified data to create absolute certainty between a business and its customers in a fast, simple, secure and truly digital way.

Along with bank-verified data, we also offer businesses the flexibility to choose from trusted data sources, like mobile network operators, government identity documents, and our own digital identity wallet—depending on the business and compliance needs they have to meet.

OneID®’s real-time verification solutions balance digital ease with the strongest counter-fraud measures. It seamlessly blends into the digital habits of today’s customers, enabling businesses to verify 98% of UK adults with minimal friction and maximum confidence.

In addition to identity verification, OneID® simplifies age verification, Direct Debit setup and customer and employee onboarding. By streamlining these processes, OneID® partners with businesses to implement key regulations like the Online Safety Act, reduce operational costs, improve customer engagement, and drive growth.

OneID® is certified under the UK government's Digital Identity and Attributes Trust Framework (DIATF), FCA-regulated, and a B Corp business committed to making the digital world safer. Headquartered in the UK, we’ve brought together experts in Digital Identity, Payments, Banking, Technology, and Government to help businesses build trust and security at scale.