WILL NEXT GENERATION DRIVERS’ LICENSES IMPINGE ON INDIVIDUAL PRIVACY?
ARE THEY A BACKDOOR WAY TO ESTABLISH FEDERAL ID CARDS? 

GW Civil Liberties Expert and Supporter of Identification Cards, Amitai Etzioni, Available to Comment on Today’s American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators (AAMVA) Recommendations for Issuing High Tech Drivers’ Licenses 

WASHINGTON – The American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators today are announcing their recommendations for the next generation of secure drivers’ licenses. These ID cards could contain such biometric data as fingerprints and retinal scans for the country’s 184 million licensed drivers. 

Privacy advocacy groups, such as the Electronic Privacy Information Center and the Privacy Foundation, are raising concerns over this technology, saying that there would be no difference between a driver’s license and a national ID card.  

Available to comment on the AAMVA’s recommendations and the issue of secure identification cards is Amitai Etzioni, GW University Professor and founder of the communitarian movement. Professor Etzioni is an expert on civil liberties and a supporter of high tech IDs. 

The author of 19 books, including The Limits of Privacy (New York: Basic Books, Spring 1999), Professor Etzioni served as the Thomas Henry Carroll Ford Foundation Professor at the Harvard Business School from 1987-1989. His other posts include serving as Senior Advisor to the White House from 1979-1980 and guest scholar at the Brookings Institution in 1978-1979. From 1958 to 1978, Etzioni served as professor of sociology at Columbia University; part of the time, as chairman of the department. 

Outside of academia, Dr. Etzioni's voice is frequently heard in the leading news media, in articles in publications such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Wall Street Journal and in appearances on network television. 

Professor Amitai Etzioni can be reached by calling him at (202) 994-8190 or etzioni@gwu.edu.

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