ID2020: Why is a ‘Physical Mark’ or ‘Digital Number’ important NOW? Six (6) Reasons for Mankind. Article Six (6) ‘Every Human’. The number of ‘man’. Fifteen (5+5+5) year goals starting in 2015. Five (5) years forward. Over 2.5 (5×5) billion people are in need of financial ‘services.’ Redemption draws nigh!!!
A Fundamental and Universal Human Right
Article Six (6) of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights stipulates that “Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law.” The Sustainable Development Goals (2015-2030) include target 16.9 which aims to “provide legal identity to all, including birth registration, by 2030.”
Necessary to Access Essential Services
Individuals are required to show identification to access healthcare and education, vote, and access other social assistance programs.
A Gateway to Economic Opportunity
More than 2.5 billion adults do not have a bank account or use formal financial services, making it difficult to move out of poverty or weather a period of hardship. Connecting people with digitally-based financial tools and services requires accessible, secure and verifiable ID systems.
Critical for Targeting Services and Assistance to Those Who Need Them
Organizations without an accurate system of identification struggle to provide well-coordinated services, simply because the number of beneficiaries is unknown and precise targeting is impossible.
Women with an official identity are empowered to play a greater role in household decisions and maintain financial independence. Furthermore, identification can be an important defense against child marriage, exploitation and trafficking.
A Key Enabler of Global Development
In addition to the intrinsic benefit of identity, it is a necessary prerequisite for achieving many of the other SDGs. International goals will be difficult to reach or measure without a way to identify beneficiaries.
Fairness and Equality for All, a ‘Fundamental Human Right’: Everyone should have access to a digital ID that enables them to prove who they are across institutional and international borders and across time, while giving them control over how their personal information is collected, used, and shared. The ability to prove who you are is a fundamental and universal human right. Because we live in a digital era, we need a trusted and reliable way to do that both in the physical world and online. (Physical ‘mark’ or Digital ‘number’)
Revelation 13:16-17 And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.