I am a man, not a number!

From the International Herald Tribune:

Most South Korean Web sites require members to register by presenting a name and matching 13-digit "resident registration number.”

The number, issued by the government to every South Korean at birth, is the closest thing the country has to a human bar code. For four decades, it has been a dominant form of identification, used when people buy a house, open a bank account or apply for a library card. The first six digits are the holder's year, month and date of birth. The numbers also reveal sex and place of birth.

The system, however, has a big problem: It is relatively easy to steal names and their matching numbers.

The police say that some people with access to the databases of businesses that store customer information have been collecting them and selling them to data brokers. Web sites with poor firewalls are vulnerable to hackers who can extract the personal data. Indeed, it is possible to find names and matching ID numbers just by using Google.

“It has become too easy to get random resident numbers,” said Kim Young Hong at Citizens’ Action Network, which campaigns for greater online privacy. “The resident number no longer serves as a proper way of identification.”

Our ID cards will also have their own number, which will be as easily to fake as the Korean one.