The UAE Mobile Market. Some Numbers

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The UAE's Telecommunications Regulatory Authority is set to end its 'My number, my identity' campaign tomorrow. The campaign saw all mobile users in the Emirates being sent texts to go into their telcos offices and register their SIM cards against their passports or national IDs.

It's unclear whether this is something we'll have to repeat every two years as we renew visas, but the campaign's drawing to a close certainly means a weeding out of the 'dead' SIMs in the market. Operators tend not to count unused SIMs when they publish claims of network size and penetration, often giving exaggerated market size numbers as a result. The UAE, for instance, is a market of 14.1 million mobile subscribers, a penetration of 171%.

Gulf News reports today that Du will suspend unregistered lines from January 17th with a 90-day period in which subscribers will be able to re-register before the line is deleted. Presumably Etisalat will follow suit. And an awful lot of people who haven't moved to re-register their lines are going to go into a last minute tailspin and dash to get the job done when they find their mobiles stop working.

So what has been the impact of the campaign so far? According to GN, TRA director general Mohammed Al Ghanem has said 3.82 million SIMs were cut off and 1.35 million suspended after the fifth phase - we don't know if that's a total for the whole campaign and, if not, about the first four phases or, indeed, how many SIMs remain unregistered, but that figure would mean something like 26% of the market was wiped out in the campaign so far.

Which is quite a chunk of any market, I'm sure you'd agree...

Emirates ID To Function As Bank Card? Oh Horrors...

 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

There's no end to the things you can do with a smart card and the Emirates ID card is no exception. Gulf News reports today, in all seriosity, on a banking executive from Noor Bank who has commented on the announcement, made apparently on December 31st, that the Emirates ID card will be integrated with bank cards to create a single, seamless customer service experience paradigm excellence luminance entity.

Given my UAE bank has over the years managed to screw up every single service it offers, from failing to make transfers through to issuing cards, from honouring cheques through to failing to call me before blocking Visa transactions and so on through a litany of incompetence and befuddling idiocy, the very idea of integrating such a bunch of hooning nitwits with my biometric identity chills me to the marrow.

And while it may sound attractive to pool a range of services into a single smart card, the practicality of it all is that the more things you load onto a single transactional device, the more shocking the consequence of that device's failure are. It's a little like passwords - we're constantly told by security experts that we shouldn't have a single password for every service we use. Similarly, a single card with multiple functions is inherently less secure and more prone to visits from Mr Cockup.

Added to that, the ID card now requires renewal every two years, which would mean that you forsake access to your bank account for the period between expiry and renewal. And - as we all full well know - when you for some reason fall off the rails and become an exception to the system for some reason, you could well find yourself bereft not only of identity but funds as well.

This whole integration thing comes hot on the heels of the recent ATM outage in the UAE, where customers from at least two banks found themselves unable to withdraw money from ATMs but - in many cases - found their accounts debited by the amount of the failed withdrawals.

The executive quoted by GN apparently "Admitted that there could be certain issues". You can sing that, buddy...

Emirates ID. One Card To Rule Them All...

Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This is going to be interesting to watch in October. Apparently, by then, the Emirates ID National Identity Card will be used to access all Dubai government services. That's according to a report in Gulf News. The first phase of the MyID initiative will open up 20 government departments to the use of an Emirates ID rather than individual logons and passwords for each government entity.

Which is a good thing, right? Rather than having 20-odd IDs and passwords, you can just whip out your trusty deicer  National ID card and proudly cry, "This is me! Open up your services to me, government department!"

Except that most of us don't need to access 20 government departments. I guess RTA for Salik payments, Dubai Police for registration and naturalisation and immigration for labour cards, visas and Emirates ID cards is probably about my lot. I suppose the NMC and Ministry of Youth and Culture when I'm publishing books. Oh, Ministry of Health for the biennial blood test.

And if they get just that lot together, functional and inter-operating seamlessly with the National ID that in itself will be an achivement. If they get all 20 working by October? I shall be sore amazed.

I'm not saying Dubai can't do it. You should never say Dubai can't do something, because you'll more often as not lose your shirt on it. But then the Emirates ID has amassed considerable form in the "announce now clarify tomorrow" stakes.

We can only wait and see...

The Emirates ID Card Confusion Continues

clarity matters"" (Photo credit: atinirdosh)

EIDA, the Emirates ID Authority, has established a remarkable track record of communication since its very inception. Many's the time I have posted about this deadline and that requirement being countered by that requirement and this deadline. Nothing has ever been terribly clear since the get go, if you don't mind me saying so.

And it remains oblique, opaque, obtuse and generally obfuscated. Today we have two reports in our newspapers. Well, news media - as one, Emirates 24x7, is not technically a paper anymore, having sublimed and become a being of pure energy.

Gulf News, then, is first to punch its grateful subscribers' eyeballs with a typically hard-hitting headline:

Millions of expat employees in UAE to save ID card costs biennially

The story, linked here for your viewing pleasure, is quite unequivocal:

"Millions of expatriate employees in the country can save the cost of over Dh200 for ID card renewal every two years, thanks to a new move by the Emirates Identity Authority (Emirates ID). Sponsors have to bear the costs of national ID cards of their expatriate employees, according to a top official."

And so on. It's quite clear, no beating around the bush. Our sponsors have to pay for our ID cards and take responsibility for the same - presumably extending to late renewal penalties (not cleared up in the story, but we can wait for clarity. God knows, we've waited since 2008.)

But what's this, in Emirates 24x7?

Rule to let sponsors bear expats' ID card cost under study: Eida

Hang on a cotton-pickin' moment there. 'Under study' doesn't mean 'new move', now does it? Emirates 24x7 goes on to add awful clarity to the assertion that this is no done deal but a 'move under the anvil' as Gulf News would have itself put it.

“We are considering the proposal to make it mandatory for sponsors to pay for the ID cards of their employee, but it has not been finalised. It is currently left for the companies to decide whether they want to pay the cost,” an Eida spokesperson told Emirates 24/7. No timeframe was, however, given on when the directive would be issued.

So has Gulf News jumped the gun, or Emirates 24x7 simply got it wrong? Or has EIDA told two different reporters two different things? Or perhaps told them both the same thing in terms so confusing they've come away with two different stories entirely?

We await, with a feeling of remorseless, crushing deja vu, clarification.

Let The Chaos Begin!

Hornjoserbsce: A sim card (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Gulf News today carries a Great Pronouncement Of Doom from UAE telecom provider Etisalat. If you don't register your SIM card on time, you're going to have your line cancelled, they tell us. It's all part of the UAE's Telecom Regulatory Authority slightly obtuse campaign,  'My number, my identity'.

As I predicted earlier, this one has all the usual Ealing Comedy attributes. We are all to trot off to a telephone company office with a passport copy (and original it seems) or a national ID card (copy and original we assume) and re-register our mobile lines by filling a form. The 'campaign' started on the 17th June - now Etisalat has given 1.5 million of its 8.6mn subscribers just three months to register their lines, failing which they will suspend the line. Three months after that, it's cancellation. They've sent out texts to the lucky 1.5 million hapless victims telling them to register or lose all within 90 days.

As I pointed out before, it took five years to issue everyone National ID Cards here - and that's still not a 'done deal'. The constant slew of frequently clashing announcements, pronouncements, threats and exhortations have provided endless amusement. Now we're going there all over again.

Does Etisalat really think they can get 1.5 million lines re-registered in 90 days? Even allowing for a constant and equal throughput across all their 104 offices, that means 160 applicants re-registered per office per day, or (with an eight hour day) 20 per hour. Or a constant rate of one registration every three minutes in each and every office.

Don't make me laugh. Etisalat doesn't process bill payments that fast, let alone re-registering lines (including, presumably, verifying and inputting the registration information as well as scanning documents etc). Can you imagine the long, hopeless, shuffling queues? I can and I'm in no hurry to play, thank you.

In fact, Etisalat's spokesperson told GN "It won't take more than ten minutes to fill the form... everyday we have an average of 10,000 subscribers who approach Etisalat offices to update their personal information.". At that, frankly unbelievable, number, we're still talking only 900,000 registrations in 90 days.

And then they're proposing to text another 1.5 million customers, just to add to the chaos from the preceding 90 days.

Words fail me.

Where's My Identity Card?

English: Letters in a post office box in a US post office lobby. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I renewed my UAE residence visa last month. Visas used to last for three years, now they last for two. This is apparently to improve the flexibility of the labour market. Sure enough, a new Emirates Identity Card is also part of the fun and games.

Yesterday marked the passing of The Last Great Deadline for applying for an ID card in Dubai. The Emirates Identity Authority, or EIDA, has been issuing dire warnings and waffling about deadlines since the whole thing started back in 2007. Five years later, the card issuing process is finally linked (or at least, operating in parallel) with the visa application process and a deadline has passed without being extended, clarified or otherwise obfuscated.

I had to go to Sharjah's Central Post Office yesterday. I wanted to wait around for fifteen minutes waiting for a listless youth, who had apparently had all the bones removed from his body, to find my registered letter and experience tells me this is the best place to do it. While I was waiting for the aforementioned youth to bother turning up, I noticed a long, shuffling queue which led to a counter labelled "ID Card Collection Counter". Behind this, there were floor to ceiling racks stacked of cardboard mail boxes stuffed with envelopes and two grumpy looking blokes flopping around and grugingly doling out envelopes to supplicants. Because your ID card isn't actually sent to your PO Box, it's sent to the post office where your PO Box is and then handed out individually. There are in fact two queues - the one with no people queuing in it is marked 'Ladies and Locals'. There must have been thousands of envelopes in all.

This dystopian little scene reminded my of my own, as yet undelivered, ID card. It's been nearly a month since the visa was issued and there's been no sign of any ID card. I asked around. A pal with a visa issued last December is still waiting for her ID card. Another who applied in May is set to go for fingerprinting late in July.

Anybody with a less charitable outlook would conclude that the EIDA people are swamped and the whole system is totally backed up trying to manage the tide of last minute applications. If the scenes in the EIDA back office are in any way parallel to the communications side of things, it must be a tottering, Heath-Robinson style system creaking dangerously under the pressure.

I prefer to think of it as a well oiled machine snapping into action. And anyway, I'm in no hurry to join that long, hopeless-looking queue in the post office...

Has anybody out there actually received an ID card recently?

Cue Another Farce?

Two cellphone SIM cards (bottom and top) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Did  you catch this one? I, for one, didn't I've missed it until I finally tumbled today.

The UAE's Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA) last week launched a new campaign, 'My number, my identity'. It's probably my fault and certainly not the almost impenetrably obtuse language of the announcement which is clarified by Gulf News today in a story that, try as I might, I could not find online.

We're all going to have to trot off and re-register our mobile SIMs with whichever operator we're with. From July 17th, Etisalat will have over 100 registration points around the country where you can go, eagerly clutching your national ID or passport with visa, and complete an application form to, effectively, re-apply for your mobile phone number. Du didn't confirm its re-registration arrangement intentions to GN in order to make the story, but CEO Osman Sultan, quoted in the TRA release lauding the TRA's campaign, did say customers could go to Du shops.

Many of you will recognise July 17th as the likely starting point for Ramadan, the ideal time to conduct a national campaign of this sort.

Unregistered SIM cards will be cancelled "once the registration period expires" according to the GN story. We haven't been told when that is, or what likely timescale they have in mind.

There are 12.36 million mobile lines out there. It's taken five years for the Emirates ID Authority to 'roll out' the national ID card. How long will it take this campaign I wonder? How many needless frustrations, queues, visits to physical locations and extended deadlines, empty threats, retracted announcements and 'clarifications' are we set to see?

But believe me folks, take this one seriously and get in there early. Because if there's one thing these bohos can do well, it's cut people off...

EIDA Discovers The Internet

Eida (Photo credit: cgsheldon)

A lovely piece in Khaleej Times today lifted from national news agency WAM  telling us how the Emirates Identity Authority is launching "the Social Media engagement service". 

The brave providers of 'context and analysis' didn't even bother changing WAM's copy,  using the official headline and including the redundant definite article and the unnecessary caps for social media. You can read the EIDA announcement on the authority's website here.

I must confess, they might have made a remarkable four year long hash of their communications, but EIDA has consistently served up quality entertainment.

The "Social Media engagement service" will help customers with queries and "underscored the Emirates ID’s keenness on keeping pace with the development of the modern media and employing the social networking tools for upgrading the ID card-related services and meeting customers’ requirements by responding to their queries and solving their problems most urgently through the channels they prefer in their daily life."

EIDA has already lauded its own success with  the service, replying to over 1,700 customer queries and complaints last month alone. It's followers have grown by 40% over the month-long test period.

If you want to social media engage with the Emirates ID people, you can talk to them on Twitter @EmiratesID_HELP or on Facebook, where you can pick up insightful hints and tips such as 'Important info! Ensure that all personal data entered in the e-form are correct'.

There is also, by the way, a new ID card status service. I've just renewed my visa (itself a somewhat fraught process in the circumstances) and am waiting for my new ID card so I thought I'd try it out. Apparently I'm 15 years old, which is always nice to discover when father time weighs down on one's shoulders. Quite where my ID card is, I couldn't honestly say...

Court Confusion Continues

Image by s_falkow via FlickrI'd hate to be the presiding judge over this one. Gulf News reports on the ongoing 'Facebook slur' court case currently being heard at the Dubai Court of First Instance. The funny thing is it doesn't really involve, well, Facebook...

It's a real 'he said, she said' case, defendant NF is accused of sending a threatening text message to Emirati AM, threatening to 'humiliate and dishonour him and his family' by uploading his and his family's photos to Facebook. None of the coverage of the case states that these photos are in any way lewd or compromising - and without that angle, we're really talking about the crime of doing what over 800 million people do pretty much every day.


NF's lawyers say that AM, having lost 11 cases to NF regarding the conduct of their business relationship, had maliciously bought a mobile SIM card and sent the messages to himself. He had allegedly used an old copy of NF's passport to do this.

So there was actually no 'Facebook slur' at all - GN's sub-editors once again using a Möbius strip to distort reality to make a better headline. There was the threat of uploading images to Facebook, which doesn't really count as a slur, does it?

This case is actually more about texting - did the accused send these texts and is their content actionable under UAE law or did the accuser apply for a mobile using a woman's passport? We're told AM is Emirati and must assume NF is not - so it's interesting to think that Etisalat would sell a SIM card to an Emirati man using a foreign woman's passport who is no relation to him, but presumably the court can get to the bottom of that one quite quickly.

The case would actually have been a great deal more worrying to contemplate had it involved a 'Facebook stur' - it's harder for a court to judge what went on here as content can be uploaded and deleted quite quickly. Facebook is a closed shop, so you can't use Google caches, for instance, to look at archived content (unless it has been posted using Facebook's 'public' setting). You could take screen grabs of the offending material, but screen grabs can be faked relatively easily. And you'd have to depend on specialists to weigh in on that type of issue. Facebook itself can be pretty obtuse when it comes to responding to user complaints - the abuse button isn't a sure-fire way of issuing a take-down notice and much of the 'policing' of Facebook is automated, so the interwebs are littered with the voices of frustrated users who have issues with fake pages and the like.

As it is, this is only one of two fascinating stories regarding texting in today's press. The other one has an Indian man sending a text to a major in Dubai police threatening to bomb the Burj Khalifa and attempting to extort $1mn, released after four months in jail after his 'friend' boasted to a barman that he'd set the whole thing up. The 'friend' is now in court himself. You have to wonder what on earth was going on in his head.

You're also left wondering what would happen if a truly complex case of Internet fraud or identity theft did come up...

The Emirates Identity Card: A Fresh Fandango

Image by P Shanks via FlickrIt was with infinite weariness I started this post. I've resisted commenting on the various announcements made by the Emirates Identity Authority for some time now, having just taken it as read that whatever they say will be corrected or clarified at some stage in the future, then recanted or re-clarified, changed or just turned on its head. I've been following the whole sorry saga since November 2008 and it's not been pretty, I can tell you. For a convenient glance at the whole backstory, you can follow this here link.


In this rather grumpy post, I called the whole thing a fiasco. And I do think I was justified in that.

As a communications case study it's quite without parallel - a remarkable track record of unclear and frequently unsustainable announcements that our media has done very little to clear up. The newest moves, reported in today's Gulf News (the other lads seem to have missed the story), are as impenetrable as the fog sitting on the ground during this morning's drive to work. Gulf News has two stories today, this one on its front page tells us that you now need to be fingerprinted at an Emirates ID Centre while undergoing medical tests to renew your visa. This flies in the face of the recent announcements that those renewing would not have to be fingerprinted. Asked why by the fearless bastions of the fourth estate over at GN, a spokesperson responded: "It is for security purposes."

Apparently preventative medicine centres (PMCs - you know, the places where we're herded around in shuffling lines to be dehumanised and then stabbed in the forearm by a licensed butcher, leaving a nasty bruise for days that never happens when a hospital takes a blood sample) are now being linked to the EIDA system. Quite why this means we have to be fingerprinted again is anyone's guess. This process was originally announced to be completed by 2010.

Reporting inside the paper, Gulf News tells us there is now an absolute deadline for expatriates to register for their Emirates ID cards of March 31st 2012.

The original deadline for the ID card was, as those with long memories will recall, January 2009. This deadline was extended in an announcement that said the deadline was not being extended, which I posted on here. It was subsequently extended to the end of 2010. Interestingly, the original deadline for UAE nationals was 31st March 2009, although as of today there doesn't appear to be a deadline for nationals at all.

So, three years later, we have a real deadline ("We're serious this time, we're telling you!") with a fine to be imposed upon those not complying, of Dhs20 per day up to a maximum of Dhs1,000. The real deadline is December 1st 2011 in Fujairah, Ras Al Khaimah, Umm Al Quwain an Ajman, February 1st 2012 in Sharjah and March 31st in Abu Dhabi. Dubai gets until June 1st 2012.


Quite who is going to administer the application and collection of these fines in each municipality with different deadlines applicable is a question GN doesn't address. One suspects this is because the whole fine thing is just another pronouncement of negligible substance from a source that has given us so many.

I just can't wait for the inevitable story that the EIDA folks have been awarded for bringing the project in on time, under budget and to quality...

The Emirates ID Card. Meh.

Image via WikipediaHaving applied for, and received, my Emirates ID card ages ago, I no longer take much notice of announcements, pronouncements and other strange noises coming from EIDA, the Emirates ID Authority. This is lucky as I would have gone mad.

The Cards Middle East conference has been taking place this week and EIDA's officials have been taking the opportunity to further inform the public regarding the ID cards, the introduction of which caused so much fun and hilarity. If you're interested in the backstory, you'll find much of it documented gleeully here.

Monday saw EIDA announcing that soon people will be able to use the PIN number issued with their cards. I cannot for the life of me remember being issued with a PIN number alongside my card, but who am I to argue? The PIN number I don't have will soon allow the public to access online services from the government, at first in Abu Dhabi. This is a good thing and I, for one, have no intention of letting any hiccups in the past colour my view of the most excellent services being planned for the future.

Today's announcement is that PROs can now pick up ID cards on behalf of company employees. For those unused to the many strangenesses of life in the UAE, a company's public relations officer, or mandoub, is the guy that takes care of visas, health tests and the many other government requirements businesses here have to satisfy. The EIDA move is all part of the 'redesign' of the card issuing process. Given the cards were first introduced/announced back in 2008, you'd have thought we'd had plenty of time get the process bedded down, but apparently not. Applicants have complaning about delays in issuing cards that stretch into weeks according to Gulf News, which does cite EIDA as saying 70% are delivered within five days.

The big news, however, is that the National ID card is 'to be mandatory' according to the GN piece, which manages somehow to keep a straight face in its reporting of a card we were first told would be mandatory back in 2008 and which has managed to be largely useful in the intervening period as a way of opening certain types of locked door, as a handy wallet-stiffener or a useful tool in prising apart the fingers and thumbs of accidentally super-glued infants.

Any contributions regarding other potential uses for Emirates Identity Cards are welcome.

The Emirates National Identity Card. A fiasco.

Image by dawn m. armfield via FlickrI've been moaning about the Emirates National Identity Card fiasco since early in  November 2008 - and I have by no means been alone - many august online voices (including SeaBee and Monsignor Goat) have been reeling around in awe at the ever changing cycles of misinformation that have clouded every aspect of the rollout of the UAE's national ID card scheme.

I suspect many of us viewed yesterday's pronouncements similarly - in fact, I voiced my glee on the Dubai Today show yesterday when I prophesied a round of the clarifications that SeaBee loves so well. Quite what has to be clarified isn't yet clear, because the lack of clarity in the things to be clarified is obscuring quite what could be clearer.

UAE newspaper 7Days, which has slowly but surely been regaining its tabloid swagger following the concerted campaign to eradicate it a while ago, today does what no other newspaper has dared to do. It listened to reader complaints and decided to actually investigate how people are meant to be making an application for a national ID card before the supposed December 31st deadline. Yes, you can pick yourself up from the floor now. It did journalism.

What was the result? The paper's Nichola Jones called all of the 30 typing centres listed on the EIDA website in Dubai to find out if she could start the application process. Only nine of these were working numbers - and of these, only three answered and only one actually confirmed they were accepting applications. None of the typing centres in Abu Dhabi answered the phone. This is perhaps understandable - one of the Dubai typing centres had explained to the paper they weren't taking applications as they were working through a backlog of over 1,000 forms.

Ten calls to the EIDA 'emergency hotline' weren't answered, confirming what the paper had heard from readers - it's chaos out there. Here's Nichola's story, Identity Crisis On The Cards?

Vague threats are being bandied about regarding fines - enough to prompt colleagues yesterday to start talking about applying for the card (I've had one since September 2009, although have not once managed to use it for anything useful like, for instance, identifying myself) and I told them to do what I did - download the amusingly titled application application. (You may recall, the application application was a PC application that let you fill out an application so that you can apply for an appointment to make an application. The application application didn't let you make an appointment for an application: you still had to apply for an application appointment even if you had an application filled using the application application.).

Except you can't. There is no longer an application application. It has expired.So you can only go to one of these mythical typing centres. It's worth noting that 7Days doesn't actually tell us which typing centre was open, contactable and claiming to be able to process applications. That'll be because the 7Days team are all down there today.

So what happens on the 31st December? Are people without an ID card application registered going to blow up? We can only wait for some clarification.

With all my twenty four years' in Middle East media and communications, I can tell you that in my professional opinion the introduction of the national ID card system in the UAE has been a case study in botched and muddled communications that has confused, and quite possibly squandered, millions. Some of the amazing backstory is in these posts from the past.


I am only amazed that over two years later, it is still going on.

(And now, with thanks to Mita, The Inevitable Clarification)

SNAFU

It was all too good to be true. There was far too much sense being spoken about identity cards. No more than a few hours after I had coffee with a pal in the security business who had told me that he had no intention of getting an identity card (he doesn't trust the security being applied to protect all that sensitive data and biometric information) WAM issues a statement that the Ministry of the Interior is insisting on the presentation of a National ID card for any transaction after November 22nd, by nationals and expats alike.

If you haven't got a card yet, this means big trouble. The Ministry of Interior handles police and civil defence, so we're looking at stuff like needing a card to pay a traffic fine, register a car, file a complaint etc etc.

Except the announcement goes on to say that expats living in Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Sharjah are exempted until 'a later date'.

So here we go again, another round of senseless announcements about this blasted card - can we expect each Ministry to now stipulate what dates it will offer what services to what category of person now?

At least I've got one of the things... just in case any of 'em are even half serious...

Deoxyribonucleic Acid

Image via Wikipedia

I have to confess, when I first saw the news that a group of police and forensics experts will meet today in Sharjah to discuss setting up a UAE national DNA database, my first reaction was of irritation. We've just been through the laborious process of having our finger, thumb and palm prints, our photographs and our other identity details taken, so if you wanted my DNA you could have had it then.

If you consider the disastrous roll-out of the national ID card system, one can only shudder at the potential in this new move. Commented on at length by many a blogger and even held out to dry by the dailies eventually, the conflicting announcements, lack of preparedness and ill-assembled systems deployed to manage the ID card process resulted in protracted, and comic, confusion on a huge scale. Imagine a repeat performance only accompanied by men in lab coats swabbing our cheeks and pecking little hunks of us off to be labelled and then mixed up.

But my irration passed as I read the story (once again, it was The National wot had the skinny) and saw what I can only describe as eminently sensible comments from the Chairman of the Emirates DNA Working Group, Dr. Ahmed Marzooki. He talked to The National about a possible 10-year programme, with initiatives to set up a legal framework to deal with issues of individual privacy and also to look at facilities, procedures, staffing and the like.

Marzooki also pointed out that the imperative to collect the data wasn't just criminal investigation (although that surely must be the most important driver) but also to be able to identify people in cases such as natural disaster and other tragedies - in fact, just back in August, a process was started by Dubai police to try and identify the relatives of eleven men who were killed in a fire villa in Dubai's Naif area. Storing the remains, contacting relatives, taking samples and shipping them must be a laborious and immensely expensive process - the database would mean an end to that type of investigation and speed positive identification for families and friends.

So I came away impressed with this clear evidence of quality of thought and with the feeling that if Marzooki, the man who is Interpol's only Middle Eastern representative, is at the front of this one, we may just see the lessons of the ID card roll-out learned.

We may even see the data integrated with the ID card biometric data, albeit with access controls in place. We may...

Don't Panic

I tried to do the lettering above in relaxing colours, but it didn't work. You'll just have to imagine them...

The National today reports that EIDA, the Emirates Identity Authority, has told us not to panic. Which is nice!

"Calm down, don't panic, your deadline isn't until the end of 2010," Darwish al Zarouni, the director general of EIDA told the newspaper.

Gulf News (600g) meanwhile is still carrying the clear message that 430,000 expat professionals haven't registered and there are only 13 days left for the deadline to expire.

I, who hold an appointment to get my card in September (the first available at the Rashidiya ID centre when I booked) am going to go with The National on this one.

The communications aspect alone of the ID card initiative has been a fascinating case study for me. Truly fascinating...

Identity

I'd just like to say that the Emirates' Identity Card website thingy appears to be working and I've just used it to book two appointments for myself and Sarah. They're both at Rashidiya in April, because Sharjah is apparently booked all year, but I'm not complaining. They're both on different days, too, because there were no contiguous appointments, but I'm not complaining. And the system just wouldn't buy a family application for two people, but I'm not complaining.

Now we can go an use the new and enhanced application application.

It looks as if it might go right this time. The site's here. I even got a text from them confirming the appointment a few minutes after I'd completed the form.

Yayyy!!!

Catch 22

Gulf News today has a one page feature titled ‘All you need to know about your ID card’ which doesn’t quite tell me all I need to know, because what I, personally, really, really need to know is why the website has been such a spectacular failure and why it hasn’t been fixed so that we’re all not involved in daily pointless three hour queues. Or why the application application doesn’t actually let me make an application or help me apply for an application. I’ll stop there. We got confused enough last time.

But, ignore my cavilling. Gulf News put its readers FAQ to two officials from EIDA, the Emirates Identity Authority, about the new ID.

One question was ‘It has become impossible to find registration forms or register on the website. Will I be penalised?’ The response? ‘It is your responsibility to register.’

Good. Well that's clear, then.

I also liked the response that said, of the Jan 1, 2009 'deadline' that ‘EIDA obeys government regulations and will demand the ID card from its employees and customers to provide services.’

Great. I can see it now...

Jan 2, 2009
‘Hello, I’d like to apply for an ID card.’
‘You have ID card?’
‘No, I’d like to apply for one.’
‘No service without ID card.’
‘But I don’t have one!’
‘Then no service is possible.’
‘How can I get one if you won’t give me one unless I have one?’
‘This your responsibility.’

But my favourite, out of a wonderful and richly informative piece (thanks, GN!) was this one:

What happens to the ID card if one dies after obtaining it?
‘The card gets automatically deactivated once we receive an automatic update from the government entity that authorises and authenticates this event.’

Authorises? I have to get permission to croak now?

I bet they'll need the ID card before duly issuing said permission.

Sheer magic!

Soap

It really is a soap opera. As predicted by a number of people, including august bloggers Grumpy Goat and SeaBee, the national identity card saga has now entered a glorious new phase. The deadline is not being extended, according to Gulf News (whose reporter, Binsal Abdul Kader must have had a really hard time taking notes whilst keeping his laughter under control): people will be able to apply for the card after the deadline but this is not, and the Emirates Identity Authority would like to make this quite clear, an extension to the deadline.

You can apply after the deadline, but the deadline is not being extended.

That this incredible piece of double-speak is not met with tides of withering scorn by GN is a testament to the magnificent restraint that so many have frequent cause to admire the paper for.

The ‘reprieve’ will entail ‘certain inconveniences’ for those applying after the deadline, EIDA’s Ahmad Al Zarouni warns Gulf News, darkly hinting at dire consequences for non-compliance.

As we are told by Monty Python in his most magnificent film, The Life of Brian: “Worse? How can it get much worse?”

One can only imagine what he means! Will they stop the website working on the 1st January so that you can’t apply? Stop stocking forms at the post offices so that you can’t pick them up easily? Hide the registration centres so that you can’t find them? Mess up the registration and appointment system so badly that you have to queue for hours just to get the right to take an appointment to process your application? Under-staff the entire system so badly that there are queues of hundreds at 5am every day? Those would be dire consequences indeed, wouldn’t they?

Gulf News’ story also refers to the popularity of the... gasp, wait for this... new application application. The application application is a PC application that lets you fill out an application so that you can apply for an appointment to make an application. The application application doesn't let you make an appointment for an application: you still have to apply for an application appointment even if you have an application filled using the application application.

I do hope that's clear.

How much sense does it make for this process to be entirely online? For instance, we could all type in our own applications (which would be parsed by some relatively simple software), attach a passport photo and send ‘em online. They could then be checked and the cards issued and collected, when they’re ready, by each individual applicant in person to verify the identity of the applicant. That would be perfect, no? No queues etc etc.

But oh no. The application application lets you type in your data and then print out a PDF document that contains that information and some 3D bar codes so that you can queue up for four hours and get an appointment in two months' time for someone to scan the data into another system using a bar code scanner. Because it’s important to introduce a 15 minute physical process rather than do it online and avoid all the queues.

The application, incidentally, contains some quaint things. You’re asked for your English Grand Father Name and your English Famous Name. You’re also asked for your Clan and Tribe. Clan McNabb, laddie! Clan McNabb!

By the way, just to save you the frustration of having to look for it like I did, if you do decide to use the application application, you’ll find the United Kingdom in the drop down menus is situated between Gabon and Georgia. I’m not sure why. It’s probably something to do with the state of our economy.

Why heads aren’t rolling over this is a mystery to me. Really.

Identity

Identity is the crisis can't you see
Identity, Identity
X-Ray Spex
Identity

Pal Dom has been trying to get his identity sorted out this week. Tuesday he went down to get an appointment, the website having failed to work. He queued for two hours only to be told, when he asked a guard what was happening, that he was queuing for nothing - the numbers for the day had been allocated and it was 'over' for the day.

He went back, earlier this time, on Wednesday only to find something like 400 people had had the same idea. The bloke at the front of the queue had been there since 2.30am to get pole position. Again, they ran out of numbers by the time our man got to the front.

Dogged, if nothing else, our man went down this morning at 5.25am. At 08:23am it is announced to the waiting crowd that only 50 tickets were being handed out today.

I tried using their mobile booking service. The website crashed. It doesn't work for the appointments service either - so if you want to book an appointment to get an ID card issued, you have to join the queues with my pal Dom and about 400 other hapless souls. People are even driving to Dhaid to avoid the queues.

I'm not playing the queueing up game, myself - I simply can't be bothered.

This is not working terribly well, is it chaps?

Tunes

The Internet has made a huge number of things easier to do. The processes of disintermediation, whereby a supply chain is shortened by ‘cutting out the middle man’ and simplification, whereby complex transactions are reduced to a ‘one click’ action have meant that we can now conduct transactions across a vast range of products, services and geographies. For the past few years, for example, we have bought gifts from friends and family online rather than buying stuff locally, packing it up and posting it. So a customer from Dubai can review, select and buy a product from Latin America from a French website and have it shipped to Scotland – and do it in a few minutes. If you stop to think about that, it’s pretty mad.

But one area where the Internet has actually complicated things is in music. You see, I can’t buy music online, unless I buy and ship a CD to myself. Apple’s iTunes service doesn’t support the Middle East and neither does Amazon.com or Napster – if anyone out there knows of a company that will sell music to the Middle East, please do tell me. In the meantime, I’ve used my UK credit card and a UK address, so now I’m buying music from America using a fake British identity and sending it to Dubai. Which is also mad, albeit a different mad.

And don’t even get me started on the brilliant online music streaming service Pandora. That’s closed to us and I’d have bought a huge amount more music if it wasn’t.

What’s amazing about this is that the music industry is complaining about online piracy and the like – it’s hardly any wonder that people unable to get the legal product will buy the illegal one. And in the Middle East they are doing so in remarkable numbers. In fact, one Lebanese colleague was famously surprised to be told that you could actually buy music online rather than downloading it from a sharing site.

So I was delighted to read in that rather natty newspaper The National that GETMO Arabia has been launched – a download site that offers access to online music, movies and the like. Over 800,000 titles, apparently. It’s nice and easy, you just go to www.getmo.com and sign up. The site looks smart enough, the log-in process is simple and effective. It’s great all the way up to actually buying some music. For a start the selection is extremely limited – you’ll find way more choice at the airport duty free. And when you actually do find something you want to buy (it did take me a while. I’m not your average R&B buying Dubai punter) you discover that you’re expected to subscribe – at a hefty €5 per month if you want unlimited downloads – the next plan down at €2 per month supports a whole three downloads. And that before you even get told what price each download is!

So that’s where I stopped. Because I’m not paying €5 per month for unlimited access to a highly limited choice of music at an unknown price. Nope, I’ll stick with my daft iTunes account – and feel sorry for anyone that doesn’t have a UK address and credit card up their sleeves, because the region’s music fans – and music industry – still doesn’t have a decent download site that can be accessed from here.

And that ensures the online music piracy in the Middle East will go on. You have to admire the music industry – a bunch of yo-yo toting cretins if ever there were one.