Category: Internet

More than ever before, we have to prove we are who we claim we are. What is the importance of our identity?

Sometimes it seems that we’re constantly being asked to verify our identity.

That might take the form of using a password to access an app or a website. We have to provide documentation to get a drivers license, and then we use that license in dozens of different ways. You may have to supply the last four digits of your social security number to access your utility bill. You’d better remember your PIN if you want to withdraw money from the ATM!

It’s easy to see why — identity theft happens every day. Someone posing as you might open a credit card, or use an existing card to buy things a thousand miles from where you are. Emails supposedly from you are more likely to get your friends to click on a suspicious link.

And it can be complicated and inconvenient to remember or store hundreds of passwords, keep straight all the security questions about which street you grew up on or your childhood dog’s name, and be inputting codes from texts or emails using two-factor authentication.

With all this effort being made to verify your identity, have you given any thought to what that identity is? Is it just a collection of memories and experiences? Is it genetic, like a fingerprint or a DNA sample? Or perhaps it is what you believe or the actions you would take in any given circumstance?

What makes you uniquely you, and how can you demonstrate that to someone else? And how can you verify that same information for others?

Related questions: What makes you you? With which groups do you identify? What makes something a human right?