See the UK Post Office accounting scandal, in which a persistent computer error went unfixed for decades and caused hundreds of post office employees to be fired and dragged through courts for corruption that never happened. A good chunk of them committed suicide.
The database is the least important part of the system: the organizational structure, rules, and procedures are way more important, because they actively help or harm people.
That’s a really weird way of looking at it. Without the database, there’s no central ledger to consult as to whether or not you’re legally a person. Like @atrielienz@lemmy.world said:
The database is the backbone of them being able to hurt or harm
Without that starting point, “the organizational structure, rules, and procedures” that rely on the data from the database are impotent.
That’s a really weird way of looking at it.
That’s how I roll.
Without the database, there’s no central ledger to consult as to whether or not you’re legally a person.
We’re already seeing them do that without a database. 🤷♂️
Other countries are able to maintain internal databases without using them to screw over their own citizens (except when they do). The problem isn’t the database.
atrielienz@lemmy.world 14 hours ago
The database is the backbone of them being able to hurt or harm so I’d say it’s pretty important. Here’s the other problem though. The federal government under Trump is having a really difficult time protecting the personal identifiable information of the citizens. Not only have they allowed private companies to access that data (palantir etc), but they are also having a lot of difficulties with cyber attacks. Part of the reason those cyber attacks haven’t been as effective as they could be is because the data isn’t localized in one place. Now that’s exactly what they’re trying to do with this.