ID cards and security

Marco Kusumawijaya, Urban Expert , Jakarta

More and more office buildings on Jl. M.H. Thamrin and Jl. Sudirman, especially those with foreign tenants, are applying silly security measures following the JW Marriott Hotel bombing.

Visitors are now required to leave their ID cards at the reception counters, without exception.

This policy is ridiculously overacting because keeping visitors' IDs has nothing to do with protecting the buildings from attack, in particular providing better security in general. Instead, the measure causes inconvenience and is an intrusion of privacy and poses potential danger to the visitors themselves.

After a body and bag search, requesting visitors to surrender their ID cards is irrelevant to both the security of the buildings and their tenants and other visitors.

If anything does happen to the buildings and the visitors, ID cards are extremely important for the visitors for, among other things, identification purpose.

In case of a terrorist attack, there is a greater possibility that the visitors' ID cards, which are kept by the receptionists or building security officers, may be destroyed together with the reception area. In other cases, such as fire and earthquake, the panic situation would make it impossible for the visitors to retrieve their cards, and it is probable that they might be lost after the event. So, where did the idea of keeping visitors' ID cards come from?

From this point of view, it is clear that holding visitors' ID cards is putting visitors in danger while at the same time serving no security purpose at all.

Many visitors may need their ID cards with them while they are in the buildings, for example for banking services or for applying for a membership with an organization.

In Indonesia, especially Jakarta, there is also a dubious ruling that citizens should always have their ID cards with them. The law reads that citizens should have ID cards, but there is no mention about people having to carry the ID cards at all times.

However, the Jakarta authorities have been staging operations to make sure people are carrying their ID cards. There is a contradiction between one authority demanding citizens carry their ID cards at all times, and building managements requiring that visitors hand over their IDs.

It is indeed bad enough for Indonesians to have ID cards and to be obliged to reveal or expose private information. This practice dates back to colonial days, when natives were required to produce a pass when traveling.

The Japanese fascist administration might have strengthened this practice to what we inherited. The fact is that there is no requirement for Japanese citizens to have ID cards like we do in Indonesia. Citizens are registered at City Hall, but not required to bring their registration information. Company employees' identification cards practically function as ID cards. If one enters an office building, he or she is just asked to show the cards. There is no request to surrender the cards at the reception desk, even for a single minute. Building security guards and receptionists may just take notes, but not keep the visitors' ID cards while the visitors are on the premises.

Two months after the Sept. 11 tragedy, I visited several government offices in the U.S. and even the Congress. To my surprise, I was only required to show my passport and the receptionist took some notes, but they did not keep a single document of mine.

It is not too late for the city authorities to find out what is going on with the security measures in most office buildings in Jakarta. Something must be done before the annoying action becomes a "legal ruling" which merely puts visitors in a difficult situation in case of emergency. Will building owners or managements be responsible for the loss of the visitors' ID cards if something happens in the building?

Some building managements argue that they need to keep the ID cards, and in return the visitors get a badge, which must be returned to the receptionist after their business is over.

Preventing acts of terrorism in an office building is a must, but keeping visitors' ID cards is an irresponsible action that violates people's privacy.

Why should such a basic right be violated by an action that is totally unnecessary, while there are other reasonable measures building managements can take to protect against terrorism.