Empowerment or repression? Opening up questions of identification and surveillance in Brazil through a case of ‘identity fraud’

A real but typical case of identity fraud is used to open up the complex web of identification systems in Brazil. It is argued that identification has two polesrelated to the nature of citizenship—repression and inclusion—and that reactionsfrom citizens to new identification schemes can be attributed to how they view thepurpose of the cards in these terms. In Brazil, a sense of inclusion and citizenshipbased on a fear of anonymity and exclusion predominates leading to widespreadsupport amongst even critics of state activities. However, this may be undermined bythe lack of state preparation for an information society, particularly the absence ofmeaningful data protection laws.