Canadian Passports Are Insecure and Slow

How Canada fell behind at doing the first step of an online interaction, proving you are a Canadian.

Apart from Newfoundland... You're cool.

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References & Sources
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[DrErikEvrard]

In Belgium we have something similar to RealMe, and it's called ItsMe. It works for any level of government, but also private organisations are allowed (and will) use it, e.g. banks, insurance companies, hospitals, etc. It's extremely convenient. Many other European countries have something similar. Germany and the UK are notorious exceptions.

[simon]

Your videos are just incredible! Greetings from Germany, another country with horrible digital identification services

[m.p.baldnessdyslexic]

Everything I am thinking about but I can not manage to explain, you take the time to make a video about it's crazy. Thank you. I was having a bad day and struggling but your video cheered me up. It must really be hard for you to realise that the country you chose as your new home has broken political system and the worst banking ID in the western world and one of the worse banking systems as well. I try to tell my friends in Québec , Ontario and the rest of Canada that its broken but they think I have moved to Europe, its not because I am snob its because its not normal for a country to use fax's in 2022. Seriously Canada its really embarrassing ! ps good job Alberta on this front :)

[keithtonkin]

I remember the last time I renewed my NZ Passport I did it all here on my laptop including the photo. The passport arrived in the mail within a week I think.

[ManuelOctavio]

I love the topics you bring to light, Paige!

[maty-_-]

Awesome video with great analysis. Just like all your other ones. Crazy that you only have 15K subscribers. Here’s one more 😊

[martyfill]

Great video well done Canadian government should endorse Alberta approach identification

[dennisverweij]

I had a run-in with how poor the digital governance of Canada is during my trip to family in Canada last Christmas. I have an expired permanent resident card, as once upon a time I use to live in Canada, but it is now expired and has been for a while. I have flown to Canada before with being expired. I just flew with the tourist visa waiver program. But this Christmas, I show up to the check-in and my visa waiver was no longer valid. Not because it was over the date, but rather because I was still a resident of Canada, therefore I should not need the visa waiver, and should fly with my resident card. they had between my previous flight, and my flight for Christmas made an "or" to an "exclusive or" between resident and tourist visa. But because my resident card was expired I could not fly with that, and I wasn't allowed on the flight. They told me I had two choices, renew the resident card, or renounce my residency altogether. Now I couldn't renew it because that would 1) take time for a new card 2) I did not meet the requirements for the amount of time living in Canada for the past 5 years. So I went ahead to renounce it. I had to get photos taken by and signed by a studio, print out several forms, and mail it all to the embassy in Vienna, as they are the only Canadian embassy that deals with this stuff in Europe. I couldn't find if there was any way to do it digitally, my parents couldn't nor could my brother. But after 2 days, I found that there was a hyperlink in the middle of some random paragraph after the login portal that allowed me to do it all digitally. But if you just google and try to find it, there was no way you could find the digital form, all the government information sites will point you to the old fashion snail mail way of doing things.

At one point of time, Canada was indeed the leader in digital governance, but that was nearly 20 years ago. They haven't kept up, and it is beginning to show.

ps. I also remember having some issues with the gckey crap, for some reason I needed to ask for a new one each time or something...

[BikeHelmetMk]

It's worse than even this, Paige. I submitted a form to the government last year on one of those government sites. I got a confirmation letter later that my submission was received... but it *spelled my name wrong* - they are probably printing out the digital submissions and having employees retype them manually into some other legacy system.

[andrewweitzman]

Paige, the complete text to "Kittens and Gun Safety" Is:

1) Meow loudly at staff after loud noise has occurred until it is clear that staff has rendered itself non-operable

2) Groom intensely for a half hour

3) Consume former staff's eyeballs.

[acchaladka]

Fantastic subject, I'd like your to give us an outline of what space- age amazing Estonia of all places, had done in this too. Also, where's the damn link to write my mp about this please? Fuck! Nice job again, Paige.

[GingerKiwiDev]

Ka pai Paige! Definitely will be sharing on LinkedIn and Toronto JavaScript Slack.

Things like this is why I went back to school online at Massey U in NZ while in Toronto in 2019. It was easier, more efficient - even though I didn't have my adult "I'm a NZ citizen" paperwork at the time. (I had been on my mom's passport when we were in Wellington in primary school). I was able to get my "citizenship via descent" certificate (which is beautiful!), IRD number, and student funding in just a few months. I got a digital mailing address in Wellington (in my old neighbourhood no less).

I already had done almost two semesters at Massey U before I would have even started at a uni in Canada. I don't have my passport yet, because the pandemic happened.

[hamzaalberta]

Great video buddy. It is a real eye opener. My brothers had to get fake tickets online just to renew their passports for travel in summer. If it wasn't for a kind Ukrainian-Canadian they would not have been able to visit our family overseas. From what I heard some poor people could not even go after the death of a loved one. I have been to third world countries where they can deliver a passport within six days.

[SPAMMAN]

I am very surprised my home province has the best digital government system. I would of never expected that

[NoStNick]

The right to forget your mothers maiden name isn't guaranteed in the Charter?? Maybe i should have read it before moving here.

[AceChina]

Took me almost 3 god damn months to get my passport in 2021 because 3 (yes 3) Canadian bureaucrats made a mistake and didn't notify me about the mistake (I had to call them and find out). I primarily use my Mexican passport now because I never want to deal with that shit show again. Canadian passport is now my emergency secondary passport.

[gargoyle]

Germany got electronic Identity card a decade ago but due media panic about "privacy concerns" nobody uses it. So sad. But this time it's not the Governments fail, but the people.

[Tacosoftware]

Their new passport system actually is better now. I got my passport within a week of getting it. They recently implemented their new system just 2 weeks ago and somehow was the first ones to try it.

[avimakkar]

BC services card has improved significantly

[OohPutain]

It never occurred to me that "le numérique" does not have a perfect translation in English