Some countries are already implementing that - for example, in Portugal, the Citizen&#x27;s Card is a smartcard with a private&#x2F;public key pair, signed by the issuing department, and which one can use to login to certain governmental sites (like the IRS) and to sign documents. I hear Estonia has a similar system.<p>While I think it&#x27;s a good idea for services that already required official documents (governmental services, bank accounts, certain utility contracts), I fear that once the system is actually used by most people - right now it&#x27;s still mostly ignored - more and more services that were once somewhat anonymous will start requiring the card, since the barrier is much lower than having to send an authenticated photocopy.