California’s new digital driver’s licenses to work in Apple, Google wallets

Since it launched on a trial basis in September, the digital version of the California driver’s license has quietly attracted half a million users — more than any other state, but still less than 2% of the people licensed to drive in this one.

Thursday, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced a step that could make the so-called mobile driver’s license more broadly appealing: Apple and Google will soon support the license in the wallets they pre-load onto all iPhones and Android smartphones.

Up to this point, the state has required you to use the California Department of Motor Vehicles’ wallet app to store the licenses on your phone. The DMV wallet, which is available through the Google and Apple app stores, is a single-purpose piece of software, and your phone may already be crowded with single-purpose apps from retailers, financial services, smart devices, ticketing agencies, streamers and the like.

Once Google and Apple have updated their smartphone software — no date for that was announced Thursday — people will be able to sign up for and download a mobile California license directly into the wallets already on their iPhone or Android phone.

After that happens, though, there will still be a major hurdle to the mobile license, DMV Director Steve Gordon said: the limited number of places where you can use them.

So far, the Transportation Security Administration will accept the mobile license only at Los Angeles International, San Francisco International and San José Mineta airports, although TSA has said the license would work at the rest of the state’s commercial airports later this year, Gordon said. And only a handful of stores in downtown Los Angeles and in Sacramento will let you use the digital ID to verify your age, according to a map on the DMV website.

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One potential advantage of a digital license is that it can limit how much of your personal information you show when someone asks to check your ID. For example, if you don’t want that creepy bouncer or overly friendly cashier to see your home address when you show your proof of age, a digital license can simply confirm that you’re 21 or older — and share nothing else.

To perform that feat, however, the license requires special software in the hands of retailers, restaurants, bars, clubs and other businesses that recognizes and exchanges information with it. The process is based on industry standards, so multiple apps could emerge for age-verification; the DMV’s wallet uses an add-on app called TruAge.

Like about a dozen other states that have implemented some form of digital ID, however, California faces what Gordon calls a chicken-and-egg problem: businesses want to see more people adopt digital licenses before they decide to support them, and people want the licenses to be more widely accepted before they bother to sign up for one.

What Gordon hears from consumers, he said, is, “OK, I’ve got it, now what do I do with it?�

Bringing Apple and Google on board could induce more people to download their licenses, but those two companies, not the DMV, will decide which features of the license their wallets will support, Gordon said.

In a statement, Apple said its wallet offered extensive privacy protection. “When presenting a driver’s license and state ID in Apple Wallet, only the information needed for the transaction is presented, and users will need to review and authorize using Face ID or Touch ID before the information is shared. Users do not need to unlock, show, or hand over their device to present their ID,� the company said.

Similarly, Google said that licenses in its wallet will be able to share only the minimum amount of data required for that transaction or service, keeping other personal information hidden.

The technical standards for digital licenses are designed to prevent the unauthorized transmission and collection of personal information, which is a level of protection physical licenses cannot provide. (Ever wonder what happens to the photocopies of your license that some service providers insist on making?)

Nevertheless, privacy advocates at the Electronic Frontier Foundation have questioned whether the standards have been in use long enough to be fully vetted. The EFF also says retailers could still combine the limited digital information from your license with other information they collect about you and sell it to data brokers.

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Although states have made their digital licenses optional, some civil libertarians also worry about the prospect of mandatory digital IDs, which would raise equity issues alongside privacy ones. In a 2021 report, the American Civil Liberties Union found seven major potential drawbacks in the trend toward mobile licenses, including the risk of police asking to see your digital license as a pretext to search your smartphone.

“If not done just right, digital driver’s licenses could be disastrous for privacy, increase inequity, and lead to pervasive ID checks in American life, including on the internet,� Jay Stanley, a senior ACLU policy analyst, said when the report was released. “We need to proceed very carefully here.�

Advocates of digital licenses argue that privacy and security concerns have been integral in the development of the license standards, and that the digital versions are far better on both fronts than their plastic counterparts.

For example, Apple said, “Apple and the state-issuing authority do not know when or where or with whom a user presents their driver’s license or state ID, and Apple doesn’t see or retain any presentment information that can be tied back to a user. “

State officials across the U.S., meanwhile, are moving ahead; almost every state is either implementing a digital license or studying the issue.

Gore said the DMV is working with other California agencies to find more uses for the digital license, such as when responding to disasters. And in the near future, she said, retailers with Clover and Verifone point-of-sale terminals will start recognizing the state’s digital license.

Gordon said the rate of adoption for California’s digital license has been on par with other states’ efforts, despite using its own wallet instead of the popular ones from Apple and Google. And there’s a hard cap on how much the program can grow: state lawmakers have limited the pilot to 1.5 million digital licenses.