Step 1: State adopts digital ID system and mandates that subdivisions and political units of the state are required to accept it for identification purposes in their interactions with the public. Step 2: Step 1 is extended to private actors.

What am I missing? I realize I’m completely handwaving away the details of implementation, as well as assuming that there’s at least one state that would make the political choice to accept a slightly higher baseline of ID misuse compared to a system that verifies that the instrument matches the bearer 99.99999% of the time, but conceptually it seems pretty straightforward. At the bottom of the digital ID, just put 8 pt letters reading “This digital ID constitutes legal identification of the person to which it has been issued for all purposes, public and private.” Boom, done.

I also don’t think there necessarily needs to be an incentive for businesses to invest in expensive card reader systems that phone home to a database and authenticate the QR displayed on the device. Instead, just change the law against selling liquor to kids saying that a good faith effort to validate the authenticity of state issued digital ID is a defense to prosecution under that law. In my state, at least, this is basically how it works now with physical ID cards.

Now, if you’re talking about an ID system operating at the federal and state level simultaneously or across state lines, another poster mentioned the still-not-fully-implemented 2005 Real ID Act and is a fair comment on the difficulties that would exist in coming up with a framework that would work on a many-to-many basis for every purpose for which each type of state ID documents is used.

Or if you’re unwilling to accept the shortcomings of the existing ID card regime (older siblings? doppelgängers?), then sure, you can come up with system requirements that try to eliminate every edge case that exists, and you can have an expensive and administratively burdensome physical AND digital ID system.

But otherwise, I think it would be conceptually pretty simple for a state to create a widely used digital ID ecosystem within that state.

The US mandated the acceptance of fiat money. That too was controversial at first.