Seriously, I know the guys at Ars take pride in accurate reporting - but this is one heck of a beatup of the issue. The health and human services access card project as it was known hasn't even rated a significant mention in the media or social tracking polls down here in the land of Aus.

As it stands currently, Australians already have to present various cards to different agencies to access services - there are 43 different cards at last count. The proposed system sought to consolidate these cards into one, and also save on reissue and paperwork costs particularly as people move through different life stages and their needs change.

The card as proposed had significant value, and dealt with a large number of community concerns, particularly those arising from the Australia Card days - back in 1987, and well before global terrorism became a catch cry for identity improvement schemes.

Further, there was no information printed on the card visible to the human eye other than a photograph, signature, and the unique card ID. Everything else on the card could only be accessed on specially designed hardware, and even then the hardware could only access specific sectors of information, medical data for health professionals, basic identity and verification information for benefit agencies, etc.

The closure of this project is a devolution for the Australian community, and just sets back the need to modernise the machinery of dealing with government a few more years.