House Transportation hears advocates for optional mobile driver’s licenses, emphasizes privacy and standards

The House Transportation Committee on an informational hearing discussed a proposal (House Bill 1970) to allow Pennsylvanians to obtain an optional electronic driver’s license or state ID alongside a physical card.

Jeremy Grant, coordinator for the Better Identity Coalition, told the committee that ‘‘there’s really two problems we’re trying to solve’’ in digital identity: identity proofing (establishing that a person exists and is who they claim to be) and authentication (verifying that person when they transact online or in person). He said a cryptographically signed mobile driver’s license stored in a phone’s secure wallet could let an issuer vouch for an identity without revealing unnecessary personal data.

Grant argued the change could limit large-scale identity fraud by replacing weak shared secrets such as Social Security numbers and knowledge‑based questions with device‑bound cryptographic proofs. He cited federal analyses of pandemic‑era and ongoing losses tied to compromised identity and said states could use established standards to protect privacy and interoperability. ‘‘If I’ve already gone through the process of having an agency vet who I am … why can’t I go to them and ask them to vouch for me when I need to prove who I am to another party?’’ he asked.

Grant described selective disclosure as a privacy benefit: in many transactions, a relying party needs only a limited attribute (for example, “21 or older”) rather than a full license record. He noted that international standard ISO 18013‑5 is already referenced in the bill and recommended adding ISO 18013‑7, which supports online verification use cases; he also urged the committee to consult NIST guidance and a NIST playbook project that is building security and privacy best practices for online use.

Committee members pressed on access and risk. Representative Rangkiewicz said constituents had struggled to meet Real ID documentation requirements and asked whether digital IDs would ease or worsen those burdens. Grant said digitizing vital records and creating DMV help desks (he cited Georgia as an example) could help people who lack standard documents, and he repeatedly stressed the bill’s optional nature: ‘‘you still have a right to paper,’’ he said.

Representative Powell asked whether Pennsylvania would create a patchwork system if it acted alone; Grant recommended following ISO standards and the NIST playbook so state systems remain interoperable with other states and platform wallets.

Representative Hohenstein expressed skepticism about private companies accessing government data and asked how biometrics fit into the model. Grant said biometrics are commonly used for deduplication in DMV records and for unlocking devices but argued that asymmetric cryptographic keys — possession of a private key on a device — are harder to scale for attackers than shared secrets or mass biometric spoofing. He described the proposed architecture as one that would reduce reliance on third‑party data brokers by allowing an authoritative issuer (the DMV) to vouch for selected attributes.

Representative Mary Isaacson reiterated concerns that broader digital access to DMV or identity data could increase fraud risks and asked whether the effort was intended as a step toward a national system. Grant said the coalition’s blueprint calls for leveraging existing authoritative documents as digital counterparts rather than creating a new national identity system, and he emphasized privacy protections and standards as safeguards.

There were no votes or actions; the session was informational. Chairman Kerry Benninghoff closed by saying the draft meets TSA standards for checkpoint use and adjourned the meeting.

Provenance: Jeremy Grant’s presentation and Q&A across the hearing (transcript excerpts beginning 00:04:06 and concluding 00:30:46) were the primary record for this article.