You laugh, but in China, your national ID card is used for nearly everything important, and then your WeChat account or phone number is used for everything else. Almost all logins are done through SMS verification or WeChat login (no passwords in many cases), and your WeChat and phone numbers chain back up to your national ID card.

It turns out that you can completely centralize ID and authentication, provided you have a government which is mercilessly willing to violate your privacy...

And the downside is as was mentioned above: it's required for everything and there will always be a trail that can be traced back to you.

Nice in a way. Just don't ever say or think anything the Government doesn't approve of, because it can all be traced right back to you, and they have a million ways to make your life miserable if they get the slightest hint that you aren't toeing the line.

There are European countries that have their own digital IDs that provide authentication and signing.

I hope that's sarcasm.

It's a very US-Centric view of the world.

It is sarcasm.