WHIT: ONTARIO UNVEILS NEW SECURE DRIVERS LICENSE,

C O N F I D E N T I A L TORONTO 000470 SIPDIS SIPDIS NOFORN DEPARTMENT FOR WHA/CAN AND CA/PPT/IA/WHTI E.O. 12958: DECL: 12/09/2017 TAGS: PGOV PBTS PREL CPAS CA SUBJECT: WHIT: ONTARIO UNVEILS NEW SECURE DRIVERS LICENSE, WHTI PROSPECTS UNCLEAR REF: TORONTO 81 Classified By: Consul General John R. Nay for reason 1.4(d) ¶1. (C/NF) SUMMARY: The new Ontario Drivers License, while incorporating new, badly needed security features, is unlikely to meet the threshold for use as a WHTI-approved passport alternative. Recently appointed Minster of Transportation Jim Bradley, has announced that he will begin discussions with the federal government in Ottawa on the incorporation of citizenship data as a first step towards making the drivers license a WHTI-compliant citizenship document. However, career officials within the MoT insist that the new Ontario license unveiled on December 7 is not/not intended as viable WHTI alternative. END SUMMARY. ¶2. (SBU) On Friday, December 7, Ontario Minister of Transportation Jim Bradley announced plans to replace all of Ontario's 5.8 million drivers licenses with a more secure document. The new license will incorporate new security features such as a second photo, 2D Barcodes, microprinting, and ultraviolet "watermarks". ¶3. (SBU) News media immediately seized upon Bradley's remark that he believed the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) would accept the license as soon as citizenship information could be incorporated into the document. Both Bradley and media reports neglected to mention that DHS has, to our knowledge, made no specific assurance that the new Ontario license will be accepted as a WHTI alternative. ¶4. (C//NF) On December 17, Steve Burkett, the senior MoT civil servant in charge of drivers license design, production, and security, told us the Minister is well ahead of his own bureaucracy on this issue. Burkett asserted that the issuance of the new licenses was motivated primarily by the expiration of the production contract of the old, less secure licenses. Where feasible, new security features are being incorporated in the new contract. According to Burkett, his staff was not directed to design the license as an "Enhanced Drivers License" similar to the WHTI-approved documents that DHS has endorsed for several U.S. states. Burkett was not aware of any significant progress in reaching agreement with the Canadian federal government to incorporate citizenship information in the new Ontario licenses. ¶5. (C//NF) A 2005 Ontario Auditor-General report cited lax security in vetting the operators of Private Issuing Offices, which issue and renew drivers licenses on behalf of the province. Burkett indicated the Private Issuing Offices would continue to be part of Ontario's license-issuing infrastructure even if and when Ontario began producing WHTI compliant documents. He said the government would likely ask DHS, the Canadian Border Services Agency, and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service to vet the private issuers, which the province would then allow to issue WHTI compliant licenses. ¶6. (C//NF) COMMENT: WHTI-compliant licenses have been a highly political issue in Ontario since Premier Dalton McGuinty's March announcement that the long-planned document security upgrade would also result in a border crossing document (reftel). Ambitious announcements aside, much work remains to be done -- the Ontario government has not made concrete plans with Ottawa to incorporate citizenship information into the licenses. Nine months after the Premier's announcement, working levels of the Ontario transportation bureaucracy remain skeptical. More troubling from the U.S. perspective are the continuing security loopholes in the private issuers system that could undermine the documents' legitimacy-regardless of its physical security. NAY