St John of Patmos saw it coming: EU digital identity will know everything

In Patmos, where the Evangelist John foresaw a “mark” controlling trade, a shopkeeper scans her phone to pay taxes. Her data feeds the EU’s Digital Identity Wallet, threatening liberties from free speech to privacy. This echoes the Revelation’s warning -“no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark”- and China’s social credit dystopia.

The eIDAS 2.0 regulation, enacted on May 2024, is an update on the 2016 EU electronic identification, authentication, and trust services. It mandates a Digital ID Wallet by December 2026, linking passports, bank accounts, and health records. The European Commission forecasts 80 per cent adoption by 2030, saving businesses €11 billion annually, according to 2024 estimates.

The scheme also aims to reduce fraud: Share only age for a booking, not full identity. Pilots in 26 member states with 350 entities in 2024 cut identity theft by 15 per cen, per EU data.

Yet cybersecurity risks abound. Global data breaches exposed 2.6 billion records in 2024, per Verizon’s Report. The EU’s Frontex system leaked migrant data in 2023, highlighting centralised server weaknesses.

John’s Revelation warns: “And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark … And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark” (13:16-27). Soon the Digital ID will know everything, tracking purchases, travel, internet habits, even social media posts. EU “hate speech” algorithms could flag IDs for dissent, curbing free speech.

China’s social credit system offers a grim parallel. By 2024, Beijing’s system scored 1.4 billion citizens on behaviour, restricting travel or jobs for low scores, The Guardian reports. The EU’s Digital ID, if linked to compliance metrics like carbon footprints, risks similar control.

Privacy, Europe’s bedrock, is at risk. The EU’s General Protection Data Regulation (GDPR) only saw 1,200 fines in 2024, showing Brussels’ lack of scrutiny. Shifting data to EU servers erodes citizen control. Free movement, a Schengen pillar, faces curbs. Pilots in 2024 showed Digital IDs tracking carbon emissions, potentially limiting travel for non-compliant users. Economic freedom falters as mandatory IDs loom. 

Spain, Italy, and Greece signalled in 2024 that Digital IDs may be required for services, risking exclusion for a rough 10 per cent of citizens who do not own a smartphone. Greece, in particular, like other southern states, faces compliance pressures that threaten its autonomy in the Digital ID rollout. 

Penalties tied to recovery fund conditions push Athens to adopt the Digital ID swiftly, despite its low 67 per cent broadband coverage – far below Denmark’s 90 per cent. Greece’s reliance on foreign tech, such as IDEMIA, a company providing identity-related security, for ID chips, unlike France’s National Identity Care (eID), risks external data control. This mirrors broader EU dynamics, where southern nations face stricter mandates while northern states like Germany, with 5 million using its own ID Wallet, and Denmark, with its personal identification system (MitID), delay integration to safeguard national systems.

Practical issues deepen the threat. Portugal’s 2024 pilot saw 30 per cent of users locked out by glitches. Europe-wide, 15 per cent of rural citizens lack digital skills, according to 2024 Eurostat data, thus facing service exclusion.

Resistance grows. A 2024 Eurobarometer poll showed 65 per cent of Europeans oppose mandatory IDs. Dutch farmers and French truckers protested digital overreach. On X, users call it a “control grid.” Nationalist and conservative parties, at 20 per cent in 2025 Europe Elects polls, gain ground.

The Digital ID’s broader implications endanger Europe’s cultural and democratic fabric, rooted in Christianity. Eerie as the biblical prophecy may be, the Revelation’s “mark” symbolizes worldly power over the spirit. Today’s digital system risks reducing citizens to data points under unelected Eurocrats. 

China’s social credit system, linking behaviour to access, shows where this leads: A society where dissent means exclusion. Historical parallels – Roman censuses, Nazi personal numbers, Soviet IDs – warn that centralised data curbs freedoms. The EU’s unified digital identity, sold as progress, could erode Europe’s diverse cultures, threatening the liberty to live free of state oversight,

Europeans, from Patmos’ shores to Berlin’s streets, must have the right to reject this digital cage, push back and demand opt-outs and local encryption. By 2026, will we be free citizens or subjects of a Brussels superstate? The shopkeeper’s scan is a warning: Resist now, or bow to an all-powerful state forever.