Show HN: Use Their ID – Use Your Local UK MP's ID for the Online Safety Act

176 timje1 33 7/28/2025, 9:49:10 PM use-their-id.com ↗

Hi HN - I made a site that takes a UK postcode, grabs the local MP's information and generates an AI mockup of what their ID might look like.

It's a small, silly protest at the stupidity of the Online Safety Act that just came into force.

Comments (33)

dannyobrien · 30m ago

As someone who was involved in the original guerilla digital activism that spawned the third-person URL format for independent UK government-watching websites (ie "Write to Them", "They Work for You"), I applaud your on-topic brand extension, Tim :)

thorum · 3m ago

Unintended side effect, UK MPs can now watch as much porn as they want with plausible deniability.

1a527dd5 · 29m ago

I think this is a fun project, but I'm not sure I'd leave this up for much longer.

MPs can be litigious. Especially if this is seen to be enabling things like ID fraud.

Also, there are only 650 constituencies. I would pre-populate the list so when entering a new postcode, it doesn't stall waiting for AI.

crinkly · 22m ago

MPs will be immediately trying to hang the civil service for telling them this was a good idea. Don't expect legal action. Do expect buck passing.

travisgriggs · 13m ago

I wish there was a modern day version of "Yes, [Prime] Minister" for this kind of stuff. It's like the episodes could write themselves by the week.

crinkly · 3m ago

Well having worked for the government in an ancillary security role about 20 years ago on contract, I don't think they could produce a parody notably worse than reality to use as a contrast. Today, I suspect it is worse.

Hire an expert they said. From the pool of experts they had heard about through contacts in the civil service. None of whom have any industry or real world experience. At best, someone was on an industry eating and drinking with the right people panel. I was there for 3 months and crawled back to my previous job cap in hand, bruised and educated.

It was long enough ago that I can away with rounding errors of months on my CV thank goodness...

Spivak · 24m ago

You want a different photo each time to avoid easy filter lists.

qualeed · 40m ago

I like the spirit but wouldn't this run afoul of one or two laws? Identity fraud or some such?

I'm not in the UK, so I don't have any idea about their laws, but I'd be shocked to find this was above board. Your FAQ claims it's a parody site and claims "The ID number isn't valid and you can't use the card for anything real." but you've just confirmed here it can indeed be used for real things (discord, reddit).

Your domain registration is UK-based, so, be careful!

chippiewill · 32m ago

I agree, the UK Police wouldn't typically let you get away with "it's just a joke". This would constitute a mixture of identity theft, fake ID and misuse of computers.

timje1 · 25m ago

It's literally just sticking the MPs name into an AI and asking for it to generate a mock ID for them. None of their real data is being used (e.g. their face, their DoB, the address) and the mock IDs wouldn't fool anyone for a second. I'd love if someone who understands the law would weigh in though

John7878781 · 5m ago

It's better to be safe than sorry. For your own best interest, I would shut down the site and delete this post.

nemomarx · 12m ago

If you can fool discords implementation with a video game character they can't actually be checking very well?

qualeed · 10m ago

I certainly agree!

However, I doubt that's a strong legal argument.

Mindwipe · 35m ago

The only way you'd ever get found out is if the affected MP was lying to the public and the identity documents do indeed get retained...

qualeed · 34m ago

>The only way you'd ever get found out is if the affected MP was lying to the public and the identity documents do indeed get retained...

I'm more talking about the developer of the site rather than the users. And the developer could potentially be found out if they posted it on a popular hacking website and used a known alias and registered the domain in the UK.

But, if they're comfortable, all the more power to them. As I said, I do really like the spirit of the site.

shubb · 22s ago

If I was that developer, I'd blacklist embedding of all British MPs and councilors to avoid fraud. This would also block the entire UK political class from accessing adult materials (I got blocked by a wine forum), which would be a very effective protest...

arrowsmith · 30m ago

The generated addresses aren't real. It gave a London address for my MP; I know where he lives and it isn't London.

Most MPs' home addresses are actually quite easy to find. Mine's was printed below his name on the ballot paper last election – a nice reminder of how we used to have a high-trust society. I doubt this practice will be continued for much longer.

timje1 · 24m ago

Yeah the address on all the IDs is for parliament. I assume one could find em there

gardnr · 21m ago

It looks like the code was/is going to be published?

From the FAQ:

> How did you do this?

> This site uses React for the frontend and Node.js for the backend. The MP data is fetched from the UK government public API, and the AI-generated images use the latest model from open AI. The images are stored on a Cloudflare R2 bucket. The code is open source, so you can check it out on GitHub. It was done in a hurry.

The git repo linked from that FAQ shows a 404: https://github.com/timje/use-my-mps-id

DalasNoin · 39m ago

Always tells me that the MP wasn't found for my selected area.

bargainbin · 36m ago

Just like any other interaction with your local MP…

timje1 · 37m ago

what's the postcode?

Muromec · 40m ago

>It's a small, silly protest at the stupidity of the Online Safety Act that just came into force. The IDs actually work (for Reddit, Discord etc.) which highlights how terrible this implementation is.

Could you give a short TL;DR of how ids are constructed so we can all laugh here in comments?

timje1 · 35m ago

it's literally just the MPs name. It's a fake DoB (because their DoB's aren't public knowledge anymore) all the numbers and such are nonsense, the images wouldn't fool a human for one second. The AI tools don't let you generate an ID for any real human being (because that sounds like all sorts of fraud) so you can't upload a picture of the MP or anything like that - so I just let the model fill in whatever face it thinks is appropriate for the given name.

arrowsmith · 29m ago

> because their DoB's aren't public knowledge anymore

Most are on Wikipedia, no?

tialaramex · 1m ago

Even if they weren't, most MPs will be old enough that their top level Birth Records are available, so if they don't have a common name or you know enough biographical details you can find them anyway. If they've got a weird name like Elon Musk you just go name -> DOB in one step, if they're a Sarah Black maybe you need to know approximate age, birth name, rough part of the country where they were born. For super common names like John Smith you will need to know the mother's name, year and specific location of birth at which point yeah you're closer to just knowing their DoB anyway.

evil-olive · 30m ago

it's a bit buried in the FAQ - if you're a non-UK user like I am and just want to see what the output looks like, Keir Starmer's postcode is WC2B6NH so inputting that will give you an already-generated example of the output.

arrowsmith · 25m ago

> Keir Starmer's postcode is WC2B6NH

It's actually the postcode of a WeWork in Holborn (which happens to be in Starmer's constituency.)

Keir Starmer's postcode is SW1A 2AA.

crinkly · 26m ago

This is great. Weaponising the stupidity of the idea, compromising it entirely until it's so obviously ineffectual it's unenforceable, then going after the politicians who pushed it for the waste of money and effort.

Create a scandal. Bad PR is the only way out now.

Mindwipe · 36m ago

Always tells me an MP can't be found despite multiple attempts.

timje1 · 30m ago

Seems like open AI is rate limiting me for a minute, I didn't expect to get top of HN this quickly. Use Starmer's for now - WC2B6NH

philipwhiuk · 32m ago

Are you putting in a valid UK postcode?

spullara · 41m ago

uk ain't playin' these days, i would take it down if you are under their jurisdiction