As some of you know, I was born in Brazil and I had been living in Israel since may 2006. This is my second time in the country. First time was last year when I came here to work. I liked the place so much that I decided to come back and enjoy the Mediterranean life.

Life in this country is quite nice but a little bit peculiar. Firstly because of the fact that most people don't have a single clue about what is living in here, specially on what regards to secret Israeli food like Shawarma and the Sabich. Secondly, because this country is full of weird surprises like the one that I'm trying to write about.

One of the basic steps to become a local is to get new documents specially because in Israel it is obligatory to carry an identification document with you. That may sound a little bit awkward for USA and UK citizens however if you consider that in Brazil every identified citizen has his fingerprints collected, Israel is not so bad. :-)

As far as my current knowledge allows me to say, the Israeli main identification document is called Teudat Zehut that is a very cool and big ID card... With a lot of information, like your parents name, your Jewish birthday date and if you consider the appendix it will have even your home address. In other words it has a lot of stuff that you don't want to care about. So in order to make things easier a lot of citizens choose to carry only their driving license that has enough information and has the size of a credit card. So did I. After passing on the exams, here I was anxious to have my local driving license.

Well, after few weeks waiting I was happy to receive it by mail, however, I'm quite shocked with the lack of precautions that some local government agencies are dealing with the Teudat Zehut number. As what it seems as a normal behavior, my ID number could be easily read on the envelope containing my new document, exactly as it happened when my Israeli Passport was delivered at home. The main difference is that while my passport required a signature, which means that it wouldn't be left in my mailbox, the driving license was lonely in my mailbox. In fact considering that I received it during a holyday, it seems like my driving license was either delivered on someone else mailbox or was took by someone "for a walk".

May sound too paranoid? Maybe... I'm still discovering what can be done just with the number of my Teudat Zehut, still, this is not a very safe behavior. Sounds like the obvious is true: Identity theft is not the country main concern.