World cup tickets to have personal information

A German court in Frankfurt court has ruled that security interests made personalized World Cup tickets a necessity.

A ticket holder had filed a complaint requesting that his identity card number be removed from his World Cup ticket, but the Frankfurt district court ruled that such information was necessary to ensure security at the tournament.

The ruling said that identity card numbers were the ultimate proof of identity, especially because names and dates of birth could be misprinted on the tickets.

All World Cup tickets will bear personalized information in an attempt to clamp down on scalping and hooligans.

The system has come under criticism from both sides and FIFA has described the German ticketing system as complicated and will do its own distribution for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa while privacy protection groups have protested against demands to include such personal information on the request for tickets.