U.S. Biometric Passports By Late 2004

truthsearch writes "The Register is reporting 'Current plans call for the new passport books to include a contactless smart chip based on the 14443 standard, with a minimum of 32 Kbytes of EEPROM storage. The chip will contain a compressed full-face image for use as a biometric. European biometric passports, by contrast, are planned to feature both retinal and fingerprint recognition biometrics on their smart cards.' How they tie this to '9/11 fears' is curious considering the hijackers had valid paperwork."

Comments

Re:They did same sort of thing after TWA 800

[Threni]

"They ratchet up security procedures, requiring everybody to show ID when flying, but when they decide that the aircraft went down not because of terrorism but because of a design flaw, do they roll back the tightened security?"

When do you think `they` will decide that the WTC incident was a design flaw?

Given that we already have passports, what is the downside of having a 20 MB chip in a passport with pictures, animations, DNA, fingerprints, audio samples etc etc? I don't understand. It's just a (potentially) more secure, harder to forge mathod of ID. Sure some people will get fake ID. That isn't a logical argument for not having a more-secure ID system. You don't NOT use a condom just because it's not 100%. Do you?

Because some people can answer "yes"

[Frothy Walrus]

And still make it in.

Offhand, every male in Israel comes to mind.