Germany Begins Iris Scans at Frankfurt Airport

securitas writes "Deutsche Welle reports that at Germany's Frankfurt airport biometric iris scans of airline passengers have begun. The German government says that the six-month pilot project is part of Europe's 18-country Automated and Biometrics-based Border Checks initiative to improve 'border control routines' and domestic security, with a full-scale system to follow. The system uses an iris scan embedded in a passenger's machine-readable passport, which is compared to the passenger's iris with an onsite scan. Travelers must 'sign a data security document' and agree to be checked by border guards. The article also references the capability of an iris scan to determine drug and alcohol consumption. The European Parliament is considering replacing all of its traditional passports with a new European biometric passport by 2005. The IRISPASS system (press release) was built by Byometric systems, Iridian and Oki Electric Industry. More coverage at CNet/ZDNet, AP/USA Today and mirrors at AJC, and CNN."

Comments

Iris changes

[BWJones]

greasy, dirty or peeling skin on the finger can easily distort fingerprint-recognition, a factor that plays no role in the case of iris-recognition.

So, does this mean that folks with melanomas of the iris, cataracts, macular degeneration (which is common and can manifest initially through pigment changes in the iris), etc... will have to go through a bigger hassle than the other passengers when traveling?

Also, since the iris does change throughout life, I would guess that one would have to renew their iris scan on their passport from time to time.

Re:Iris changes

[Anonymous Coward]

6 months is too short a time frame to achieve anything. I am guessing it would probably take more than 6 months to get some percentage of Europe to use this. What about travellers from other countries. How can you keep your borders safe when people from other countries can come in without their IRIS scans on their passports.

Re:Iris changes

[erick99]

From an interview that can be found on CNN's site:

Rick Lockridge: Illness and aging cause changes to your eyes, but the iris never changes from the eighth month of gestation until death. That's why EyeTicket and others feel iris-recognition technology is superior to thumbprint recognition and other competitors.

Happy Trails!

Erick

Re:Iris changes

[Safety Cap]

Didn't the movie Demolition Man (Stalone, Snipes) have a scene where Snipes used a victims eyeball to open some doors?

Yes, and there was a similar scenario in The Minority Report (Tom Cruise).

The beauty of identity theft + biometrics is that there's no way to issue another account. :)

Re:Iris changes

[furiousgeorge]

>>Anyone have any info on how hard it
>>would be to fool an iris (or retina) scanner?

You don't have to fool the scanner. According to the article the iris print is stored on a card/passport that you present. So all you have to do is forge the source.

If they were looking up your iris in a master database that would be a different issue.

Re:Iris changes

[orthogonal]

well think of it as free govt. sponsored testing that could lead to early warning signs of serious eye problems ..... or not

Your eye scan has revealed serious problems, Citizen!

It appears your iris is not Aryan. We're not sure, these days, if the problem is that your iris is Arab, Turk, or Jewish, but to be on the safe side we'll be sending you for Aussiedlung im Osten, "resettlement in the East"; you'll be going to a special clinic there!

Before you mod this flamebait for its allusions to the Nazi era, please recall that the Holocaust began with (comparably) innocuous decrees announcing that all Jews would be peacefully "resettled" in the "the East", and that even with Germany's "rehabilitation" since the Nazi era, ethnic violence and discrimination against Turkish "Gastarbeiter" ( "guest workers") has continued despite official condemnation.

Given the general feeling among the younger German generations that Naziism is "merely" historic, and something they have no special responsibility for as a people, and abetted by those Germans who, growing up in Communist East Germany, were taught that they were the victims, not the perpetrators, of the Nazi crimes, I don't thing it's flamebait at all to question a renewal of the "your papers please!" mentality in Berlin.

Re:Iris changes

[Anonymous Coward]

Given the general feeling among the younger German generations that Naziism is "merely" historic, and something they have no special responsibility for as a people...

Posting AC since this is offtopic, but younger generations of Germans should not be held responsible for what their grandparents might have done...no more than younger citizens of the US should be held responsible for slavery, or that Jews should be held responsible for the death of christ.

Your racist suggstion that the opposite is true is little better than the more blatant racism that you claim to oppose.

Re:Iris changes

[orthogonal]

younger generations of Germans should not be held responsible for what their grandparents might have done...no more than younger citizens of the US should be held responsible for slavery, or that Jews should be held responsible for the death of christ.

Your racist suggstion (sic) that the opposite is true is little better than the more blatant racism that you claim to oppose.

I'm afraid that you, in your haste to remove the racist label from Nazis and place it on me, missed my point.

I'm not saying that Germans born after the Nazi era are responsible for the Nazi sins of their ancestors.

What I am saying is that Germany went from awarding Iron Crosses, and otherwise accepting Jews into mainstream German society, circa World War I, to putting those same Jews on train to the East in 1942.

What I am saying is that even self-described "liberal" Germans today feel it's acceptable to refer to Turkish Gastarbeiteren as "Germany's niggers" while denying Turks born in Germany the franchise and full citizenship (as cited in Father/Land: A Personal Search for the New Germany by Wall Street Journal reporter and German-American author Frederick Kempe (I don't have the book at hand to give the page number, sorry)).

What I am saying is that as it was possible for Germany to slip from basic acceptance of Jews in 1914 to the Nuremberg laws by 1935 to genocide in 1942, Germans have a special responsibility, not so much to repent for the sins of their fathers, but to be watchful that they don't repeat similar sins today.

To be frank -- if not politically correct -- and with the risk of offending our German friends, the U.S. is far less likely to repeat slavery (or Native American genocide), than Germany is to oppress its Turkish or other minorities.

Re:Iris changes

[netsharc]

I call Goldwin, or maybe not, besides, it's the great fucking USA who's turning to the 1984 fascist state. I'm an Asian living in Germany, and I'd rather be here than in USA.

Re:Iris changes

[quax]

Having lived in Germany as well as the USA (currently back in the USA again). Being German and married to an American and I can hardly claim to be objective. For what it's worth I will share my oberservations with you anyway.

Never have I heard somebody using the N word for Turkish people, although in Eastern Germany I wouldn't completly rule it out, but where did you get the idea that this would be acceptable bahaviour in Germany?

Before coming back to the states my wife and I lived in Heidelberg for the last 4 years.

Our neighbors Wolfgang and Inchy were German and Turkish respectively. They had the cutest little boy who they raised bi-lingual. She is running her own hair salon while he is working as an Audi car mechanic. They are both great people and very much liked in the neighborhood.

Inchy being a self asserted, independent woman is maybe not your typical example, but she is very much representative for the 2nd generation of Turkish immigrants.

There are hot-spots were integration didn't happen and did not work. You will find these mostly in large cities such as Berlin, Hamburg etc. It is there were Islamic fundamentalism finds willing followers. Immigrants to distant lands tend to glorify and idealize the state of the culture that they left behind. That is why I find anything that is regarded as typical German in the US either hilariously quaint and completely out of sync with modern Germany or simply embarrassing. That is also why young Turkish people that my parents met in the southern Turkish city of Antalia told them that it is Germany were you can find the worst backwards Turkish people who cling to completely outdated ideas of what is supposed to be Turkish.

I am 100% with you that the citizenship laws in Germany are completely bogus. They are one of the main reasons why I voted for the Green party in the last election because they sincerely want to let go of these stupid ethnic focused definitions of what is considered German. Being fluent in German and sharing the values of modern-day multi-ethnic Germany is what should count and nothing else.

I am very much in favor of Turkey joining the EU. Once this happens this issue will be moot anyway (EU citizens are free to live and vote on the town council level anywhere in the union).

The main difference between Germany and the US is that there are hardly any neighborhoods in Germany that I don't feel save to walk in at night.

Inner city segregation is much worse in the US. And the school diversity is back to the level before the busing started in the 70s.

I don't think the US is in any position to point fingers at Germany for not learning of its mistakes.

The lesson that we drew from history is that democracy has to be defended at all cost. I don't mind that an administration that I trust knows who I am and where I am knowing that this information will not be abused. I have this level of comfort and faith in the German as well as EU institutions and the contemporary German governments (may they be social-democrats or conservatives). But I don't blame any American for not having the same level of comfort with American institutions because I certainly don't have either.

Re:Iris changes

[orthogonal]

The lesson that we drew from history is that democracy has to be defended at all cost. I don't mind that an administration that I trust knows who I am and where I am knowing that this information will not be abused. I have this level of comfort and faith in the German as well as EU institutions and the contemporary German governments (may they be social-democrats or conservatives)

I'm going to ignore your other points not because they are not valid, but because they'll lead us far off topic, and are very much subject to argument.

(As to Germans referring to Turks as "niggers", I gave the reference for that (Kempe's Father/Land) when I originally posted about it.)

You say that you're comfortable with the contemporary German government having information about you and your whereabouts, because have a "level of comfort and faith" in the German government and the current European Union institutions.

Fine. I congratulate the German people on living under a democracy, and I do not seek to minimize the effort that must have taken, emerging from dictatorship, ruin, and division in 1945. (And to some extent I must also claim credit for my country and, specifically, the Marshall Fund and the US policies toward the BRD after the war.)

But that's not my point. Currently you see no reason to fear the German government, and its retention of information about you.

You also wrote that "[t]he lesson that we [Germans] drew from history is that democracy has to be defended at all cost." I've noticed that Germans often talk about defending "democracy" and less often about defending "liberty". Perhaps it's merely a matter of translations, but I'm not sure -- perhaps it's also a matter of outlook or Weltbild. But it's not a matter of opinion that Hitler was democratically elected, winning a plurality votes and seats in the Reichstag in 1932.

So in addition to defending democracy, I think we need to defend liberty. Part of that is never allowing government -- no matter how good a government, no matter how well intentioned, no matter what checks and balances the Constitution promises -- to accumulate too much power over, or information about, the individual. Because a good government today can become a Fascist dictatorship tomorrow -- and more often than not it will do so with the enthusiastic support of the people, a people often fearful and hungering for the security only a Fascist government can promise ("A Volkswagon in every garage and death to the Bolshevik and Jewish untermenschen!").

I suspect that, like you, Berthold Guthmann also felt no reason to fear the German government, or its records on him.

In World War I, Fliegerleutnant ("Flight (second) lieutenant") Guthmann, an observer and gunner on military aeroplanes, earned the Iron Cross, 2nd class (the same as that also awarded to Adolf Hitler), the Tapferkeitsmedaille (Medal for Bravery), and the Verwundetenabzeichen (the wound medal, equivalent to the Purple Heart). His recommendation for the Iron Cross reads, in part, "Lt. Guthmann is brave and a fine officer, although Jewish...." In 1943, Guthmann and his family were arrested for being Jewish; Guthmann was eventually murdered at Auschwitz.

I'm not saying the current German government will abuse its iris-scanning. It probably will not. But how sure can you be -- especially in the face of German history -- that every future German government will resist the temptation to use these records in abusive ways? That's the lesson Germany needs to have learned from the Nazi era.

Your comment, well-intentioned as it is, as civilized a picture as it presents of 21st century Germany, is evidence that that lesson has not been learned. (But it's a lesson only incompletely learned in the U.S as well, not that that should be any consolation to anybody.)

Re:Iris changes

[be-fan]

Youth in the US also consider the American genocide of the Native Americans to be "merely" historic. And rightly so --- what their ancestors did is not their fault.

Now the scary thing is that modern Americans still believe a lot of the "God blessed America" nonesense that allowed them to conceience displacing an entire race of people.

Re:Iris changes

[filer]

Sheesh.. whatever happened to Godwins Law? What's with all this NAZI shit? As a previous poster pointed out: is it fair to blame people for the actions of their forefathers? Personally I think it's dangerous to do such a thing - and borders on racist.

Europe, unlike North America, has more or less open borders. Millions of people cross between European borders every day with more than a cursory check by border control (and sometimes - none). Frankfurt Airport is the second largest airport in Europe (the biggest on The Contintent, the largest rail transit point on The Continent, and a major transit point to points east (Eastern Europe, far east, and middle east). In short, if I was a terrorist, organised crime figure, drug dealer, war criminal or some other kind of international desirable, it would be my chosen point of entry. I do not begrudge the German governments desire to make an effort to secure the area to the best of their ability. Unlike you and the rest of the slashdot pundits, they have a responsibility to their European neighbours and the international community to do so. They are trying to avoid a repeat of the Hamburg Cell.

I am sure they also wish to keep traffic flowing through this transit area as quickly and as smoothly as possible for economic reasons. Iris scans, while they may or may not be infallible, seem to work well and they are *fast*. Certainly faster then having some US immigration agent question you about every minutae of your life to the point where they ask to see photos of your loved ones (as happpend to me pre-9/11 while I was in-transit through JFK to visit a European girl friend).

The fact is, I dread passing through the US cuz it's tedious, they ask a lot of questions that are none of their damn business, and (though I don't care about this part) they enter your name into a database anyway. Most people I know who travel internationally don't even fly through the US anymore because they think it's going to be a pain in the butt. Personally, if it gets me through immigration and customs in a timely manner (as has always been the case in Europe - I've gone through CDG without them even openning my passport) I will happily submit to a retinal scan. I've got nothing to hide. I just want to get where I am going.

While some may claim that this is open to abuse, as it is I suppose, I don't really see a better way to balance the desire to secure that airport (and Europe) with the desire to keep people moving through it as quickly as possible - and last time I was there - it moved.

Unless one is to claim that identification isn't a necessity at border crossings and international airports. I really don't see what the fuss is about. If you don't want to be identified at the border - stay home. Some countries want to secure their borders and citizens, and as I have mentioned above, European countries have to worry about every other EC countries border being secure as well.

Re:Iris changes

[kisak]

Fine. I congratulate the German people on living under a democracy, and I do not seek to minimize the effort that must have taken, emerging from dictatorship, ruin, and division in 1945. (And to some extent I must also claim credit for my country and, specifically, the Marshall Fund and the US policies toward the BRD after the war.)

This is the efforts of the previous German and USA generation, and is of no credit to our generation. Just as it is unfair to blame the young Germans for what they grandfather did or did not do (many Germans fought Hitler), it is a bit fresh to take credit for the Marshal plan of our grandfather generation. I am proud that my grandfather fought in the war, but that is no proof that I would pass the test if I would end up in the hell war is (it can be an inspiration, but not an excuse for not taking responsibility in my own life). The concept of past greatness as proof of present superiority is what the nazis did to keep control of the German nation if you don't mind me reminding you.

Each generation have to be vigilant and protect democracy, liberty, and the other things we value for the next generation (our children). The mistake of Germany in the 1930's was to think that a country like theirs, a great and proud nation of Europe would always be at the hart of civilization. The shock for the world and most Germans was to discover after the war that Hitler had turned the cultural nation Germany into a barbaric slaughter house (remember, few in the west knew about the concentration camps in the early years of the war, and the presence of these camps was denied or kept secret until the war was over).

It is disingenuous to blame the parent post for emphasizing the need to protect democracy first and then to claim that Germans have not learned their lesson. First of all, it is our lesson, the whole God damn western world. It would be pure racism to suggest that the Germans are a murderous "race" (what does this word "race" really mean anyway) while the rest of the west (or at least the holly allies) has democracy in their genes.

Second, Hitler never won an election (the Nazis got at their peak below 30 % of the votes). Hitler did not believe in democracy, he just manipulated the process (and the voters insecurity) to get a foot hole and then he did a coup d'etat. This is why in Germany they have had difficult debates for the last decades what how to deal with parties that has at their core to get rid of democracy (is it democratic to ban anti-democratic parties?) and balance between free-speech and nazi propaganda (is it hate speech, speech having as a direct consequence violence and death?). It is similar to US discussion about how much protection the president should have compared to the right of protesters to be heard (the so-called free speech areas). Or if it helps the democratic process when democrats and republicans redraw districts to make elections a formality. Democracy is a process which has to constantly change to meet the constantly changing challenges that any nation have to deal with.

I'm not saying the current German government will abuse its iris-scanning. It probably will not. But how sure can you be -- especially in the face of German history -- that every future German government will resist the temptation to use these records in abusive ways? That's the lesson Germany needs to have learned from the Nazi era.

No, the lessons is ours to learn. And the current USA generation, since the USA is the leader of the free world with its huge military advantage, probably has the largest responsibility to learn this (responsability is tough, live with it). Remember that the iris scan tests in Germany -- whatever its merits -- follows directly

Minority Report

[Metallic Matty]

I fear a bleak future run along the lines of Minority Report's eye scanning. Honestly, this technology is scary.

Re:Minority Report

[NanoGator]

"I fear a bleak future run along the lines of Minority Report's eye scanning. Honestly, this technology is scary."

I don't. Hollywood's been predicting that the world will rot for decades. Instead, it slowly gets better and better.

Technology can be dangerous if it is absorbed too quickly. There's no time for thought and adjustment. However, we have a very big population, and that means technology is very slow to be adopted, and by then proper precautions are usually taken.

It's also worth noting that nearly everything people imagine happening that would be real 'bad' has large problems with practicality. The benefit has to outweigh the practicality, and nearly everything that people are afraid of fails that test in one form or another. Somebody told me once that they were afraid that if electronic identification got too out of control, the gov't would watch what everybody's doing. You could get stopped from boarding an airplane because you were at a Muslim church earlier that day. (Note: That's what he told me, that's not my own idea there.) Everybody worries that it'll be the case, but nobody thinks abou twhat it'd take to do that. Besides requiring a massive computer network and central data archive to store all this information, a computer has to go in and do the analysis on it. Hello?! There are 300 million people in this country. We're a long ways away from having that data available. Then there's the whole matter of false positives. Make it too sensitive, and you'll have a lot of people chasing false leads indefinitely. The only way it would practically work is if it looked for VERY strong stuff. Even then, you still have to have a human review it and make a judgement call. The United States Gov't would have to front a LOT of expense and co-ordinate a massive effort to do what people are afraid of, and the benefit is... What? Total control? Our gov't isn't after that. It's too hard to acquire, too hard to maintain. On top of all that, even those in power find themselves in a not so lovely position. I'm sure Mr. Adolf had a terrible time knowing who his friends were.

It's not that I'm trying to be dismissive here, I'm just not sold on the idea that it's all that scary. I am quite happy to support the right checks and balances, however. If we were talking about electronic law enforcement (as opposed to electronic flagging, which is what this technology is about) you'd be having an entirely different conversation with me.

Re:Minority Report

[cindy]

"Hollywood's been predicting that the world will rot for decades. Instead, it slowly gets better and better."

Can I come and live in your world? ...please?

Re:Minority Report

[no longer myself]

Hello?! There are 300 million people in this country. We're a long ways away from having that data available.

300 million people isn't a big deal to a computer. Think of it like this: You can hold a lot of details about a person's life within a single megabyte of text. Try printing a whole megabyte of raw text and you'll see that's quite a dosier. (*note, do note use the bloated MS Word format where "hello world" takes up 128K) Using 1MB per person, that comes to a mere 300 gigabytes of data. Hell, Google can sift through that much data in the blink of an eye. The technology is already there, and it's too damned easy to implement.

I know you're not trying to be dismissive, but just sweeping it under the carpet and remaining complicite simply because you accept the rhetoric that it's good for national security will only feed this beast even more. It will evolve into a massive "jobs program" bogged down by so much red tape and politics that you will have effectively created yet another corporate welfare system to support an industry that common people can no longer afford, corporate pawns will be forced to endure, and the wealthy upper class can't imagine living without.

Re:Minority Report

[NanoGator]

"300 million people isn't a big deal to a computer."

300 gigabytes is nothing to sneeze at. It's also a very big underestimation of the resources that'd be needed. First there's the tracking devices. Then there's getting the data from the tracking devices to the computer. Then there's the computer taking the info from those devices and doing something. You really think they can build a computer that'll handle 300 million real time connections?

" (*note, do note use the bloated MS Word format where "hello world" takes up 128K)"

Actually the 'bloat' is the 32k header file that every Word .DOC has. It's not like they're using 12k to describe each character. It may not be the most efficient use of disk space, but then again, that's not the strength it's touting is it?
"Hell, Google can sift through that much data in the blink of an eye. The technology is already there, and it's too damned easy to implement."

No, it's not. Google's not keeping an eye on 300 million websites in real time. It's crawling around the web looking for keywords to pick up on. It provides thousands of results per search, which is the opposite of what the gov't would need in order to use this sort of technology to to find would-be terrorists. They don't have thousands of agents to go sending after each hit. They also don't have a way of profiling individuals in a meaningful way. That work still has to be done by humans, and that will be the case for the next few decades.

"this technology is scary"

[funny-jack]

Honestly, this technology is scary.

I think that has probably been said by someone about pretty much every technology we use today. It isn't the technology that's scary, it's what people might do with it. Almost every new technology has the potential for good, as well as evil.

Re:"this technology is scary"

[Metallic Matty]

I think that has probably been said by someone about pretty much every technology we use today. It isn't the technology that's scary, it's what people might do with it. Almost every new technology has the potential for good, as well as evil.

I completely agree. But with a congress passing legislation like the Patriot Act, I believe the potential for evil is reasonably feared.

Re:(Cliche Slashdot post...)

[Elektroschock]

Oh, it's all for the security of the United States. there is the pressure from. The next time a terrorist group attacks Manhattan, we will know a little bit more about these guys, their biometrical data. To look someone in the eyes is very important for psychologial reasons. Eyes don't lie :-)

Re:(Cliche Slashdot post...)

[LordKazan]

Excuse me, just because something the german's do is something you don't agree with you call them Nazi's? EXCUSE ME?

Right now our own [US] government is a lot more like the Dritten Reich than the current german government.

As far as many europeans I know this doesn't bother them, because it's not more invasive than many other things that happen over there.


Be careful about throwing around the "Nazi" term - it may offend some of us around for many reasons, especially when it's inappropraitely and racistly used like you just did.

What me, worried?

[NMerriam]

Germans collecting bilogical data about everyone who comes through their borders...what could go wrong?

Re:What me, worried?

[kfg]

(family history for 300 years).

I'd be far more worried about Ashcroft with that data than Schroder.

The problem is not always who gets the data now, but who gets it next.

There is also a flip side to this data that most people don't think about. If one's identity is one's data, one can be officially eliminated by erasing the data.

First they round you up using the data, then they erase the data, then they can do anything they want. You don't exist.

KFG

Re:What me, worried?

[boogy nightmare]

Get used to it matey.. the americans want my fingerprints and biometric data to enter your country!

The beginning of the end

[NeoTheOne]

Its only a matter of time before walking out your door requires a biometric scan. It is preposterous that we as free people of the world allow ourselves to be subjected to this for the sake of "security". This is like any other "protective" measure. It screws over the decent people of the earth and does nothing to the criminals. GUN LAWS DONT KEEP GUNS OUT OF CRIMINAL HANDS! All the terrorists and bad guys are gonna do now is sneak into countries without flying to them directly. Or the terrorists will recruit people inside of countries they dont like. You dont stop bad guys by telling them to stop. You MAKE the BAD GUYS stop. Leave joe-shmoe's rights alone.

Just wait until this stuff gets cheap.

[Eric_Cartman_South_P]

When all this "We Will Keep the Terrorists Away(TM)" technology becomes really cheap, we will enjoy a future where:

All transactions are electronic. Think "Credits" in "Total Recall".

All movement is scanned. Think eye scanning in "Minority Report".

All new information is copyrighted, and DRM free info is exchanged amongs the population like drugs are today. Think "Matrix" where Neo gets his little disks for cash, before he goes and follows the White Rabbit.

All information is put together in a database, where the Government can search it at will, without a warrent. Think "198..." scratch that. Think "2004", TIA project, Echelon, Patriot Act I, Patriot Act II, Patriot Act III (comming soon to a Democracy near you) et. al.

FUN!

Unbalanced security

[Rosco P. Coltrane]

With each new device or method used in airports to catch or filter out terrorists, the barrier to commit terrorist acts is raised higher. What do you think will happen when it becomes virtually impossible to do anything even remotely odd near or inside airports and airplanes? well I'll tell you : terrorists will fall back on easier targets, chiefly trains. And then, once a train has been derailled, every government will start applying airport police-state methods to railway stations and trains, and so on ...

It's an endless battle. If countries carries on trying to defend themselves like they do now (mostly in the US, but also in other countries), they'll all turn into huge menacing police states. and terrorists will have won. If those countries don't defend themselves, terrorists will blow things up forever and will have won again.

What the world really needs is a true force of education in dangerous countries, a project that spans over 2 or 3 generations. The US is in Afghanistan and Iraq, why don't they set up schools to teach the current generation of kids there not to hate, and why terrorism is bad? They're not doing jack squat, and neither are any other countries concerned by terrorist threats. Instead of starting to implement that long-term, but only real solution to the terrorist problem, they barricade themselves and make life miserable for their own populations.

Re:Unbalanced security

[amplt1337]

The US is in Afghanistan and Iraq, why don't they set up schools to teach the current generation of kids there not to hate, and why terrorism is bad?

Those schools would be called "non-interference in foreign domestic affairs," "removal of military presence in foreign nations" and "non-endorsement of repressive monarchies."
Unfortunately such an education tends to raise oil prices.

Anyway, those measures wouldn't stop fanatics like Osama -- just the common and middle-class people who wind up supporting him, since he's the only one doing anything (however reprehensible) about what they view as a major problem with national sovereignty and domestic freedoms. But, if Osama had to carry out suicide attacks himself, we wouldn't have too much longer to worry about.

Re:Unbalanced security

[m1kesm1th]

I'm not sure its possible to instill into a young mind that terrorism is bad. Sure, you can show that bombing civilians is bad, but how can you can you explain to a kid whose brother and sister were killed at a checkpoint that that was just a mistake, or that his brother was a justified civilian casualty, but saving the country was better?

Basically we have justifications for what we do. Though it always helps to try and look at it from the other persons perspective. Forget trying to teach terrorism is bad. Another person who sees the violence as an act of war, will be able to justify it. So long as civilian casualties are acceptable. Look at Iraq or Afghanistan, was that good or bad? Look at the good side, bye bye dictator. The bad side, real civilian deaths. A lot. Now if we find this justifiable. Terrorists feel their war is just as justifiable. I believe their mindset is exactly the same as you might find in revolutionaries. They feel they're in a civil war, outnumbered outgunned and plotting insurrection.

I don't think you can really fight this type of warfare with guns or policing. Nor can you just say, thats wrong kid (i'm purposefully mangling what you said, forgive me). However I totally agree with you on one thing, education.

I think theres one thing really wrong in the world and it probably expands to everywhere. We think we're better. Not just us, everyone. We think we're better because of where we come from, what we do, anything. We're so patriotic, but I think sometimes that becomes a form of racism, like my country is so much better than yours. If conditions are better, great, but it doesn't mean that my country is any more civilized than Tibet. If people truly didn't believe they were better than anyone else, we probably wouldn't fight.

However, its a pipedream. Its inherent in everyone, we all think we're special to a certain extent because we're individuals. However wars are never normally fought between two people who truly relate to one another. Maybe if we understood that we're all pretty much as insignificant as each other, then things would be better. Maybe children can be educated so they embrace differences and understand they are no better anyone else, no matter the country/religion/colour.

Re:Unbalanced security

[torpor]

The proper response to terrorism is to do nothing in response.

Those who are waving the terrorism banner right now are using it to distract us all from the other, real, serious problems.

Such as the U.S. National Debt, &etc. That is not Freedom.

Re:Colored contact lenses

[selphish189]

Ahhh... as with most iris scanning I would assume that one of two things would happen (or both). 1) Whenever you got your passport, and everytime you got scanned at the airport, you would be required to remove your contacts. 2) The iris scanning will probaly be able to read through contacts or at least dectect that they are contacts. You cannot fake a the depth of an iris with a contact, so i am sure that could be dected. Also, you get different contacts regualry, so since no two contacts can be the same, just as no two irises can be the same, your passport would only be good for a few months at a max. of course this is assuming 1 and 2 are not correct.

Never trust the client

[Malc]

What good is comparing an iris scan to information on the passport? It should be compared against a central database. At some point the system used to place the information on the passport will be cracked - either by hacking or theft. Criminals or terrorists with the most money (Al Qaeda have had access to millions of $$ in the past) will be able to effectively bypass the system whilst the honest individual citizens are kept under the thumb by big brother.

Forge the source

[FlyingOrca]

Hmm... sounds like a job for strong encryption. I was thinking more of a database, though... and the security issues there are frightening. Hell, just the *stupidity* issues there are frightening!

Re:Me as a German

[ahillen]

I did not here a beep about this here in Germany, I guess the plan is to introuce the system through the backdoor.

Well, maybe, but than they wouldn't make a press release, right?

WTF does it matter?

[poofmeisterp]

Okay... so they begin doing iris scans. That's great.

Now Mr. John Q. Terrorist gets on the plane and hijacks it, sending 150 people crashing to their death in the sea. HE'S FRIGGIN' DEAD. Who cares what his biometrics are?

Two months later, another terrorist boards a plane and hijacks it. Oh, GOOD. They got his iris scan! The world will be safe!!!

I'm sorry, but I don't know of many suicide terrorists that strike twice.

Oh, and if you want to comment on how this isn't about terrorism and is more about catching known criminals, etc.... again... what does it matter? Their iris scans aren't on file anywhere else... and if they're really a criminal considering travelling overseas or even internationally, I *think* they would have the sense enough to utilize false documents.

There are other ways of travelling.

I fail to see what this will solve or even help.

But whom can you trust?

[yanestra]

If Germany starts scanning iris', that's mainly because the U.S. wanted so for the sake of their security.

IMHO it's doubtful if this will change anything in the effective security level. - A number of convicted terrorists were native citizens of non-listed non-suspicious countries or naturalized there, with legal passports.
An even bigger number were from a suspicious country with legal papers, which were certified by U.S. officials, including visa and so on.

To me it seems that the main problem of people with invalid or forged papers is that they are just economic refugees, having not even enough money for proper papers.

Too few money does not seem to be the primary problem of today's terrorists. At least not of those who I heard of.

Re:(Cliche Slashdot post...)

[MKalus]

How many times in the last year have I heard European leaders referring to our current President and his government as "Nazi's"?

Never, the thing you seem to remember is a statement to the effect that the tactics Bush is using are eerie similar to the tactics Hitler was using.

And if you think that statement is not true you might want to get a good history book some time.

Another Country Not to Visit

[tbond_trader]

You want to treat me like a criminal then why should I spend my money in your country?

The main gate is clanging shut now

[Catbeller]

I have this thing, more than a thing, really; more of a screaming, frothing refusal to submit to fingerprinting, retinal scanning, DNA sampling, gait analysis, random drug testing, ID picture taking... I don't think I should have to unless I am arrested and accused of a crime (and I better see a judge and a lawyer, too -- no torture pit in Syria, please).

I understand that pasports are necessary, and I would submit to good old picture ID, of course. Seems to have worked for a very long time. I do detest having to state various things about my private life (are you married? divorced? where's your wife? A: why the hell is that your business?).

The 40 or so hijackers that crashed the jets were here on perfectly valid ID's. No biometric scanning would have made a difference.

So, why are we submitting to this crap? And do you think that the powerful in the U.S. will be ducking their heads into retinal readers when they travel? Do you think the Saudi royals will?

Do you think they will stop at retinas? DNA will follow. Then RFID tags to track us. All in the name of Safety. Although none of these things will stop criminals from blowing something up. They merely have to keep their noses clean until they attack.

Now, I know that I am unemployable in corporate America now and forever, for they operate in some realm other than constitutional democracy. I don't grant them the right to make me pee on command, or track my private life (they can fire you for going to a union organizing meeting on your own time -- ruling was upheld).

But this -- I'm not going to guess, I am going to state that very soon I am locked out of Europe. And if the U.S. follows the EU's lead, I won't be able to leave the United States because I would refuse to have my biometric data taken for a passport?

I'm never able to travel out of the U.S. unless I submit. They won't let me leave.

I'm in prison. We all are.

The truth spoken...

[Archfeld]

especially considering the treatment the Roma's regularly receive in Europe, not just Germany either, denied citizenship anywhere, their childeren deneied schooling and the same treatment any other kids born in the country to non-citizens. As for the US we are currently so close to treating those of Arab descent as criminals just as we did such a DIS-SERVICE to the Japanease in WW2....We are not in any position to start throwing many stones, with non-citizens sitting in internment camps in Guantanamo Bay, never charged, denied any of the BASIC human rights we so LOUDLY TOUT...

offending our German friends

[Sapphon]

the U.S. is far less likely to repeat slavery (or Native American genocide), than Germany is to oppress its Turkish or other minorities

I think entirely the opposite is true - due precisely to their country's history, the German people are far less likely to oppress or otherwhise mistreat ethnic minorities than other countries (i.e. the US).

Germans suffer greatly under an (often subconscious) apprehension over how they appear to be treating other cultures. Germany is much more likely than most countries to be scrutinised for it's actions concerning minorities, for as soon it makes a controvesial move there will instantly be cries about how it is reverting to form. Austria elects a right-wing government and no-one blinks an eye, Germany has the world's eye upon them and thus adopts a far less forceful approach in it's international relations.

To be frank, Germans have a much more tolerant and open-minded view towards foreigners than most Americans - and I've never heard anyone refer to the Gastarbeiter as "Germany's Niggers". The comparison is apt only in the sense that both groups are one of largest minorities in their respective countries - at least virtually all african-americans speak English. This is getting off topic, but the problem with the Turkish peoples in Germany lies in equal parts with them and us. Some have a tendency to form enclaves and refuse to assimilate or even learn German. When you walk down streets where every shop sign is both in German and Turkish (except for the pub/social club, which is just in Turkish), all the kids on the street are Turks, and nary a word of German is spoken between the teenagers on street corners, you wonder whether the Regierung (Government) might not have a case for denying citizenships to those who aren't making an effort to become part of the German community.

Unlike in 1935, the German government of today (for all their flaws) makes plenty of effort to try and integrate the immigrants currently living here into mainstream society. Stronger border controls just mean they can focus on the problem at hand, rather than having a growing pool of people who have to be adressed.