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US Expands Fingerprint and Mugshot Program for Visitors
prakslash writes "The US State Department has expanded its anti-terrorist fingerprinting program to include visitors from close US allies such as the UK, Australia, France, Germany and Japan. Everytime a visitor enters or leaves the US, they will have to get their mugshot and fingerprints taken - something that used to be mainly limited to your local police precinct. More news can be found here and here. In addition to the huge costs involved, one has to wonder if this will affect tourism to this country." Hmmm, a huge database of digital mugshots and digital fingerprints, which will be kept forever - hope we have enough RAM to search through it quickly and constantly.
(though i'm a big fan of big databases anyway)
this is something that should have been done long ago.
It's better for one innocent man to be inconvienced than to have 3,000 die just because they decided to show up for work that day.
Remember - For Bush and Country.
Let the Flaming begin.......
That really is my homepage, no kidding.
I know you mean well, but please do bear in mind that other countries had this policy for a while.
How dare you demonstrate that the US is not alone in its abuses of civil liberties! Are you new at Slashdot or something? Repeat the Slashdot political dogma after me: "US == Evil ; Any EU nation == Can do no wrong".
Don't blame me, I didn't vote for either of them!
I'm a lot less disturbed by this "strong authentication" of foreign travellers to the U.S. than I am of all the policies applying to U.S. citizens with no oversight or public review.
Authentication against what, you twat? In case you hadn't noticed, other countries aren't exactly falling over themselves to supply ready-made mugshot/fingerprint databases of their citizens to the US.
Fingerprinting our European cousins is not going to solve anything. We ought to lock down the border with military and militia, and keep out all arabs. Only Muslims are terrorists. IRA and ETA are fighting for a return of soveriegnty over their homelands.
Islam is a virus that exists only to propogate and infect the whole world. They will not rest until all of us are on prayer rugs bowing to Mecca. They do not care if we are conservative or liberal, Irish, English, African or Souix. All they care is that we are infidels.
The only solution is to strike hard, fast, and preemptively in order to remove the threat of Islam which exists only as an instrument of Satan in order to undermine western, civilized, christian society. They fear enlightenment, truth, and freedom. We cannot win but to eliminate them, like multiplying both sides of an equation by zero -- no more problem; problem solved.
This is why these laws won't work.
If somebody is going to commit something illegal, he'll probably enter the country illegally. Probably through the porous mexican border or the huge coastline that the US has.
Actually, the truth is that you are wrong. The hijackers entered the United States via real and honest US Visas. Many of the people arrested in the US for terrorist related activities have been abusing the system via student visas. Sorry, but even as a liberal that I may be, this is an incorrect and erroneous assumption. In other words, you're wrong.
Secondly, this is downright disrespectful. Detractors will argue that it's for the safety of the US. Well, I really don't see how it'll help. Once the dude is in the country, and has committed the offence, this sort of system is absolutely worthless. Effort should be put into preventing these sort of tragedies. Efforts like putting more effort into the Israel Palestine crisis, managing Iraq more effectively, stop being so patriachal and showing more respect to the citizens of the world.
This is a Customs, INS, and border issue. Please don't drag in geo-politics into it. The police cannot find and ferret out people who are planning the murder of innocents if they don't know who they are. That means you must take a picture. Whoop de doo.
I for one, will be taking my tourist dollars elsewhere. Where the authorities respect me. Where I'm not treated like a criminal and people realise that not everybody is out to get them.
Fine then. Look, America was the biggest free entrance country in the world for the longest time. Those days are over. If you complain about being harassed by photos, all the while knowing with certainty that people are trying to get in the USA are definitely planning MASS MURDER on an UNPRECEDENTED SCALE, then you have your priorities out of whack. You must understand none of this would have changed if not for the MASS MURDER of some three thousand citizens and foreign nationals one Tuesday morning.
I am a known liberal. Doesn't mean that I am stupid, and need to hug a man with a dynamite belt for the sake of making others feel less inconvenienced.
If you are insulted that you might be seen as a terrorist, I would suggest you stop projecting the worst on people. What if your kinsmen were killed out of nowhere? What would you think? Look, think about your own people. What if they were murdered?
This is not Geo-Politics as everyone says. This is religious extremism that mannifests itself in murder. For all of you people out there that say the USA caused all of the problems in this 'War on Terror' stuff, then when did the USA found Wahhabist Extremism. After all, this extremism is the cause of it.
Please, someone refute me on this. I would like people to tell me how policies from a nation half a world away can cause people to strap on explosives to themselves and attempt genocide. Explain that to me. Explain how we made the Ayatollahs. How we literally MADE THEM. If we tipped their culture, then tell me how much we had to push, because it looks like the beating of a moth's wing from where I am standing.
But please, refute me. I would love to hear this one, how the USA destroyed a mighty culture of peace and tolerance.
Japanese airport security is RIDICULOUS. Just recently, the transporation ministry (or something like that... I forget) announced they are revamping their airport security. The current highest security level will now be the new lowest level. Anyone can get into Japan if they REALLY want to. Many people stay way past their alloted time. Hmmm... sounds JUST LIKE THE US. The US (and now apparently Japan) is trying to do something about that.
From the article...
But Washington decided to extend the programme after determining that visa waiver countries will not meet an October deadline to introduce sophisticated passports, which include biometric data and make counterfeiting virtually impossible.
The UK authorities, for example, have said they will not be able to issue the new passports with the new data - such as an individual's fingerprints or iris pattern - before mid-2005.
The US has to protect itself. They cannot rely on others (including allies) to do it for them. A request was made of the allies to ensure their passports contain certain data (biometric data, anti-counterfeiting technology, etc.). Many of these countries did not comply. This expanded program will help fill the gap left by the allies.
What's the problem with that? Did any of you read the article?
Regardless of how this program will help prevent terrorism (I don't believe it will help much, but it will definitely cut out one avenue.), the bottom line is simple -- if you are not a U.S. citizen and do not like the idea of having the U.S. finger print you, DON'T GO TO THE US. Just wait until your country gets around to upgrading their passport system. Then your biometric data will be included on it -- gathered by YOUR GOVERNMENT. Then, when you go to the US, US officials won't have to bother you. All the data they want will be on your passport (gathered by YOUR GOVERNMENT, not the US - does that feel better?).
3cx.org - A truly bad website.
Fourth Reich? This gets modded +5 interesting? Give me a fucking break. Why don't you go talk to a Holocost survivor and then tell me if the present day United States comes anywhere near the level of evil exhibited by Nazi Germany.
Last time I checked we weren't tossing Arabs into labor camps or gas chambers. And if you come out and call Gitmo a concentration camp then I'd suggest you ask the aforementioned Holocost survivor what those were really like. And then ask him if he was carrying a gun and engaged in acts of war/terrorism against Nazi Germany -- or if he was tossed into the camps just for being Jewish. Last time I checked there are millions of Arab/Muslim American citizens that aren't being tossed into camps and who are living normal lives inside what you arrogantly call the "Fourth Reich".
BTW: I hate George Bush too. But calling my country the "Fourth Reich" is indefensible. Good for a cheap +5 post on Slashdot though it seems. Bah.
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
One form of the Lanchester equations uses 3 populations: conventional army, guerilla army and civilians. There is a conversion term between the guerilla army and the civilian population. In other words - civilans remain neutral but take loses and can be converted to guerillas.
Turns out those conversions have a devastating effect on the conventional force, because you get more conversions as civilian losses occur so civilians casulties must be strictly avoided, yet the targets, guerillas, are "masked" by the civilian population, thereby reducing the force multipliers of the conventional force. The nullification of force multipliers is faster than pure guerilla with no conversion. The odds for the conventional force "winning" grow very dim.
But similarly you could add a conversion term to the conventional forces to convert to guerilla forces, which pretty much dooms the conventional force.