Today is Comment Deadline for RFID-Chip Passports

An anonymous reader writes "Today is the deadline for submitting comments to the State Department concerning the use of RFID chips in passports. These devices would store in digital form all the information currently on a passport as well as a digital copy of the passport picture. This information could then be read by an RFID reader presumably being operated by port of entry personnel. However, these devices could feasibly be read by anyone, including those with malicious intent. The use of RFID chips in passports is a bad idea for many more reasons than can be listed here. If you haven't yet, send your comments to the State Department. You can email them directly at PassportRules@state.gov with the subject 'RIN 1400-AB93' or go to rfidkills.com for more information and an online submittal form. ... It's also being covered on Wired." Here's the proposed rule itself (PDF).

Comments

Why must they emit?

[Anonymous Coward]

This is something I don't get. Why use something that emits a signal? Digitize it ... fine. Barcode it for easy reading ... fine. But why make it so somebody sitting next to me in an airport can pickup the signal?

Re:Why must they emit?

[0x461FAB0BD7D2]

Exactly. We have something like that in Hong Kong already: Smart Identity Card

It is an identity card, on a MULTOS 4.06 operating system that supports the ISO7816 standard.

An RFID-based system is not much more useful than a Smart card.

Re:Why must they emit?

[jcuffe]

Not to mention the fact that if they make everyone's ID emit some value, who can say what happens when you get a cluster of people standing together? Even if the broadcasting range of the RFID device is quite short, wouldn't you still have to basically whip out your card and swipe it to ensure that it's reading *your* card and not somebody else's? And if you have to do that, isn't the RFID chip 100% liability and 0% benefit?

How to kill your passport & other questions...

[justanyone]

Supposedly, putting an RFID tag in a microwave will kill it (make it no longer workable). This is an easy fix for those who don't want people nearby to read their passport info.

Questions:
* What do I gain, as a passport user, by having mine working?
* What prevents someone from putting a fake RFID tag in/on my passport, thus making it seem like I'm engaging in high-tech forgery?
* What benefits come from an RFID-based reading of the thing, vs. some kind of contact-based smart card that clearly shows when it's being read (you have to make physical contact with the device)?
* What's to stop the authorities from putting RFID readers throughout the airport and tracking where specific people walk?
* Why not put rfid tags on boarding passes instead, so that to go from the counter to the plane you have to walk past numerous RFID readers and it keeps track that you didn't miss a checkpoint, etc.
* Won't my address and phone number be on this? What if I'm a single female concerned with personal security? Some schmo could stalk an airport, find me, strike up a conversation, and then get home before me since they know I'm not home?
* What about ex-husbands / abusers / stalkers / restraining-order-prevented people from scanning the new address of someone to find / kill / abuse them again?

Seems to me there's something very Orwellian / Soviet / THX-1138-ish about this whole thing.

-- Kevin

Re:How to kill your passport & other questions

[j-turkey]

Supposedly, putting an RFID tag in a microwave will kill it (make it no longer workable). This is an easy fix for those who don't want people nearby to read their passport info.

According to the proposal:

Damaged, Defective or Otherwise Nonfunctioning Electronic Chip

Section 51.6 of Title 22, Code of Federal Regulations (CFR), governs the validity of damaged United States passports. This rule would amend 51.6 by adding new language providing that a damaged, defective, or otherwise nonfunctioning electronic chip may be grounds for invalidating a United States passport. A passport with an intact data page but a nonfunctioning electronic chip would still be used as a travel document. However, detected attempts to alter chip data or to substitute a different electronic chip would result in invalidation.

That sort of answers a few of your questions (although it's sort of an ambigous answer -- disabling the RFID is grounds for invalidation, but you can travel without the RFID? I don't get it). Have you submitted your comments yet?

Read distance enhancement

[justanyone]

The change specifies a read distance of approximately 4 inches.

I wonder if the technical experts have bothered to mention that this signal is being broadcast in all directions, and that simple dish antennae can enable exchanging signals over tens of yards/meters if not longer?

Has anyone thought about Embassy security personnel being given a task to eliminate all radio-frequency broadcasting devices in the building to prevent espionage, yet everyone will now be carrying a small broadcasting station that can be converted to send data out of the building? Detecting small bugs is a big deal to these guys. I wonder if they have an opinion about their jobs getting harder...