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US Passports To Recieve RFID Chips
connah0047 writes "The Washington Post reports that US passports will be getting RFID chips by October of 2006. Despite security concerns, the U.S. has now committed to putting RFID chips in the passports of all U.S. citizens. The new regulations will mean that all new and renewing U.S. passports will contain RFID chips by October 2006. While some believe this is a step forward, there are major privacy and security issues with the wireless technology."
Wonder how long until this gets whored out..Unfortunately for us, RFID chips can be read by any schmuck walking down the block with a scanner, not just the ones at the customs desk in the airport. Essentially, you may as well just pass out flyers with your personal information on them...Is this REALLY where we should be heading?
"Crime fighters fight crime. Fire fighters fight fire. What do freedom fighters fight?" -George Carlin
So destroy your current passport and have a new one reissued right before they institute the chips. You'll have 10 more years of RFID-free travel.
Meh, you can't expect those monkeys to listen to a mere 2335 people...I bet those wierdos who wrote in forgot to include substantial gratiuties along with their reasoned explanation of why this is the dumbest idea ever...I know I did.
I'm still trying to figure out how this could possibly add security. You know the immigration weenies are going to start relying on their magic passport detetctors, and it's not like you can include anything like strong encryption on a RFID chip without making it the size of a deck of cards.
Well, at least I can build a RFID scanner to help me find my passport next time I lose it.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
just wrap your passport in foil
i'm not saying that you don't have a right to complain about this, and that there aren't real issues of snooping involved
but i am saying the solution is easy and the implementation of this won't be stopped
so get some foil, and wrap it up, and move on to fighting for something worthwhile
don't waste your energies on a done deal with an easy work around
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
On the plus side, it will be much easier for terrorists to wave a RFID scanner and pick out the Americans on an international flight.
-- Gary Goldberg KA3ZYW 301/249-6501 AIM:OgGreeb Digital Marketing Inc., Bowie, MD
So what happens to the RFID when it goes through a dozen X-Ray scans? How about just sitting in my pocket at 35k ft? Have these chips been tested to show that they will continue to work after normal wear of a passport? My passport certainly takes a beating everytime I travel: x-rays, increased radiation due to high elevation, bending, humidity, etc. I doubt all these things have been tested for.
I really don't want to have to wait and hour and miss my flight as the prove that I am who my passport says I am just because some stupid chip failed.
Troll/Flamebait/Funny/Interesting
:-}
If I was in this situation I'd be reluctant to get a passport and travel overseas. This seems to be a bad thing for Americans as most of them don't really know what is outside of America... I learnt about other countries from stories of our war veterans fighting on foriegn soil to help protect it... Do American children get taught about the same stories of the 1st and 2nd World War? the A bomb drop etc in school? Mormans have it worse, their new testament was based in America, maybe they don't even know about the Israel/Palistine area....
Hopefully I'm only speaking about a small number the Americans and some of them can flame me back to disprove what I've just said.
*Holds up lighter to ignite flame throwers*
The feds have a new toy, and they insist on playing with it. Their promises about anti skimming technology are hollow. It won't stop terrorists from using an illicit RFID reader to pick out the Americans. They might as well just paint red white and blue targets on us! I have written about this and written about this.
The Uncoveror: It's the real news.
If you want a taste of freedom you should try visiting France disguised as a black North African. You'll soon find out how much fun having no papers is.
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
Sheesh, talk about quotes out of context!
Mr. Lincoln was making an appeal to national unity (i. e. against secession), arguing that factionalism will only cause the death of the concept of republican government entirely. If anything, Mr. Lincoln's appeals could be better used to support RFID tags in passports, saying that we should all "get behind" the idea in order to "defend our way of life."
Seriously, can't you find a convenient Wilde or Mencken quote somewhere or something?
The article does lend itself to the the interpretation that these are RFID chips but they are not. Some of the technology is similar to RFID, but we should be using precise terminology here in order to have a debate on the merits of the actual technology being used. Again, this isn't RFID. These passports have privacy protecting measures that are not even possible with RFID. That said the solution is not perfect. We should be debating this improved but somewhat flawed solution rather than debating the obviously stupid (and non-existant) concept of RFID passports.
Lasers Controlled Games!
I just had to go search for more info on RFID implants because sooner or later bills will be proposed by somebody that they be introduced, initially on a voluntary basis....
...unlike the VeriKid service provided by the Mexican distributors of verisign technology:
http://www.solusat.com.mx/index1.html
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,60771, 00.html
...they seem to be popular with body piercing fans:
Amal Graafstra Gets an RFID Implant
http://www.bmezine.com/news/presenttense/20050330. html
Back in July silicon.com reported the following: "Tommy Thompson, the Health and Human Services Secretary in President Bush's first term and a former Governor of Wisconsin, is going to get tagged. Thompson has joined the board of Applied Digital, which owns VeriChip, the company that specialises in subcutaneous RFID tags for humans and pets. To help promote the concepts behind the technology, Thompson himself will get an RFID tag implanted under his skin." http://networks.silicon.com/lans/0,39024663,391505 25,00.htm/
December 2003 - Subdermal RFID chip provokes furore http://www.theregister.co.uk/2003/12/04/subdermal_ rfid_chip_provokes_furore/
October 2004 - FDA approves computer chip for humans - nice pic of an implant next to George Washington... http://msnbc.msn.com/id/6237364/
This article was followed up in November 2004 http://slate.msn.com/id/2109477/
Verisign thoughtfully provide a method to save you getting your child swapped in the hospital. "The number of total switching incidents is as high as 20,000 per year in the U.S." But don't worry. In this case the tag is not implanted... http://www.verichipcorp.com/
Although RFID implants have their detractors...
http://www.spychips.com/
http://www.notags.co.uk/page26.html
http://www.rfidconcerns.com/
http://www.shire.net/big.brother/digitalangel.htm
http://whiterose.samizdata.net/archives/cat_identi ty_cards.html
http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2005/02/impl anting_chip.html
And the odd geek or two: http://www.x11.net/wiki/index.php/My_RFID_Implant He has mp4 video footage of the implanting procedure. It doesn't sound like he will want to remove this implant anytime soon - OUCH!
The Mexican Government - "Mexico's Attorney General required the Mark of the Beast in a 160 people. Thousands more are now planned..." http://www.tldm.org/News4/MarkoftheBeast.htm
And the European Parliament! "Brussels: 'Implants to track people are OK'". http://management.silicon.com/government/0,3902467 7,39128836,00.htm/
"Power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely" Lord Acton (1834-1902)
My hyperlinks aren't worth the paper they're printed on.
Personally I don't have anything to hide. If they want to monitor where I go. What do I care.
Maybe a little more big brother watching might keep a few more people honest.
Translation: Take my rights! I wasn't using them anyway.
The problem with this view point is that these protections exist to protect you and I against the threat of arbirary government. Aside from the possibility of nuclear terrorism, it is highly unlikely that terrorists will ever be more of a threat to Americans than say Automobile accidents, but the Government, if allowed to erode our rights, can take away our liberty.
If security is what you want, then I would suggest that you refrain from driving a car. For example even in September 2001, more Americans lost their lives to auto accidents than to terrorist actions. Even in Israel, it is a rare thing that terrorists kill more Israelis than auto accidents do in any given month (only happened once to my knowledge). So.... which do you fear more? Are you so afraid of dying in, say, an auto accident, that you are willing to give up essential liberty for that safety? If not, what makes terrorism such of a great threat that the response should be dispurportionate to the historical analysis of the risk?
International terrorism is a threat that is far overblown. And as in every other area of the world where this has been the case (Israel, N. Ireland, Colombia, Spain, France), the only solution is political. That there is a fine line between a careful political solution and appeasement should not be lost on people, but that line does exist and must be used to separate terrorist criminals from their civil supporters. Indeed the rhetoric that they hate us because we are free, and that we must give up our freedom to fight them seems to me to be arguably both oversimplistic, naive, and appeasement-oriented (if subconsciously so).
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Just because YOU don't excersize your rights doesn't mean others should have it taken away who use it because it'll help you sleep at night. It would honestly take less work to work things out with these people than put all these security measures in place. All this shit stems over us sticking our gaw damn noses where they didn't belong in the middle east and getting involved in holy wars between tribes.
As far as Padilla is concerned...clearly he was an enemy combatant, whether caught in the act or by association. If he isa supposed to be an example of the failure or potential failure of our sysem, I don't see it. Due process may have been eroded but the smell test definately applies. At the very best for Padilla he was a merc if not directly loyal to Al Qaeda for religious reason he was a paid gun. Why else are you running around in Afghanistan. I don't think he was a tourist or a student of foreign affairs. Guilt by association at the very least.
If he is not allowed to challenge allegations in a court of law, what protections are there for the rest of us? If he is not allowed to challenge his detention, what is to prevent Bush or some later president (Democrat or Replublican) from using the same policy to imprison indefinitely and without trial those who either embarrass his administration or otherwise pose as obstacles to implimenting policy?
One of the most important documents I know of in American history is the Declaration of Independance. In this document, Thomas Jefferson clearly lays out the dangers that arbitrary government provides to the general liberty of the citizens. Out of this experience arose our Constitution and Bill of Rights. These are not mere protections against theoretical dangers. These are protections against the dangers that the Framers experienced. And dangers I fear we are on the brink of today.
At the very best for Padilla he was a merc if not directly loyal to Al Qaeda for religious reason he was a paid gun. Why else are you running around in Afghanistan. I don't think he was a tourist or a student of foreign affairs.
We know this because we trust the Government to tell us the truth on these matters? I thought we had an independant judiciary because we *didn't* trust the government to lock people up because they always know best. I thought we had Habeas and due process protections because we *didn't* trust the government with the ability to lock up people without trial merely on their say-so.
In Article I of the Constitution (Section 9 iirc), we see a reference to another important aspect of due process rights. That Habeas Corpus can only be suspended *by Congress* and only in the case of invasion or insurrection. Habeas Corpus began as a part of English law which required the executive (headed by the King at that time), from locking up individuals on an arbitrary basis without trial. Habeas has been suspended by Congress twice in the past: Once during the Civil War, and once in the immediate aftermath during a second insurrection. But Congress has not suspended Habeas today, and this important protection applies.
I've een searched at the airport for no reason. I don't like it but that is one of the prices of safety.
There is an argument that can be made that choosing to fly on an airplane presents facts such that there can be some compromise there. After all the Consitution says we have the right to be protected from *unreasonable* search and siezure and the courts have repeatedly ruled that reasonability can exist outside the search warrant regimen provided that interests are balanced in specific circumsntaces. While I believe that most of our airport security is misplaced and while it is clearly possible to carry dangerous improvised weapons on board an airplane (in the most extreme case, are you going to ban professional boxers and martial artists from flying in the name of preventing lethal weapons on board aircraft), I will agree with this rule subject to the condition that it is not unduly expanded. I think, for example, that the scatter xray scanners (the ones that allow security guards to see through clothes) probably go too far. I think portions of the Patriot act go too far, and I think CAPS II goes too far on other grounds (in that it restricts liberty unduly without due process rights).
I think first amendmnt liberty has its time and place and protecting terrorists is not one of t
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP