Slashdot Mirror
E-Passport In the Works
ExE122 writes "In an attempt to curb falsification of passports, the United States has placed an order for millions of embedded ID chips. 'The chips carry an encrypted digital photograph of the passport holder. The chip is designed to be read by a special device that will be used by U.S. government workers who check passports when travelers come through border crossings. The State Department began issuing what are being called e-passports to tourists last week and will gradually increase production. State Department spokeswoman Janelle Hironimus said existing passports will remain valid until they expire but, eventually, all U.S. passports — about 13 million will be issued in 2006 — will contain such chips.'"
Passports are valid for 10 years upon issue, IIRC. Are you telling me that secure passport tech will slowly be phased in over 10 years? Because we all know how often Americans travel overseas.
If anything, this will raise the value of existing non-RFID passports, since they are more easily modified to indentify someone else.
Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
-- Pablo Picasso
Came back through SFO from Edinburgh yesterday and saw signs for a couple of dedicated test lanes for this (they were closed, but they were all set). I was wondering what the heck it was about.
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
So this means my passport that was processed Aug. 9th doesn't have an RFID chip?
One of the things that is a lot more common today than it has been in American history, yes, even back in the "bumpkin days" of America pre-industrialization, is that people just don't critically think anymore. "Special device?" Anyone with a modicum of critical thinking skills would look at a few simple things and freak:
1) All computer security systems have been defeated.
2) This is kinda like one of them thar computer security systems that has been defeated.
3) I'm carrying this thing around the world, and any schmo who can defeat it, can identify me faster than the police can.
4) There are a lot of terrorists and terrorism sympathizers who'd just love to off me because I'm American.
If you aren't careful, you'll be broadcasting enough info out there that you'll be easily victimized.
And if we're already on the subject of the government, why are they spending all this money to make sure passports can't be faked, greencards can't be faked, etc., if there is absolutely positively nothing being done to stop the flood of immigrants, criminals, drugs, and terrorists that are crossing our totally unprotected borders into this country every day? Every time this issue comes up, idiots say it's racism. Sorry, it's not racism to stop people and things that shouldn't be here illegally from coming here illegally.
Either that, or some chip manufacturer is in bed with the government.
steampunk web design
I used to find the low number of Americans with passports rather scary and insular until someone pointed out you only get 2 weeks vacation a year. With the US being so big and varied, it would take you most of your life in 2 week chunks to check out home let alone foreign places. :-)
Of course, us backwards wierdo liberal faggy Europeans get 6 weeks holiday
I want a list of atrocities done in your name - Recoil
What with the UK government wanting to force an ID card on us - seems applicable to Passports/Driving Licenses too.
Take a standard Credit Card sized plastic card.
Put a chip on it like credit cards use - not an RFID tag, just a simple chip that can store ONE piece of info.
That piece of data will be unique to that person, and is their ID in the system.
On the card we print a photograph, their name and date of birth.
When the card is presented at an appropriate terminal, a database lookup is done for the ID. The card reader then displays a "virtual" version of the card.
Visual inspection will allow the person doing the Identity Check to confirm the persons ID.
ID cards to be updated every 5 years, replacements for lost/stolen/damaged to be charged at cost, and be available within 2 working days, with designated places (like police stations) being able to print out temporary ID papers until replacement card arrives.
As long as downloads to terminals are encrypted, and the credentials of the operatives inputting data onto the system are checked, we have a secure system with no privacy concerns that SHOULD be cheap to implement.
Other systems, Passport Control etc could be tied to the database with your ID reference number becoming your Passport number - Give each person a pin number (or if you really insist use biometric information) and you have a bank/credit card that should also help prevent fraud.
Anyone see any holes in my plan?
Yes, individually you probably would like 52 weeks of paid time off, as a society though, Americans aren't fond of vacations. As an ex-pat living in Italy, it still irritates me to no ends that around august, nothing is open. Its also irritates me that people take so much time off. For example, one day out of the week my favorite restaurant is closed (on Tuesdays). No, of course its a small thing, but if you come here don't be expecting to be able to get breakfast tacos at 3AM here. (mmmm...midnight tacos...how I miss Austin sometimes...)
As a society, I think we would shit bricks if everything closed for a month in August. Going to the supermarket on Christmas Evening is really convenient.
Yes I'm aware of the human costs, but like heroin, we Americans are addicted to the always-on style of life...
France has the shortest (legally mandated) working year in the world. France is also the most productive country in the world.
You can oblige people to spend 2000+ hours per year in the office, but it doesn't mean they're doing anything very useful.
So I went to the shop yesterday to buy a couple of PSP games. So I pull out my plastic debit card to pay with it. They have these numeric pads with a slot for the card and a small LCD display around here in a lot of shops. (The super-markets and such just ask you for a signature, but almost everyone else has a PIN pad.)
"Oh," says the clerk, "the connection's been down the whole afternoon."
It's not even the first time something like that happens. It's not often, but it does happen.
So for purchasing games or groceries, ok, I can just pull some banknotes out of the wallet. But it kinda scares me that I'd have to depend on something like that at an airport.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
The point is to give everyone a digitally-signed copy of their OWN PHOTO. If a thief gets his hand on that, it won't help him unless he looks just like me. That's the point.
A slashdotter who didn't build his own computer is like a Jedi who didn't build his own lightsaber.
In light of terrorism, illegal immegration, identity theft and white collar crime, we will need not only passports with chips, but national IDs with smart chips too.
Not just your appearance, but your fingerprints, iris pattern, voice patterns and probably eventually unique DNA markers will be necessary. And a good long PIN or passphrase.
Those predicted bar codes on the forehead and arm look pretty likely, too.
"I'm sorry officer, my USB port is down. Could you use my saliva?"
Help end the use of Sigs. Tomorrow
In Germany we have RFID passports since last year. This despite much criticism (the old passports were considered one of the most secure documents ever). The new passport costs 59 euros, the old one was just 26 euros, so I got myself an old one just before the deadline.
:)
In my opinion, the e-passport was largely introduced to secretly subsidize the biometrics sector: The interior minister responsible for the e-passport, Otto Schily, joined two biometrics companies this month
Source (german only, sorry): http://www.silicon.de/enid/cio/21505
"How will facial biometrics work? Facial recognition will map various features on the face, for example, the distances between eyes, nose, mouth and ears. The measurements will be digitally coded and held on an electronic chip secured in the passport page."
Your passport required a picture, right? Congradulations! You have been biometricized!
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
The point is to give everyone a digitally-signed copy of their OWN PHOTO. If a thief gets his hand on that, it won't help him unless he looks just like me. That's the point.
Ah, but what if the 'Thief' doesn't want to so much steal your identity, as pick an American tourist out of a crowd of hundreds of other tourists? This isn't giving you a secure digital picture. It's painting a huge bulls-eye on your forehead...
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
Us Americans are the hardest working people in the world, and right above us is Japan. However, the irony is truely great as we are some of the least efficient workers, too (and Japan is one of the most efficient).
Unfortunately, all work and no play makes one unhealthy. Perhaps the reason, then, why Japan has the highest life expectancies in the world is because while they may get around the same time off as Americans, they're CONSTANTLY having holidays. There's nearly a holiday every same-day-as-the-month, e.g., January 1st, February 2nd, March 3rd..., whrereas us Americans don't really have very many holidays (unless you work for the postal service -_-;)...
here
This, of course, runs contrary to the common view that American workers are lazy and unproductive. However, there is an interesting catch. Because workers in the US tend to put in more hours than their European counterparts, the rankings change when you look at productivity per hour worked.
Norwegians lead the world with an output of $38 per hour worked last year. French workers were in second place, averaging $35 an hour, the report said. Belgians were third at $34, followed by Americans at $32.
There are a huge number of yeast infections in this county. Probably because we're downriver from the bread factory.
Personally I've never had a job where I had 2 weeks official vacation time per year. And I'm a U.S. Citizen.
Sounds like you're either a workaholic, or you need a new job. I had 2 in my first job, 5 in my second job (state government; paid better than the private companies in the area were paying too!), and 3 in my third (current) job. And I've always been able to actually use that time. And in my current job, I get an additional 8 weeks off every 7 years. Not quite up to European standards, but much better than what I read on here.
Why go to another country when you can go somewhere in your own country that is easier to get to, somewhere you have never been before, and somewhere that won't cost you your entire vacation budget on airfare? An American can even expand their travelling habits to include visiting other countries, namely Mexico and Canada, so that they can spend their entire life vacationing once a year somewhere in North America, and never go to the same place twice.
Airfare across the continent is actually not that much different from airfare to Europe many times. I've seen lots of deals from NYC to Paris for ~$400. Those 747s are quite efficient with all those seats.
I agree, though, there's a lot of stuff to see here in the USA and Canada. But Mexico?? What idiot would want to travel there? What a dump. Be prepared to carry around a lot of cash to bribe the cops in case you get pulled over (you don't have to be doing anything wrong, they just pull you over because you have money). And watch out for all the drug gangs leaving severed heads around the tourist cities and having gun battles with the police. No thanks, I think I'll stick to civilized countries.
We did our part. We saved your countries over 60 years ago. Get off our backs. How about a Thank you? How about taking US out for a vacation?
I hear this so often from Americans (and I am an American, for the record), and I'm really quite sick of it. Were you alive 60 years ago? Were you involved in WWII? For 99.9% of the Slashdot readers, I suspect the answers to both these questions is "no". So drop it. It's about as relevant to living people as the French helping us out in the Revolutionary War, or something that happened during Roman times.
You do have a great point about the high cost of living and low real wages, forcing most families to have dual earners. Americans work too much for too little reward.
yet.
New things coming soon to your New World Order.
Patriot Act IV.
The War on Terror - State Boarder ID checks required, no illegal ground traffic permitted.
Resistance is not only futile, it will be a felony.