Slashdot Mirror
Israel Moves Toward a National Biometric Database
An anonymous reader writes "Israeli's government has approved the creation of a biometric database which would contain fingerprints and facial photos of all Israeli citizens. If the bill becomes law — and it is at an early stage — the biometric information of each citizen would be embedded in their passport and national ID card. Israeli citizens would be required by law to submit to biometric testing upon request by government employees, soldiers, and policemen, so that their biometric info can be compared to the info embedded in their ID card / passport. The declared purpose of the bill is to combat forgery of passports and ID cards, and also to aid identification 'in cases of a mass disaster.' The bill was approved over objections from civil rights groups and the Israeli Bar. The article notes that no other democratic country has a comprehensive biometric database of all citizens."
The article notes that no other democratic country has a comprehensive biometric database of all citizens.
But the UK is working on it.
If intelligent life is too complex to evolve on its own, who designed God?
Sounds more insidious than some of the neighboring countries we decry as anti-freedom.
I wonder how many of my tax dollars are being used by their government to subjugate their people? I don't like this at all, not for any nation.
According to "The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy"
Israel is "the largest total recipient since World War II" of U.S. aid. "Total direct U.S. aid to Israel for this period amounts to well over $140 billion since World War II. Israel receives about $3 billion in direct foreign assistance each year, which is about one-fifth of America's foreign aid budget." The authors claim that "This largesse is especially striking when one realizes that Israel is now a wealthy industrial state with a per capita income roughly equal to South Korea or Spain."
"Israel is the only recipient of U.S. aid that does not have to account for how the aid is spent." According to the authors, this makes it "virtually impossible to prevent the money from being used for purposes the United States opposes."
Before you all get excited: the law stands at "kriaa tromit", which means it's just now readt to be voted on. Each law has to be voted three times after this stage... I'm sure it won't pass, since other draconic laws were blocked. This particular stage, is very easy to pass, for any law, even crazy ones....
But i don't think you appreciate the situation with Israeli documents: they are the most popular forged documents in the world right now: our passports are the easiest to mangle with, and because many countries trust Israeli passports, it's the most bought passport in the black market. Even the Israeli ministry of foreign affairs issued several rules to disencourage Israeli tourists from selling their passports... Our IDs are also quite popular, since we still have problems of women trafficking...
And about terrorism... well, i doubt anybody actually thinks this system will have anything to do with that. There are a very few actual cases, compared with the total, where Israeli citizens Arabs were involved in terrorist activity...
And the last comment i have on this issue, is that in the end, friends, it all comes down to money. Some CEO, with a security system, is related to some government official, and is going to rip off the treasury, when he accidentally of course, win the auction for creating the system. At least that was true for many other security related systems in Israel, the ones that did not go through the defense industry.
Hope I shed some light.