Slashdot Mirror
Apple's Secret Plan To Join iPhones With Airport Security
Hugh Pickens writes "Currently — as most of us know — TSA agents briefly examine government ID and boarding passes as each passenger presents their documents at a checkpoint at the end of a security line. Thom Patterson writes at CNN that under a 2008 Apple patent application that was approved in July and filed under the working title "iTravel," a traveler's phone would automatically send electronic identification to a TSA agent as soon as the traveler got in line and as each traveler waits in line. TSA agents would examine the electronic ID at an electronic viewing station. Next, at the X-ray stations, a traveler's phone would confirm to security agents that the traveler's ID had already been checked. Apple's patent calls for the placement of special kiosks (PDF) around the airport which will automatically exchange data with your phone via a close range wireless technology called near field communication (NFC). Throughout the process, the phone photo could be displayed on a screen for comparison with the traveler. Facial recognition software could be included in the process. Several experts say a key question that must be answered is: How would you prove that the phone is yours? To get around this problem, future phones or electronic ID may require some form of biometric security function including photo, fingerprint and photo retinal scan comparisons. Of course, there is still a ways to go. If consumers, airlines, airports and the TSA don't embrace the NFC kiosks, experts say it's unlikely Apple's vision would become reality. 'First you would have to sell industry on Apple's idea. Then you'd have to sell it to travel consumers,' says Neil Hughes of Apple Insider. 'It's a chicken-and-egg problem.'"
The irony is that the "1984" theme became one of the most successful ad campaign for Apple back then ...
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
which hasn't happened yet.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
I've attended a couple of Tech conferences where the presenters seem to assume that
...
- everyone is, or will be on Facebook
- everyone has, or will have an Apple device (iphone or ipad)
All rather short-sighted. In the past we've seen new ideas come along and be embraced by society and then abandoned. Skateboard parks, CB radios, kung fu
Not to say that Apple doesn't have a large customer base now - but it won't always. Is it really that worthwhile to introduce special handling for people with a special type of device?
"The greatest lesson in life is to know that even fools are right sometimes" - Winston Churchill
... that shouldn't even be a problem in the first place. What's so wrong with passports again? They already have various other security (like RFID chips, iirc), and they're much more tightly controlled than phones you can buy off ebay.
the game
You mean for the security theater that didn't exist a decade years ago in a type of travel terminal that didn't exist a century ago? Stop kidding yourself: nothing lasts forever.
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
We have RFID tags in our passports already, so they are already moving us towards electronic IDs. It's a foregone conclusion that the type of ID done for international flights will eventually crop up in domestic travel as well, for better or worse.
Consumers won't fight phone ID provided there is some added convenience that comes with it. Perhaps if we didn't have to remove shoes, for example (even though that security theatre seems unrelated to digital identification).
Why should Apple allow the US government to own a monopoly on creepiness?
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
Apple submitted the patent in 2008, it was approved in July, and both Slashdot and CNN are talking about it today, so this is "secret" HOW?
In all likelihood, it would be a service that would be available *IF YOU WANT IT*
Christ, people, if you suffer from this type of PARANOIA regularly, seek professional help.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
Per previous /. article, leave your cell phone at home: http://yro.slashdot.org/story/12/09/04/1552228/leave-your-cellphone-at-home-says-jacob-appelbaum
There's no such thing as "illegal download"
Somehow a publicly published idea about how to get people through airport security faster and easier is now a "secret plan for searching you at the airport" and comments equating it to all sorts of nasty things...
It's a public patent, and the goal of the thing is clearly the opposite of what everybody seems to be claiming...
Ask any big defense company. Government contracts are fabulous things.
I've spent most of my life reading patents for money. No one, at any company, gives a crap about right and wrong. If it's a novel idea and you think there's some chance of making money on it, you patent it. I'd be reviewing applications for Zyklon B if there was a way to monetize murder.
Before too many more people go off half-cocked, please allow me to remind everyone that every major tech company, particularly Apple, patents all sorts of crazy stuff that they never use. Here is an article detailing 10 patents from the last few years (the article is a year old) of crazy things that had /.ers (and others) predicting all sorts of weird and crazy stuff -- and not a single product has been released using any of them.
Remember when Apple patented touch gestures for the rear of an iPhone-like device? In the four or five iPhones released since then, have they ever implemented it? No. Seems doubtful they ever will at this point.
I'd wait until such a device actually exists in the wild before getting excited about it. Like a lot of companies, Apple simply builds up their patent portfolio for offensive and defensive purposes.
Yaz