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Help a Journalist With An NFC Chip Implant Violate His Own Privacy and Security
An anonymous reader writes: His wife thinks he's crazy, but this guy got an NFC chip implanted in his arm, where it will stay for at least a year. He's inviting everyone to come up with uses for it. Especially ones that violate his privacy and security. There must be something better to do than getting into the office or unlocking your work PC.
He says, "The chip we are using is the xNTi, an NFC type 2 NTAG216, which is about the size of a grain of rice and is manufactured by the Dutch semiconductor company NXP, maker of the NFC chip for the new iPhone. It is a glass transponder with an operating frequency of 13.56MHz, developed for mass-market applications such as retail, gaming and consumer electronics. ... The chip's storage capacity is pretty limited, the UID (unique identifier) is 7 bytes, while the read/write memory is 888 bytes. It can be secured with a 32-bit password and can be overwritten about 100,000 times, by which point the memory will be quite worn. Data transmission takes place at a baud rate of 106 kbit/s and the chip is readable up to 10 centimeters, though it is possible to boost that distance."
He says, "The chip we are using is the xNTi, an NFC type 2 NTAG216, which is about the size of a grain of rice and is manufactured by the Dutch semiconductor company NXP, maker of the NFC chip for the new iPhone. It is a glass transponder with an operating frequency of 13.56MHz, developed for mass-market applications such as retail, gaming and consumer electronics. ... The chip's storage capacity is pretty limited, the UID (unique identifier) is 7 bytes, while the read/write memory is 888 bytes. It can be secured with a 32-bit password and can be overwritten about 100,000 times, by which point the memory will be quite worn. Data transmission takes place at a baud rate of 106 kbit/s and the chip is readable up to 10 centimeters, though it is possible to boost that distance."
I'm sure our local superhero cold fjord can tell us why a Small, Libertarian-Approved State should mandate the installation of these on all citizens and civilians.
Well? We're waiting, my friend.
It seems small, when we think about data these days being in the multi-gigabytes, but 888 bytes is AMPLE to completely destroy the security of your legal identity.
Say, a social security number: 9 bytes.
A telephone number, with area code: 10 bytes
Full name, assuming a null padded, 3 entry struct with 15char max strings and 2 delimiter bytes: 47 bytes
Address, assuming 4 lines with 20 chars each (with null padding as needed)-- 40 bytes.
All that, and we are only about 1/7 to 1/8th of the data memory, or about 106 bytes.
One could squeeze a shortened URL to a facebook page, and quite a bit else in that space, such as DL number, credit card number, cellphone number, email address, and whatnot.
888 bytes can hold a LOT of very dangerous information.
He should stick his arm in a microwave oven for 10 seconds on full power and let us know whether it still works...
I agree fully that 888 bytes is enough to cause someone damage via identity theft. The problem with this phase of trying to "test" the security of these devices is that there is very little to interface with, which is going to create a false sense of security (I'll argue this is part of the reason for the early advertising and testing)
888 bytes is enough to hold your gender, religion, ethnic background, political affiliation, and at least your last few coordinates. Lots of stuff to discriminate, or tamper with to make it appear that you were in places not visited. Not a huge concern in the US currently (at least with most of that kind of data), but how about the Middle East, or China, or pick a country in Africa. The landscape can change very drastically depending on where you are, let alone who gets into power.
Did Facebook and Google teach the masses nothing in terms of "bad things that can happen with technology?" Probably not, because you know.. even if you could read/write fast enough to heat this gadget up and burn the carrier's arm you probably won't hear about it on the "News".
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
Why does it matter what his wife thinks? And if she truly did suspect he is crazy, wouldn't he divorced right about now and caring a lot less about the chip in his arm?
How on earth is he getting that kind of range! The 'usable range' on these chips is a few mm.. I know, I have one and use it every day!
use a microcontroller, a couple of fast power mosfets, and a big capacitor to crank a few watts into his grain of rice...
Dude's doing it all wrong, it's meant to go in your right hand or your forehead! ^-^
All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.
There's a couple schools of thought about chipping pets - one is the cancer risk is minimal, the other is that it isn't minimal.
So I'll say that a good use of his chip will be to see if he gets cancer.
_ _ _ Go for the eyes Boo! GO FOR THE EYES!
You mean help this journalist come up with some stories to write about
Just install a reader for this chip in the wife and you'll get all of your privacy and security and many other things violated...
You can't handle the truth.
Dont upload your nudes to it!
I think you have a chip in your shoulder.
Didn't some guy (a university professor) in the UK do this about ten years ago? He was a bit of a publicity seeking knob too, IIRC.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
I know, I keep getting e-mails from ppl citing the Bible.
Rene Schoemaker.
Nancy Pelosi was Speaker of the House, and generally considered the second most powerful democrat behind Obama. You can't figure out why conservatives might have a problem with top democrats? You may have noticed Obama wasn't very involved with the drafting of the ACA, that was spearheaded by Pelosi. It would be more accurate to call it Pelosicare rather than Obamacare. The first draft, the last time the Democrats controlled the White House, was called Hillarycare.
For those conservatives of a more libertarian bent, they may be unimpressed with Bush and Cheney and may see some good in some democrats. Pelosi, however, supported the Patriot Act, currently supports the NSA dragnet, No Child Left Behind - she's the figurehead for the Democrats, except when the republicans have an even worse idea, in which case she gets on board with them.
Just wait 364 days, until he's locked all his authentication to the NFC, then some chloroform and a scalpel will give him all the privacy and security violation he's asking for.
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
Its not that NFC/RFID chip has potential uses, its that it is uniquely identifiable. This just means that you can be tracked everywhere and with the right equipment that can even be done by satellite using power beaming tech. That said, your entire body is a walking equivalent of an RFID tag anyway and can be interrogated by radar providing a unique signature. The RFID tag just means that at least some steps can be skipped, reducing backend processing time. It can also be used in conjunction with the more complex method of analysing the return signal from the body to confirm if the chip has been replaced.
Whilst this may seem little to worry about now, all societies eventually decay to a totalitarian model. In the past, fake papers could get you and your family out of the country, or you could sneak across a border. With these automated tools, especially radar systems that can penetrate RF shielding and target the human body, you would not be able to get away. You can be killed from orbit without anyone ever knowing.
Now think of Western security services who have spent the last 40 years building radar signatures of everybody and associating personal details with those signatures. Also, imaging a global network of satellites tasked with keeping that tracking information up-to-date 24/7.
That's current tech.
Think of the holocaust and how accurate records made extermination easy.
Its not RFID/NFC that is the problem, or even radar, the problem is much more human and it is in our nature.
The most insidious violations happen while you're not there and moreover, without you having choice left because everyone is doing it and/or getting the same treatment. It's not so much about your data ending up in the open, though that can be pretty bad already. It's about everyone's data getting abused en masse, without recourse or redress. By publishing himself like this, he retains something of those, where an anonymous faceless in the crowd wouldn't.
I want to visually see that chip, together with the other one implanted at birth.
--ac
Why doesn't he use a Cattle Ear Tag then everyone can read it even when they doesn't have a nfc capable device. Seriously, I think it's not smart to give up you privacy like this, via an NFC tag.
Technically Obamacare IS Rommneycare, a Republican alternative to a single payer system (single payer is a much better system BTW). When the Democrats proposed it the Republicans simply lurched further to the right and declared it terrible.
If we can get the reporter's uid on the no-fly-list it should be pretty entertaining to listen to his rants.
Volunteering for the chip is an exercise of freedom. Great.
But being obligated to take one that is linked to a system of governance or control is where violations can starts, violations of privacy or freedom depend on social meaning given to the chip.
An equivalent example of the journalists logical flaw: When the internet was born and everybody was dependent on other forms of information and computers where only used by the average person to type up papers and could only connect to the internet by a dial-in connection, an equivalent challenge would have been to share my IP address and ask if someone could use it to violate: constitutional freedoms, bank account, relationships with family and friends, or commercial relationships?
You see, the chip is the latest vehicle for the promise of convenience and/or modernization, just like the internet was. With that convenience we will need to build systems of control to fulfill fairness requirements we feel are obviously needed and required by such a promise. Flaws in such a system of control, or just outright exploitation of trust extended to such a system lead to the type of violations we actually need to worry about. The issue then is how much can we trust government that incites fear, that keep secrets, that uses secret courts, that ignores its own regulations and laws, that would "update the dictionary" so that torture is something else, that would bail a banker out, what would enable and/or endorse confiscation of private property by law enforcement and/or government (see the civil forfeiture), that can't deny the existence of a scenario where a drone strike on it's own citizen on it's own land, that basically has no interest in the well-being of its citizenry. So why should we trust such a government at all?
That is why the journalist has missed the point. The very chip carries with it the possibility of more violations we rightfully should fear. It carries with it the next version of the wooden yolk. (why is a new yolk better than the old one?) How is taking a chip to try and show that it doesn't bite different from trying to justifying murder by saying, "Everyone eventually dies anyway"
However, in reply to the challenge the journalist is making, I offer an equivalent challenge for the sake of ponderance here on /.
Would you still take the chip, knowing it is the equivalent of your SS number, your drivers license and your badge number, journalistic credentials and bank account access IF complete access to the system (no restrictions at all) is also given to everyone who also agreed to being chipped? No restrictions means that everyone is an admin, everyone is a shopper and everyone can know and do everything.
If you can say yes to that do an experiment where you leave your home unlocked, your car unlocked and the keys in the ignition. Regarless, this is where think we all need to go, eventually, in some form.
If you say no, then I ask why you should give the chance for such complete access or control to anyone? Convenience? Ha!
http://geekdoctor.blogspot.com...
As a journalist you must come up with creative ideas to get any kind of attention.
no, its not. stop being disengenious. Romney care was a single state issue, which makes it constitutional according to the 10th. This is not the same thing at all.
now, if another state implemented it (not the fed) you could still call it romney care
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
So just what uses can we contrive? I kind of favour using it as a proximity sensor in or near steering wheels that disables his mobile phone if the car is running, while leaving the passenger's phone functional. Of course Big Wireless may not like the hit on their bottom line.
The storage issue is a red herring. It just needs enough to store a short URI where everything else can be found. Probably want a private key too, to be used only for generating signatures within the chip.
Oh, I'm sorry sir, I thought you were referring to me, Mr. Wensleydale.
Unless we're talking about sex (and even then sometimes) the words "man" and "woman" are usually interchangeable and the generic "man"
I'm not sure that man and woman were ever interchangeable, but it is true that man had a generic sense in C19th and early C20th English. That is a retrograde usage in the C21st.
Putting aside the obvious sexism, how practically, do we deal with the ambiguity this obsolescent usage introduces? For instance, when Rousseau is translated as: "Man is born free, but lives everywhere in chains," does man there include women? You wouldn't know, would you?
Don't worry, they'll go over this again in English class when you get to middle school.
Well here at university, were you to make this error in an essay, I would be required to deduct marks for your breach of gender-neutral language requirements.
Personally I find the "he/she" (which is considered acceptable ... you won't lose marks) construction abhorrent. So I follow a simple rule, when I have in mind a man, I use man and he, when I have in mind a woman I use woman and she and when I have in mind an unspecified member of a defined class I eschew the singular and speak of the class. i.e. in stead of "a user ... he/she" I prefer "users ... they." Either construction is acceptable however, "a user ... he," is not. A difficulty arises where, like here, one deals with a particular anonymous individual, where I reluctantly submit to the requirements of my profession and use they in the singular (which I find only marginally less ugly than he/she or (s)he).
So I guess you (or OP if that is not you) meant something along the lines of "It is obvious, in such cases, that people receive their own money which was taken from them by force, directly and specifically, without their consent, against their own choice." Unless, of course, OP meant what they wrote to be taken literally and thereby, like Rousseau in the quote above, to exclude women. After all, in discussing a particular woman, to speak of what pertains to "a man" might seem to be going out of the way to exclude her (at least it seems that way to a user of C21st English, YMMV). Which again raises the question: "Ayn Rand was not a man. So how do the considerations differ for women?"
https://dangerousthings.com/implant-faq/#mri