The IDs are issued by the postal office and the banks, i.e. they are completely disconnected from the government, although you do need a birth certificate from the taxation office to get a card in the first place.
You can also use your drivers license or passport for identifying yourself.
Getting a passport cost around 30 (SEK 250), and I think the ID-cards are a bit cheaper, but since they are issued by private firms, their price depends on where you get it.
From September we will also get a national id that is ICAO compliant (the same time they start issuing digital passport). The national id will be optional and cost around 45 (SEK 400) (the same as the passport). They will contain the information that is written on the card and a photo, although from september 2006 (one year from introduction) you have to give away your fingerprints to get one (although, according to info from the Police that issue the cards, the fingerprints will not be stored in a database, only on the card).
The card will also have a smart card chip that can be used to store digital certificates.
The only reason that the cards are introduced is so that Swedes shall be able to get Schengen compliant IDs.
The EU is not a country, it is a conglomeration of countries.
That depends on your point of view, the Union has several exclusive areas in which the Union works on a federal level. Other areas are treated on a confederal level.
So, the Union do have the appearance of a single country in some areas; however in defence and foreign policy each state still have veto power.
This is of course a problem, even in the new constitution, but at least the constitution moves in the right way (e.g. mutual defence guarantees, more power to the EP and so forth).
The main problem with the ratification of the treaty is that in some countries, there will be referendums and in some there will be parliamentary votes. Having parliamentary votes in each state is as I see it OK, but not national referendums they are inherently undemocratic in this question and the only valid referendum as I can see it would be a joint European referendum.
Preferably, it would be a joint European referendum and parliamentary approval in order to guarantee both the peoples and the individual states influence in the question.
Having a referendum in each state is just plain wrong since this means that one Swede would be worth 7 Frenchmen, 2 Dutch or 0.5 Finns.
In some aspects, yes, in the matter of free speech, then no.
From the ECHR:
Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers. This article shall not prevent States from requiring the licensing of broadcasting, television or cinema enterprises.
The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary.
As for another user's question... what are open (lossy compression) alternatives ? There's plenty of 'open' alternatives. Problem is that there's a patent of some form behind every single one that I'm aware of. The JPEG thing, JPEG2000, Wavelets, Gradient Tesselation, Fractal..
This isn't standard, but i can give you this algorithm gratis, you have to put a file format on it to use it, and implement it in real code. JPEG is a bit more complex, and will give better image quality, but this is simple and definitely patent free since Fourier is dead since a hundred years or more.
The hashes are used as authentication (challenge response?), nothing is being encrypted. States may however add encryption of sensitive data, if added (fingerprints, iris-scans etc).
The sixth power came from this (ICAO report on contactless IC's): "Because inductive coupling decreases with the sixth order of distance, adjacent systems or other external noise sources are unlikely to adversely affect the reading operation "
"State Department contractors are looking to include some shielding, such as metal fibers in the passport cover, to keep the chips from being read when the passport is closed."
On the other hand, if someone reads the key being sent, he will also read the response (i.e. the personal info). The thing is, if you try to record the radio signals at the border control, you will have interference from other RFID-chips and you will have to be close, so close that he can READ the passport data with your EYES.
Secondly, the device used for recording the transmissions will have to be quite bulky and power hungry to read any info from over a meter a way. Not something you carry in your hand-baggage.
According to the ICAO standard states can chose to add an authentication scheme to the RFID-tag. This is what Sweden is dong, this is probably what the US is doing.
The authentication is based on the MRZ (Machine Readable Zone) in the passport (this is text that is read through OCR and not visible unless you open the passports photo page). The MRZ-data is hashed by SHA-1 and the high 32 bits of the hash is taken (this reduce the risk of someone computing the MRZ-data backwards (actually guessing) which MIGHT be possible if you have the hash and the basic structure of the MRZ-data). The hash is sent as an authentication code to the RFID-chip in the passport, if the hash is wrong the RFID responds with a "no valid authentication" message and refuse to send any data.
A state may decide to ignore such measures in their passports (but this is unlikely for the EU and the US). And such states have the option to include metallic jackets for the passport.
The range of the RFID transmission will be around 10 cm. IIRC it weakens with the power of 6 to the distance.
Further, it is not practical to have contact chips in a book-formed passport. It is more practical in ID-cards.
While I dislike this in general and would prefer a passport free world, try to avoid spreading untrue FUD about the technology being used, the data is secure and no person is going to get within 10 cm from your passport, and try an average of 2^31 different hashes without you noticing it. Of course, if the person manage to "borrow" your passport, he will use the MRZ to obtain the key, but in that case, he can take the passport to a photocopier as well (and that is probably cheaper).
For absolute majority 367 votes of 732 is needed, this equates around 50.136612 %, not 70 as stated in the parent.
Four things can happen now:
1. The EP approves the Council's proposal. This ends the process and the proposal is made into law.
2. The EP approves the proposal but with amendments. The new proposal is then sent to the Council for a second reading. This requires absolute majority or 367 votes of 732. Before the Council's second reading the Commission is allowed to make a statement.
The Council's second reading can accept the EP's proposal with a qualified majority, or reject it. If it is rejected, the Council and EP must form a committee that consist of an equal number of representatives from the two bodies. If the committee agrees the proposal is sent to the EP and Commission for formal adoptation, if no agreement can be made the law is dead and can't be resurrected.
If the compromise goes to formal adoptation, the Council must approve the compromise with qualified majority, and the EP must approve it with a absolute majority. If either Council or EP fails to approve the compromise the law is dead. If both approves the compromise, it is made into law.
3. The EP rejects the proposal. This terminates all future attempts to pass this piece of legislation. This requires absolute majority or367 votes of 732.
4. The EP does not do anything within 3 months (+ 1 month possible as an extension). In this case, the Council's common position is treated as accepted and made law.
Personally I think it's about time we killed off the European Commision & European Parlimant entirely and moved to a US style two house system with directly elected officials. The rotating presidency should stay, though. That's actually one thing that works pretty well.
You want directly elected officials, but at the same time you want to dismantle the parlament!?!?
We should build a system based on two houses, but we must keep the parlament as the representatives of the citizens of Europe. The body that must go is the council, a lawmaking body that is indirectly elected.
The council should be replaced by a senate 1 or 2 senators per member state that are elected by general elections in each member state.
The rotating presidency must go as well, the EU should have a president supported by the parlament and council.
Yes, it is sort of like that. I do believe that it is illegal for them to do it (correct me if I'm wrong).
And many Europeans are always pissed on the Council and their undemocratic methods (they are not directly elected, but they have lawmaking power).
The thing is that ppl are complaining on the Council and the lack of democracy in the EU and at the same time, the same ppl are crying out loud on every attempt to move power from the Council to the Parlament (they are basically afraid of the superstate of Europe); however, a federal path for Europe is the only way to go for ensuring democratic legiticy for the EU.
(And of course the EP voted no to SW patents the last time)
A few objections. Fusion does produce nuclear waste as you said, however we are talking about highly active waste with half life of around 150 years.
Fission produce waste with half life of around 150 000 years, that is a very long time, and the reason that the waste is a problem.
And there is also the problem of fuel supply. The uranium supply is expected to run out in 100 years, the supply of Li (from Earth) and He-3 (from Luna) will last for several thousands of years, the supply of Dt from the oceans is virtually limitless. And in theory, any material lighter than Fe can be used for fusion.
Well, not being in the common currency has its drawbacks. You only have your selves to blame.
(For the record, I'm from Sweden so I don't have the advantages of the common currency neither. Although, I will move to the Netherlands in the fall...)
IIRC one of the main ideas with Galileo was to have precision, better than military GPS for civilian use, unaffected by US war-decisions.
The thing is that the civilian sector will use this added precision, and in some case civilians lives will depend on the higher precision. It is thus not possible to degrade Galileo, even in order to save european soldiers lives since degrading would kill civilians.
And by the way EU does not have a common army yet (although we will hopefully have one some day soon.)
I don't know where he got the information that a each execution would deter 10 murders. THIS IS NOT TRUE! At most it would prevent the killer from killing again.
Capital punishment have nothing to do with deterrence; capital punishment is about revenge.
While I do believe that there are some that have earned death for their crimes. It is simply not morally right of the state to kill its citizens! There have been enough innocents sent to their deaths to make any man shiver in horror; at least if a person is sent to prison you can right the wrong if he was wrongfully convicted, I wonder how the state would right the wrong if an innocent man was executed?
Luckily I live in the EU, so I don't have to deal with a government that kills its citizens.
Firstly, if your nation was part of a continent where there were several warring nations, and you had been making war between each other for a thousand years, then you would know that nations with to much pride will fall like rocks eventually. Thus those who would like to survive negotiate.
This is not to say that negotiations always work, they don't. But I would say that it might be reasonable to negotiate a bit longer and sometimes give in if you at least believe that the other end have some sense of honour. In the mentioned example it is clear, now afterwards that Germany at the time dit not have any honour, but was it not worth a try?
Secondly, Europeans do not have neither "honor" or "dishonor" we have honour and dishonour.
Firstly, the French site is not a French suggestion, it is a European suggestion. Thus the US have not only insulted France, but also all the European allis of the US. That is the UK, Italy, Poland, Denmark, etc etc.
Secondly, there is no earthquake risk in the European site, there is in the Japanese, I do not believe it is wise to put such an expensive project on a place where it might be substantially damaged by nature.
Conclusions: 1) Diplomats and politicians are stupid. 2) The world would be a better place if scientists and engineers were in charge.
Slashdot Mirror
It's a European Union site, not French. France has nothing to do with this.
The IDs are issued by the postal office and the banks, i.e. they are completely disconnected from the government, although you do need a birth certificate from the taxation office to get a card in the first place.
You can also use your drivers license or passport for identifying yourself.
Getting a passport cost around 30 (SEK 250), and I think the ID-cards are a bit cheaper, but since they are issued by private firms, their price depends on where you get it.
From September we will also get a national id that is ICAO compliant (the same time they start issuing digital passport). The national id will be optional and cost around 45 (SEK 400) (the same as the passport). They will contain the information that is written on the card and a photo, although from september 2006 (one year from introduction) you have to give away your fingerprints to get one (although, according to info from the Police that issue the cards, the fingerprints will not be stored in a database, only on the card).
The card will also have a smart card chip that can be used to store digital certificates.
The only reason that the cards are introduced is so that Swedes shall be able to get Schengen compliant IDs.
That is difficult if you use assembly dumps in order to assist with debugging and performance optimisations.
That depends on your point of view, the Union has several exclusive areas in which the Union works on a federal level. Other areas are treated on a confederal level.
So, the Union do have the appearance of a single country in some areas; however in defence and foreign policy each state still have veto power.
This is of course a problem, even in the new constitution, but at least the constitution moves in the right way (e.g. mutual defence guarantees, more power to the EP and so forth).
The main problem with the ratification of the treaty is that in some countries, there will be referendums and in some there will be parliamentary votes. Having parliamentary votes in each state is as I see it OK, but not national referendums they are inherently undemocratic in this question and the only valid referendum as I can see it would be a joint European referendum.
Preferably, it would be a joint European referendum and parliamentary approval in order to guarantee both the peoples and the individual states influence in the question.
Having a referendum in each state is just plain wrong since this means that one Swede would be worth 7 Frenchmen, 2 Dutch or 0.5 Finns.
Sorry, for being a bit of topic...
In some aspects, yes, in the matter of free speech, then no.
From the ECHR:
Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers. This article shall not prevent States from requiring the licensing of broadcasting, television or cinema enterprises.
The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary.
Protection of morals... WTF!
This isn't standard, but i can give you this algorithm gratis, you have to put a file format on it to use it, and implement it in real code. JPEG is a bit more complex, and will give better image quality, but this is simple and definitely patent free since Fourier is dead since a hundred years or more.
comress_image(image, factor) begin
red_freq_comps = fft_2d(image.red)
green_freq_comps = fft_2d(image.green)
blue_freq_comps = fft_2d(image.blue)
red_comp_comps = throw_away_high_comps(red_freq_comps, factor)
green_comp_comps = throw_away_high_comps(green_freq_comps, factor)
blue_comp_comps = throw_away_high_comps(blue_freq_comps, factor)
return red_comp_comps, green_comp_comps, blue_comp_comps
end
The ISS has a lifeboat in the form of a Russian Soyuz TMA vehicle. Although, it only has place for three...
The hashes are used as authentication (challenge response?), nothing is being encrypted. States may however add encryption of sensitive data, if added (fingerprints, iris-scans etc).
The sixth power came from this (ICAO report on contactless IC's):
"Because inductive coupling decreases with the sixth order of distance, adjacent systems or other external noise sources are unlikely to adversely affect the reading operation "
Also FTFA:
"State Department contractors are looking to include some shielding, such as metal fibers in the passport cover, to keep the chips from being read when the passport is closed."
Theoretically yes.
On the other hand, if someone reads the key being sent, he will also read the response (i.e. the personal info). The thing is, if you try to record the radio signals at the border control, you will have interference from other RFID-chips and you will have to be close, so close that he can READ the passport data with your EYES.
Secondly, the device used for recording the transmissions will have to be quite bulky and power hungry to read any info from over a meter a way. Not something you carry in your hand-baggage.
This is exactly what is done, the key will be in the MRZ-zone on the photo page in the passport.
See my other post on this.
Since these chips are mandated by ICAO, he would only see: here is a guy with a passport or a ICAO-compliant national ID.
According to the ICAO standard states can chose to add an authentication scheme to the RFID-tag. This is what Sweden is dong, this is probably what the US is doing.
The authentication is based on the MRZ (Machine Readable Zone) in the passport (this is text that is read through OCR and not visible unless you open the passports photo page). The MRZ-data is hashed by SHA-1 and the high 32 bits of the hash is taken (this reduce the risk of someone computing the MRZ-data backwards (actually guessing) which MIGHT be possible if you have the hash and the basic structure of the MRZ-data). The hash is sent as an authentication code to the RFID-chip in the passport, if the hash is wrong the RFID responds with a "no valid authentication" message and refuse to send any data.
A state may decide to ignore such measures in their passports (but this is unlikely for the EU and the US). And such states have the option to include metallic jackets for the passport.
The range of the RFID transmission will be around 10 cm. IIRC it weakens with the power of 6 to the distance.
Further, it is not practical to have contact chips in a book-formed passport. It is more practical in ID-cards.
While I dislike this in general and would prefer a passport free world, try to avoid spreading untrue FUD about the technology being used, the data is secure and no person is going to get within 10 cm from your passport, and try an average of 2^31 different hashes without you noticing it. Of course, if the person manage to "borrow" your passport, he will use the MRZ to obtain the key, but in that case, he can take the passport to a photocopier as well (and that is probably cheaper).
It isn't actually that bad.
For absolute majority 367 votes of 732 is needed, this equates around 50.136612 %, not 70 as stated in the parent.
Four things can happen now:
1. The EP approves the Council's proposal. This ends the process and the proposal is made into law.
2. The EP approves the proposal but with amendments. The new proposal is then sent to the Council for a second reading. This requires absolute majority or 367 votes of 732. Before the Council's second reading the Commission is allowed to make a statement.
The Council's second reading can accept the EP's proposal with a qualified majority, or reject it. If it is rejected, the Council and EP must form a committee that consist of an equal number of representatives from the two bodies. If the committee agrees the proposal is sent to the EP and Commission for formal adoptation, if no agreement can be made the law is dead and can't be resurrected.
If the compromise goes to formal adoptation, the Council must approve the compromise with qualified majority, and the EP must approve it with a absolute majority. If either Council or EP fails to approve the compromise the law is dead. If both approves the compromise, it is made into law.
3. The EP rejects the proposal. This terminates all future attempts to pass this piece of legislation. This requires absolute majority or367 votes of 732.
4. The EP does not do anything within 3 months (+ 1 month possible as an extension). In this case, the Council's common position is treated as accepted and made law.
Personally I think it's about time we killed off the European Commision & European Parlimant entirely and moved to a US style two house system with directly elected officials. The rotating presidency should stay, though. That's actually one thing that works pretty well.
You want directly elected officials, but at the same time you want to dismantle the parlament!?!? We should build a system based on two houses, but we must keep the parlament as the representatives of the citizens of Europe. The body that must go is the council, a lawmaking body that is indirectly elected. The council should be replaced by a senate 1 or 2 senators per member state that are elected by general elections in each member state. The rotating presidency must go as well, the EU should have a president supported by the parlament and council.
Since, the story takes place in Sweden and Denmark, I suppose that Anglo-Saxon is the wrong language as well. It should be translated into Old Norse.
And, IMHO Old Norse is about the coolest sounding language ever (closely followed by Anglo-Saxon).
Yes, it is sort of like that. I do believe that it is illegal for them to do it (correct me if I'm wrong).
And many Europeans are always pissed on the Council and their undemocratic methods (they are not directly elected, but they have lawmaking power).
The thing is that ppl are complaining on the Council and the lack of democracy in the EU and at the same time, the same ppl are crying out loud on every attempt to move power from the Council to the Parlament (they are basically afraid of the superstate of Europe); however, a federal path for Europe is the only way to go for ensuring democratic legiticy for the EU.
(And of course the EP voted no to SW patents the last time)
Since break-even has been reached some 10 years ago in the Jet-reactor, this guy is on crack.
A few objections. Fusion does produce nuclear waste as you said, however we are talking about highly active waste with half life of around 150 years.
Fission produce waste with half life of around 150 000 years, that is a very long time, and the reason that the waste is a problem.
And there is also the problem of fuel supply. The uranium supply is expected to run out in 100 years, the supply of Li (from Earth) and He-3 (from Luna) will last for several thousands of years, the supply of Dt from the oceans is virtually limitless. And in theory, any material lighter than Fe can be used for fusion.
Thank you Apple. Having iChat fully Jabber-compatible will alone make me upgrade.
Psi wich I use at the moment has an awful interface.
Well, not being in the common currency has its drawbacks. You only have your selves to blame.
(For the record, I'm from Sweden so I don't have the advantages of the common currency neither. Although, I will move to the Netherlands in the fall...)
IIRC one of the main ideas with Galileo was to have precision, better than military GPS for civilian use, unaffected by US war-decisions.
The thing is that the civilian sector will use this added precision, and in some case civilians lives will depend on the higher precision. It is thus not possible to degrade Galileo, even in order to save european soldiers lives since degrading would kill civilians.
And by the way EU does not have a common army yet (although we will hopefully have one some day soon.)
I don't know where he got the information that a each execution would deter 10 murders. THIS IS NOT TRUE! At most it would prevent the killer from killing again.
Capital punishment have nothing to do with deterrence; capital punishment is about revenge.
While I do believe that there are some that have earned death for their crimes. It is simply not morally right of the state to kill its citizens! There have been enough innocents sent to their deaths to make any man shiver in horror; at least if a person is sent to prison you can right the wrong if he was wrongfully convicted, I wonder how the state would right the wrong if an innocent man was executed?
Luckily I live in the EU, so I don't have to deal with a government that kills its citizens.
This is not to say that negotiations always work, they don't. But I would say that it might be reasonable to negotiate a bit longer and sometimes give in if you at least believe that the other end have some sense of honour. In the mentioned example it is clear, now afterwards that Germany at the time dit not have any honour, but was it not worth a try?
Secondly, Europeans do not have neither "honor" or "dishonor" we have honour and dishonour.
Yes, that would be the one.
I think that the US did two big mistakes here.
Firstly, the French site is not a French suggestion, it is a European suggestion. Thus the US have not only insulted France, but also all the European allis of the US. That is the UK, Italy, Poland, Denmark, etc etc.
Secondly, there is no earthquake risk in the European site, there is in the Japanese, I do not believe it is wise to put such an expensive project on a place where it might be substantially damaged by nature.
Conclusions:
1) Diplomats and politicians are stupid.
2) The world would be a better place if scientists and engineers were in charge.