Brits to get RFID-chipped license plates
posted Aug 9th 2005 9:15AM
The UK Department for Transport just gave the go-ahead for a trial of new, RFID-enabled license plates aimed to make
vehicles trackable in Britain. Unlike passive RFID which only transmits over short distances, the e-Plate licenses use
active RFID technology to transmit vehicle identification numbers and other data to readers over 300 feet away. Not
surprisingly, US officials will be monitoring the trial closely with an eye toward bringing mandatory RFID-tagged
plates to the States. Active RFID is currently in limited usage on US roadways, where the Department of Homeland
Security is issuing RFID tags to foreign freight and passenger vehicles as they enter the country. Privacy advocates
cringe in horror at the thought of RFID license plates being used as backdoor surveillance tools, while proponents
argue, predictably, that active RFID will help, you know, save the world from terrorism.
[Via textually]
How are these the same/ different from the E-passes used on some toll roads? And my bet is that the TXponders used on the 417 in ORL read our minds
heh
this makes me want to smash my monitor
So we have the RFID plate mailed to us, then get a fake plate(assuming they make it look different than our current) and continue as usual. What are they going to do? Audit you for staying home too much?
This is all assuming it actually makes it to the states.(Which means we'll be using them b4 Duke Nukem Forever hits but right after Team Fortress 2 :) )
Look out, the thought police are coming...
"The man who would choose security over freedom deserves neither." - Thomas Jefferson
Sigh. I'm sure that I'm preaching to the choir here, but the preponderance of available, but unimportant, data is exactly why intelligence fails. Until such time as we can tell what data is IMPORTANT, it won't matter what kind of data is gathered: Relevance in much more important than detail.
It won't work with number plates thats for sure. I work for halfords part-time and number plates are hand made (and we make quite a few) other places machine print them. The DVLA would have to make all of them if this ever came into action, at the moe we just register information for them. RFID Tax discs would be more feesable!
Maybe George Orwell was right.....
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety" - Ben Franklin
I wonder what our founding fathers would say today...
And to respond to Malfoy: I hope that they never make it here to the states, but at the rate our government is violating our privacy, I wouldn't be surprised
horror ! if they ever to this i will kill the chip / block the signal. Rfid can be read by everyone .
I think developments like these are very dangerous. What is the purpose of the government knowing my whereabouts? why should they be able to see when i drove down the highway to pick up my daughter from child support? I think freedom is the most desirable aspect of our modern society, and it's just that what is compromised by measurements like these. let them invest in making transportation more environment friendly, and supporting alternative means of fuel like fuelcells, instead of creating a seemingly safe feeling by monitoring our every move.
I think it's a great idea. It's much more efficient than having to stop each person and ask to see their papers. /sarcasm
Wouldn't taping a penny over the RFID chip interfere with its signal generation/processing?
"What is the purpose of the government knowing my whereabouts?"
Revenue generation. You think red light cameras are bad? Just wait till you get an RFID reader speeding ticket for doing 66 in a 65 zone...hey, yu can't complain, you WERE braking the law!
Is there any possible way to stop this from actually happening?
This is ridiculous, first road charging with a black box in your car tracking you and your speed and now RFID number plates. They'll probably want to charge us a stupid amount to have them fitted aswell.
Evidently the driver wasn't "braking"...
I really love how the government is somehow unable to balance the budget or come up with a good exit strategy for Iraq (dont start with me, I'm a Marine, and I was there, I have a right to criticize), yet somehow they keep finding more ways to watch every move I make and all in the name of the neverending "war on freedom"...excuse me, "terrorism"....you know, here we are "spreading freedom across the globe", yet somehow were turning the "land of the free" into a police state. Im moving somewhere else. Fu*k this country.
Travis, dude, the article was from England! It's happening there, not here. Calm down, you don't need to leave the country (although, by your reaction, don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.)
I doubt that it will happen here. Yes, we have I-Pass/ EZ-Pass style toll tags that can track you, but they're voluntary.
BTW, there is no constitutional right to privacy. Its not an inalienable right. If you want a right to privacy, you need to elect politicians that support that right and who will not make laws that violate that right.
I also agree that this is all about revenue. Track where people go, and you can tax them based on their mileage, the times that they drive (charge a premium during rush hour), tickets for speeding and blowing red lights, etc.
It is the taxman's wet dream.
I think it will come here and it will be "sold" to us with positive notes: helps police track criminals and terrorists, reducing drug trafficing, reduces car theft, helps with AMBER alerts (abducted kids), improves traffic planning (they can tell what route people are taking from where), etc. Heck, maybe they'll even throw in a reduction in gas taxes to make the gas prices look lower and instead charge by road usage. Rarely will a government ever say they want to track you.
But realistically, knowing this technology may be in use, would a terrorist follow all the rules and use an RFID car? Machine gun toting criminals don't get their guns from gun shops either. Key word here = criminal.
It's all about the tax revenue.
I just got my car stolen today, so I'd love to have one of these in my car.
"BTW, there is no constitutional right to privacy. Its not an inalienable right. If you want a right to privacy, you need to elect politicians that support that right and who will not make laws that violate that right."
No, just a right to freedom of association, protection against unwarranted searches, and the guarantee of equal protection under the law, all for which privacy is a necessary and inextricable component.
Last I checked, you don't have a specifically enumerated right not to get shot in the face while excercising your first amendment right to free speech. It's just sort of assumed.
There most certainly is a constitutionally protected right to privacy (rights are inherent and can never be granted). Privacy is protected by the First, Third, Fourth, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendments. And even beyond that, remember the Ninth Amendment: "The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."
The Supreme Court has explicitly protected privacy in NAACP v. Alabama, 357 U.S. 449 (1958); Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965); Tehan v. Shott, 382 U.S. 406 (1966); Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347 (1967); and Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973)--look them up (http://www.findlaw.com/casecode/supreme.html). Any attempt by U.S. legislators to require RFID plates should run afoul of the Fourth Amendment, if the Supreme Court has any spine left. At least for state citizens... federal citizens (citizens of the United States) are, as usual, under the complete control of Congress and out of luck.
Hey, thanks for stating the obvious there Buzzcut, I couldnt tell it was happening in the UK by reading the article huh. And privacy may not be an inalienable right, but liberty is, and liberty is defined as "The condition of being free from restriction or control". Now I realize that there are certain controls that are necessary to allow a free society to function properly. HOWEVER todays government is seriously abusing those rights. I think Ben Franklin said it best:
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
Hello Patriot Act.
Not only is this a taxman's wet dream, it's a technologists wet dream! Think of all the fun to be had playing around with these systems and finding their flaws.
It'll be fun while it lasts, which probably won't be too long. I'm not sure about Britain, but here in the U.S. the local governments can barely run the Department of Motor Vehicles, which use technology from the 80's. How they'll ever mange all this new stuff and stay up-to-date against the latest explloits (high-tech and low-tech exploits) while avoiding bankrupting the government coffers is beyond me.
oh, and by the way, buzzcut, when friends of yours give their lives for an almost pointless (oil) war, you get a little cynical about the gov't. they couldnt spend the money to put armor on the hummers, but they could sure as hell spend it on research for mini-nukes...thats just what we need.
It will come here. And not soon enough; it will make Los Angeles livable again by enabling peak pricing of rush-hour travel. It worked in London; it will work here.
And as for your privacy, as the head of Sun Microsystems said, "You never had it anyway; get over it."
Hey Paul,
Why don't you help our local government in L.A. to invest in something useful like decent public transportion and city planning that makes sense? Most of the traffic problems in L.A. stem from politicians allowing unchecked growth before devising and implementing a decent traffic flow system (something that your tax dollars are already supposed to be paying for.)
Once the workarounds get out about this RFID system to the general public the only people that are going to pay this "peak-pricing" are people that want to. Then L.A. will need to enact new laws making it illegal to circumvent the system and these law will ahve to be enforced by humans which will raise the price of this failed system even more.
There are already several ways to cheat traffic light cameras. An RFID system will be a piece of cake. Most of the hacks will probably be low-tech, like the traffic camera hacks.
The only people that benefit from systems like this are the people that are selling them. You may see some short-term benefits, but in the long run it's a money pit.
Why not invest in something sustainable and useful, like public transportation?
Travis, dude, I was just in AM General's R&D shop last week. They're working on up armoring the Hummer, its their top priority (higher than diesel emissions controls, my business, unfortunately for me).
If you are really a Marine, you know that the Hummer was never supposed to be a frontline vehicle, thus the canvas doors. You also know how long it takes to get shit done in the bureacracy.
And you undoubtably know that as the armor gets added, the bombs get bigger. You saw what happened to the amphibious assault vehicle last week. No Hummer, armored or not, would have survived that bomb.
Not everything can be forseen in war. Situations change, and it takes time to react to change.
BTW, your buds are going to hate the uparmored Hummer. It's curb weight is 9800 lbs. (up from 6000 lbs.) and the 6.5L still only makes 190hp. The power to weight ratio is pathetic. Also, the GVWR is only 12k lbs. What weapons do you suggest that your buds leave back at base, because you can hardly take 4 guys and their packs at 12k?
"Sustainable public transportation" is like Communism: perfect in theory, but entirely incompatible with human nature.
People don't want to take buses, plain and simple. Even sitting in traffic is a better use of American's time than waiting for a bus.
Peak pricing is extremely controversial. The libs will say that the rich are just buyiung uncongested roads at the expense of the poor.
I wouldn't say that London's experience is exaclty flawless. I heard that the pricing worked TOO WELL, the congestion fell to the point where they were not making enough money off of the scheme, and they actually raised the rate as a result.
Are there a lot of people out there hacking red light cameras? I see ads in the back of Car and Driver for sprays and plate covers that claim to work, but I'm skeptical. Any testimonials?
Not all hummers have or HAD canvas doors. There were plenty of hummers that had metal doors long before IEDs were a concern. True, it was still not armor by any means, but they were metal.
Im just saying lets do what we can. Not everyone who has died would have benefitted from the armor, but some would have, and some is always better then none.
Talk about tangents...
the bottom line is, Im against these constant invasions of privacy whether they be current or forthcoming...
"I just got my car stolen today, so I'd love to have one of these in my car."
I believe the first thing any halfway competent thief would do is pull the power for the RFID or just rip it out completely.
Buzzcut,
Public transportation may incompatible with your human nature, but it definitely is compatible with mine and 1,500,000 other daily riders in the Chicago area (not to mention otehr cities in the US that are comparable with LA in size.) Either way you win. If you lived in Chicago to take advantage of it then there would be that many less drivers on the road for you to deal with. I have no idea why you wouldn't be in favor of that. Instead you choose to pay peak-pricing for use of roads that you already pay taxes for?
As for the low-tech hack for red-light cameras, I've heard that it works. They did a "consumer report" type thing on a local news station here and put it through a bunch of tests and they claimed that it worked. I've also read the same from review sites online. I guess you'd have to try it for yourself and run some tests on it. I'd do that, but I don't really have the motivation to do so since I use public transportation and cabs.
While this may be a scam, but one fact remains true: All technology has definable patterns that can be assessed over time. These patterns always reveal flaws, either in the hardware itself or the user of the hardware. All it takes is time and patience and hopefully access to the hardware in question, which is usually not a problem given the fact that the seller wants to make a sale and social engineering is usually fairly easy with people that want to sell something. My favorite examples are slot machines, but this concept really appliies to all machines.
You folks just don't know what's good for you. If everyone knows they'll be instantly identified when doing something wrong. People will think twice about doing wrong. I think it's a great idea. If you run a red light, the sensors in the ground will trigger and read your id then send you a ticket. I think it could be expanded to RFID people. The world would be much safer, things would run more smoothly. Relax, your government is in control. The more government does to help us and keep us safe I am for.