http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/ Engadget Comments for http://www.engadget.com/media/feedlogo.gif http://www.engadget.com en-us Copyright 2008 Weblogs, Inc. The contents of this feed are available for non-commercial use only. Blogsmith http://www.blogsmith.com/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/Mar 13th 2006 3:05PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/Mar 13th 2006 3:16PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/Mar 13th 2006 3:16PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/Mar 13th 2006 3:21PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/
You'd have all the data capacity (and then some) of the RFID system, with none of the security risks of unauthorized people scanning and keeping the information).]]>Mar 13th 2006 3:21PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/
Any information as to why the government has chosen to ignore the fact that the information on these can be taken by someone inclined to do so? ]]>Mar 13th 2006 3:23PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/
Identity theft through the airwaves. Gah.]]>Mar 13th 2006 3:39PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/
So they're rolling these out in October. That means if I applied for one now, I'd still get a non-RFID insecure crap passport, right? I suggest any other Americans reading this do the same. I don't know if the applications ask your reason for requestion a passport, but if so be absolutely sure to mention that you're only applying for a passport because you want to get one before they roll out RFID. Mention that RFIS passports are an insecure system that allows any idiot with a receiver and the right software to commit identity theft without even touching his target. It probably won't accomplish anything, but goddammit it's as subversive as we're allowed to be without going to prison.]]>Mar 13th 2006 3:44PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/
The USA intelligence agencies run off index cards - they don't share information. And if they did, it wouldn't matter how the info is scanned into the system, as others have pointed out. That's the kind of crap the uninformed congressman believe though, so they sign off on it.
]]>Mar 13th 2006 3:58PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/
Stupid decision, but at least it's easy and cheap to protect. It's just like making a duct tape wallet with aluminum sandwiched in the middle to protect RFID cards.

Oh well.]]>Mar 13th 2006 4:19PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/Mar 13th 2006 4:37PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/
And as far as "biometric data" stored in the chip, all of the same info is already stored on the inside front cover, in the form of your picture, height, weight, etc. This won't enable the black helicopters to find you any faster when you buy a copy of _Catcher in the Rye_.]]>Mar 13th 2006 4:43PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/Mar 13th 2006 4:54PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/ Anybody ever read '1984'?

Anybody ever read, "My Life and the Roundhouse" by Chuck Norris. Greatest. Book. Ever.]]>Mar 13th 2006 4:59PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/Mar 13th 2006 5:01PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/Mar 13th 2006 5:09PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/I could see That this could be a fast way of identifing who you are.

But How safe is the rfid?
I'm not gonna get a passport until they proove that it's safe and no one can steal your identity.]]>Mar 13th 2006 5:17PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/Jul 19th 2007 3:55PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/
Uh, Amex Blue is now using RFID. As reported right here: http://www.engadget.com/2005/06/07/amex-to-include-rfid-in-all-new-blue-cards/

My Amex Blue has a patently obvious RFID chip in it, considering the damn card is transparent. I'm now in the market for a tinfoil wallet to carry it around.

Luckily, I just got my new US passport a month or so ago. So ten more years before I have to get a new one, by which time the entire immigration system will have collapsed as all the passports issued since the RFID chip is introduced get hacked and duplicated by terrorists and drug smugglers.
]]>Mar 13th 2006 5:29PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/
My bad... I didn't kow that they started adding them (last June, so I'm not too far off). I was referring to the original chip they added when they first introduced the card.]]>Mar 13th 2006 5:48PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/Mar 13th 2006 5:55PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/Mar 13th 2006 6:01PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/Mar 13th 2006 6:12PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/Mar 13th 2006 6:19PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/Mar 13th 2006 6:34PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/
herd of sheep. http://www.rfidetail.com

get it sheeple]]>Mar 13th 2006 7:01PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/Mar 13th 2006 8:02PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/
1. Microwave it
2. Demagnitize it with a tape demag.
3. Zap it with a stun gun.
4. Carry your passport in an EMI box
]]>Mar 13th 2006 8:34PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/
If we lockdown the database, so that only certain IPs with matched MACs that have a secure link to transfer said license plate number to track someone down, I.E. someone kidnapped, we make our world safer.

If you don't want someone tracking you down, don't do anything illegal. Which is basically steal, kill and basically destructive things without a permit :)

NO ONE is special. I'm not special, you're not special. Get over it. There are six billion people in the world, no one is after you, unless you pissed them off. And if the chip was in that person the authorities could make sure they stay away from you.

Face it, if someone was hell bent on getting your personal information, they CAN get it. If they are clever enough, there is already WAY more than enough tech gadgets out there to help steal information and if someone is good at social engineering, garnering private information is even easier.

So how about we stop saying, "RFID is bad and bad only!" When we should be saying, "RFID is good and bad, let's think of a way where we secure it in a way, that if the info is taken and unencrypted, it is useless."

This is basically like P2P apps with big companies. The best way to deliver digital media is through IP. No one doubts this and we forced it on them. Now with RFIDs, we have the potential to stop crime altogether, aside for a maniac that knows he will be caught, and everyone is TRYING as hard as they can to stop that. Look at the BIG GLARING good that RFID can bring about and lets try to stop the BIG GLARING bad that can happen.

There are ways, don't be so lazy.]]>Mar 14th 2006 2:29AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/
Yes. What a brilliant idea. To paraphrase a very famous quote:

When they come for the Jews, say nothing because you are not a Jew. And so on: then who will be left speak for you?

This kind of blind trust in Authority is exactly the cause of many problems in this world. We must never forget that the people who have Authority are, in fact, people. As such, they are falliable, infinitely falliable, and their faults are made all the mroe dangerous because they believe they have no faults. After all, they have Authority and Authority is always right.

To say that you are safe just because you have done nothing wrong is to display the worst kind of historical ignorance. In 1970, Ruben Salazar, when told that police were about to enter the bar he was in and begin shooting, replied, "That's impossible; we're not doing anything." Seconds later, he was shot in the head with a tear gas grenade and killed.

Innocence is NOT protection.]]>Mar 14th 2006 5:44AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/
"If you don't want someone tracking you down, don't do anything illegal. Which is basically steal, kill and basically destructive things without a permit :)"

As, true, for now that makes sense. But what if our western governments start openly pursuing a more confined environment, and more and more things become outlawed or 'evil'.

Freedom of speech is such a big thing, yet have you noticed that basically, it's only those topics which are allowed that we're free to voice. And more and more, it seems - not to point fingers - but that it's the morally weaker areas that are lauded as needed freeing, and those where morals are upheld that are being consistently shut down.

Aren't we, as a western civilisation following blindly those who promise to lead us to freedom, where in reality, we are being blinded by "the light of freedom" and fail to see we are being led further and further towards the darkness of forced security (because terrorism is so 'rife' and the world is out to get us}. It is a false sense of security when one hides behind walls. True freedom comes when we embrace the wild. but we are all too lazy, too disparate, to engulfed by the lie to enpower change.

so let them bring RFID, and whatever other "security enhancing" (read privacy destroying) technology, for we will accept it like the silent sheep we are.]]>Mar 14th 2006 5:53AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/
Dont worry yourself with RFID people, just trust your government. Go about your lifes and make money and let the people in charge keep you safe and make life easier. Soon RFID wont be so chilling once you get used to it. They just want to keep terrorists out and keep you SAFE.

Now im going to go watch tv and not think about this.


]]>Mar 14th 2006 6:09AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/
And that nr. can be used to track what y'r doing. If RFID gets everywhere like in shops, 'They' can see which stores you enter, leave etc. The is nr can be read without having to break encryption. It's like having an ID nr tattoo'ed on y'r forehead (The Nazi's tattoo'ed a nr. on your arm).

And don't be fooled by the promise that they can only be read from a small distance. RFID uses power which is sent by the reader, so an advanced reader radiating more power could read your tag currently from 10 meters away.

RFID's are BAD!!!

It's okay to track inventory, but it should keep clear of humans. Let homelandsecurity or whatever agency your country uses do their work instead of sitting behind a computer screen trying to monitor everyone.

]]>Mar 14th 2006 6:59AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.difrwear.com ... ]]>Mar 14th 2006 5:04PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/
How do you protect from a persons will? No document or technology is going to flag a person that has the desire to cause harm.

All of the 9/11 terrorists had 100% legal documentation and the next group will all have legal RFID chips in whatever the government comes up with.

Giving up freedoms for the honest people is not and will never be the way to protect anyone, it only allows more control for the greedy.
]]>Mar 15th 2006 11:36AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/13/us-issues-first-rfid-passports/
www.theregister.com/2006/03/15/rfid_tags_infected_by_virus/]]>Mar 15th 2006 5:59PM