Chips in official IDs raise fears of attacks on privacy!
SAN FRANCISCO, Kalifornia - July 12, 2009 - Climbing into his Volvo, outfitted with a Matrics antenna and a Motorola reader he'd bought on eBay for $190, Chris Paget cruised the streets of San Francisco with this objective: To read the identity cards of strangers, wirelessly, without ever leaving his car.
It took him 20 minutes to strike hacker's gold.
Zipping past Fisherman's Wharf, his scanner downloaded to his laptop the unique serial numbers of two pedestrians' electronic U.S. passport cards embedded with radio frequency identification (RFID) tags. Within an hour, he'd "skimmed" four more of the new, microchipped PASS cards from a distance of 20 feet.
Increasingly, government officials are promoting the chipping of identity documents as a 21st century application of technology that will help speed border crossings, safeguard credentials against counterfeiters, and keep terrorists from sneaking into the country.
But Paget's February experiment demonstrated something privacy advocates had feared for years: coupled with other technologies, RFID could make people trackable without their knowledge.
He filmed his heist and soon his video went viral on the web, intensifying a debate over a push by federal and state governments to put tracking technologies in identity documents, and over their potential to erode privacy.
Putting a traceable RFID in every pocket has the potential to make everybody a blip on someone's radar screen and to redefine Orwellian government snooping for the digital age.
"Little Brother," some are already calling it - even though elements of the global surveillance web they warn against exist only on drawing boards, neither generally available nor approved for use.
But with advances in tracking technologies coming at an ever-faster rate, critics say it won't be long before governments will be able to identify and track anyone in real time, 24/7, from a cafe in Paris to the shores of Kalifornia.
Ed. Note: What if I do not want to be tracked. What if I want my privacy? The government does not care what any of us want. If you care about your privacy and liberty, then you must REFUSE TO COMPLY with regulations that “chip” you. Do not apply for or accept a driver’s license. Microwave your passport to destroy its RFID chip. Be creative. This is your life. Revolution Now! Independence Forever!
It took him 20 minutes to strike hacker's gold.
Zipping past Fisherman's Wharf, his scanner downloaded to his laptop the unique serial numbers of two pedestrians' electronic U.S. passport cards embedded with radio frequency identification (RFID) tags. Within an hour, he'd "skimmed" four more of the new, microchipped PASS cards from a distance of 20 feet.
Increasingly, government officials are promoting the chipping of identity documents as a 21st century application of technology that will help speed border crossings, safeguard credentials against counterfeiters, and keep terrorists from sneaking into the country.
But Paget's February experiment demonstrated something privacy advocates had feared for years: coupled with other technologies, RFID could make people trackable without their knowledge.
He filmed his heist and soon his video went viral on the web, intensifying a debate over a push by federal and state governments to put tracking technologies in identity documents, and over their potential to erode privacy.
Putting a traceable RFID in every pocket has the potential to make everybody a blip on someone's radar screen and to redefine Orwellian government snooping for the digital age.
"Little Brother," some are already calling it - even though elements of the global surveillance web they warn against exist only on drawing boards, neither generally available nor approved for use.
But with advances in tracking technologies coming at an ever-faster rate, critics say it won't be long before governments will be able to identify and track anyone in real time, 24/7, from a cafe in Paris to the shores of Kalifornia.
Ed. Note: What if I do not want to be tracked. What if I want my privacy? The government does not care what any of us want. If you care about your privacy and liberty, then you must REFUSE TO COMPLY with regulations that “chip” you. Do not apply for or accept a driver’s license. Microwave your passport to destroy its RFID chip. Be creative. This is your life. Revolution Now! Independence Forever!
