Northwest Indiana Discussion

Northwest Indiana's Leading Discussion Forum
It is currently Thu Mar 28, 2024 3:40 am

All times are UTC - 6 hours




Post new topic Reply to topic  [ 20 posts ]  Go to page 1, 2  Next
Author Message
 Post subject: POSSIBLE ANSWER FOR FREETIME = Chips in official IDs raise p
PostPosted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 8:08 pm 
Offline
Senior Member
User avatar

Joined: Tue Nov 14, 2006 3:10 pm
Posts: 775
Location: The Region
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20090712/D99CRDAG0.html



Chips in official IDs raise privacy fears

Jul 12, 6:10 AM (ET)

By TODD LEWAN

(AP) In this April 10, 2009. photo, Chris Paget, a self-described "ethical hacker," sits in the back of...
Full Image



Google sponsored links
New U.S Passport - Need A Passport In Emergency? Get It The Same Day. Call Us Now!
http://www.SamedayPassport-Visa.com


Washington D.C. Passports - The Fastest Same Day Passport Service Available... Apply Online!
http://www.USPassportNow.com/Washin








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, or 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.


(AP) In this April 10, 2009. photo, Chris Paget, a self-described "ethical' hacker," sits with his...
Full Image


But Paget's February experiment demonstrated something privacy advocates had feared for years: That RFID, coupled with other technologies, 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 government, federal and state, 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, critics say, 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 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 could be able to identify and track anyone in real time, 24-7, from a cafe in Paris to the shores of California.


(AP) In this April 10, 2009. photo, Chris Paget, a self-described "ethical' hacker," sits with his...
Full Image


On June 1, it became mandatory for Americans entering the United States by land or sea from Canada, Mexico, Bermuda and the Caribbean to present identity documents embedded with RFID tags, though conventional passports remain valid until they expire.

Among new options are the chipped "e-passport," and the new, electronic PASS card - credit-card sized, with the bearer's digital photograph and a chip that can be scanned through a pocket, backpack or purse from 30 feet.

Alternatively, travelers can use "enhanced" driver's licenses embedded with RFID tags now being issued in some border states: Washington, Vermont, Michigan and New York. Texas and Arizona have entered into agreements with the federal government to offer chipped licenses, and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security has recommended expansion to non-border states. Kansas and Florida officials have received DHS briefings on the licenses, agency records show.
The purpose of using RFID is not to identify people, says Mary Ellen Callahan, the chief privacy officer at Homeland Security, but "to verify that the identification document holds valid information about you."

An RFID document that doubles as a U.S. travel credential "only makes it easier to pull the right record fast enough, to make sure that the border flows, and is operational" - even though a 2005 Government Accountability Office report found that government RFID readers often failed to detect travelers' tags.


(AP) In this April 9, 2009 photo, electronic readers and displays for NEXUS identification cards are...
Full Image


Critics warn that RFID-tagged identities will enable identity thieves and other criminals to commit "contactless" crimes against victims who won't immediately know they've been violated.

Neville Pattinson, vice president for government affairs at Gemalto, Inc., a major supplier of microchipped cards, is no RFID basher. He's a board member of the Smart Card Alliance, an RFID industry group, and is serving on the Department of Homeland Security's Data Privacy and Integrity Advisory Committee.

In a 2007 article published by a newsletter for privacy professionals, Pattinson called the chipped cards vulnerable "to attacks from hackers, identity thieves and possibly even terrorists."

RFID, he wrote, has a fundamental flaw: Each chip is built to faithfully transmit its unique identifier "in the clear, exposing the tag number to interception during the wireless communication."

Once a tag number is intercepted, "it is relatively easy to directly associate it with an individual," he says. "If this is done, then it is possible to make an entire set of movements posing as somebody else without that person's knowledge."


(AP) In this April 9, 2009 photo, U.S. Customs and Border Protection officer Victoria Stephens speaks...
Full Image


Echoing these concerns were the AeA - the lobbying association for technology firms - the Smart Card Alliance, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, the Business Travel Coalition, and the Association of Corporate Travel Executives.

Meanwhile, Homeland Security has been promoting broad use of RFID even though its own advisory committee on data integrity and privacy issued caveats. In its 2006 draft report, the committee concluded that RFID "increases risks to personal privacy and security, with no commensurate benefit for performance or national security," and recommended that "RFID be disfavored for identifying and tracking human beings."

For now, chipped PASS cards and enhanced driver's licenses are not yet widely deployed in the United States. To date, roughly 192,000 EDLs have been issued in Washington, Vermont, Michigan and New York.

But as more Americans carry them "you can bet that long-range tracking of people on a large scale will rise exponentially," says Paget, a self-described "ethical hacker" who works as an Internet security consultant.

But Gigi Zenk, a spokeswoman for the Washington state Department of Licensing, says Americans "aren't that concerned about the RFID" in a time when "tracking an individual is much easier through a cell phone."


(AP) In this April 9, 2009 photo, a driver holds up a NEXUS identification card at a border crossing...
Full Image


In the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks - and the finding that some terrorists entered the United States using phony passports - the State Department proposed mandating that Americans and foreign visitors carry "enhanced" passport booklets, with microchips embedded in the covers.

In February 2005, when the State Department asked for public comment, it got an outcry: Of the 2,335 comments received, 98.5 percent were negative, with 86 percent expressing security or privacy concerns, the department reported in an October 2005 notice in the Federal Register.

Identity theft and "fears that the U.S. Government or other governments would use the chip to track and censor, intimidate or otherwise control or harm them" were of "grave concern," it noted. Many Americans worried "that the information could be read at distances in excess of 10 feet."

Those citizens, it turns out, had cause.

According to department records obtained by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, under a Freedom of Information Act request and reviewed by the AP, discussion about security concerns with the e-passport occurred as early as January 2003 but tests weren't ordered until the department began receiving public criticism two years later.


(AP) In this May 28, 2009 photo, a new "enhanced" United States passport lies, at left, beside an...
Full Image


When the AP asked when testing was initiated, the State Department said only that "a battery of durability and electromagnetic tests were performed" by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, along with tests "to measure the ability of data on electronic passports to be surreptitiously skimmed or for communications with the chip reader to be eavesdropped," testing which "led to additional privacy controls being placed on U.S. electronic passports ... "

In 2005, the department incorporated metallic fibers into the e-passport's front cover, to reduce the read range, and added encryptions and a feature that required inspectors to optically scan the e-passport first for the chip to communicate wirelessly.

But what of concerns about the e-passport's read range?

In its October 2005 Federal Register notice, the State Department reassured Americans that the e-passport's chip would emit radio waves only within a 4-inch radius, making it tougher to hack.

But in May 2006, at the University of Tel Aviv, researchers directly skimmed an encrypted tag from several feet away. At the University of Cambridge in Britain, a student intercepted a transmission between an e-passport and a legitimate reader from 160 feet.

The State Department, according to its own records obtained under FOIA, was aware of the problem months before its Federal Register notice and more than a year before the e-passport was rolled out in August 2006.

"Do not claim that these chips can only be read at a distance of 10 cm (4 inches)," Frank Moss, deputy assistant Secretary of State for passport services, wrote in an April 22, 2005, e-mail to Randy Vanderhoof, executive director of the Smart Card Alliance. "That really has been proven to be wrong."

The chips could be skimmed from a yard away, he added - all a hacker would need to read e-passport numbers, say, in an elevator.

In February 2006, an encrypted Dutch e-passport was hacked on national television, and later, British e-passports were hacked. The State Department countered that European e-passports weren't as safe as their American counterparts because they lacked safety features such as the anti-skimming cover. Recent studies have shown, however, that more powerful readers can penetrate that metal sheathing.

The RFIDs in enhanced driver's licenses and PASS cards contain a silicon computer chip attached to a wire antenna, which transmits a unique identifier via radio waves when "awakened" by an electromagnetic reader.

The technology they use is designed to track products through the supply chain. These chips, known as EPCglobal Gen 2, are intended to release their data to any inquiring Gen 2 reader within a 30-foot radius.

The government says remotely readable ID cards transmit only RFID numbers, which correspond to records stored in secure government databases. Even if a hacker were to copy an RFID number onto a blank tag and place it into a counterfeit ID, officials say, the forger's face still wouldn't match the true cardholder's photo in the database.

Still, computer experts say government databases can be hacked. Others worry about a day when hackers might deploy readers at "chokepoints," such as checkout lines, skim RFID numbers from people's driver's licenses, then pair those numbers to personal data skimmed from chipped credit cards (though credit cards are harder to skim). They imagine stalkers skimming RFID tags to track their targets, and fear government agents compiling chip numbers at peace rallies, mosques or gun shows, simply by strolling through a crowd with a reader.

Others worry more about the linking of chips with other identification methods, including biometric technologies, such as facial recognition.

Should biometrics be coupled with RFID, "governments will have, for the first time in history, the means to identify, monitor and track citizens anywhere in the world in real time," says Mark Lerner, spokesman for the Constitutional Alliance, a network of nonprofit groups, lawmakers and citizens opposed to remotely readable identity and travel documents.

The International Civil Aviation Organization, the U.N. agency that sets global standards for passports, now calls for facial recognition in all e-passports.

_________________

When the government fears the People, that is Liberty.
When the People fear the Government, that is tyranny."
~ Thomas Jefferson
...................................
HOW TO FIX 2011 - REPEAT 1776


Top
 Profile  
 
 Post subject: Re: POSSIBLE ANSWER FOR FREETIME = Chips in official IDs raise p
PostPosted: Mon Jul 13, 2009 7:16 am 
Offline
Senior Member
User avatar

Joined: Thu Aug 07, 2008 2:20 pm
Posts: 3039
Location: Hammond
I plan on microwaving mine, if it has a chip. :twisted: My drivers lisence has to be renewed in December of this year.

Martha, do you know if Indiana has the chipped lisences, as yet?


Top
 Profile  
 
 Post subject: Re: POSSIBLE ANSWER FOR FREETIME = Chips in official IDs raise p
PostPosted: Mon Jul 13, 2009 2:30 pm 
Offline
Senior Member
User avatar

Joined: Tue Nov 14, 2006 4:17 pm
Posts: 3800
Tiger1 wrote:
I plan on microwaving mine, if it has a chip. :twisted: My drivers lisence has to be renewed in December of this year.

Martha, do you know if Indiana has the chipped lisences, as yet?

Interesting glimpse of the wingnut thought process. The signal that cell phones transmit already broadcasts your location every 60 seconds, which is far more intrusive than a RFID chip.
However, in wingnut world apparently you just ignore that fact and disable the security feature built into the new license, making it invalid.

_________________
In the end, everything will be OK. If it's not OK, it's not the end.


Top
 Profile  
 
 Post subject: Re: POSSIBLE ANSWER FOR FREETIME = Chips in official IDs raise p
PostPosted: Mon Jul 13, 2009 5:50 pm 
Offline
Senior Member
User avatar

Joined: Tue Nov 14, 2006 3:10 pm
Posts: 775
Location: The Region
well I have researched it some. and have not seen where Indiana is going to use a enhanced" driver's licenses embedded with RFID tags.
But someone told me (I can't prove it) that Indiana
will be using a enchanced license plate soon. But again, can't prove it.

Sorry, I'm not much help.
...................................................................

Tiger1 wrote:
I plan on microwaving mine, if it has a chip. :twisted: My drivers lisence has to be renewed in December of this year.

Martha, do you know if Indiana has the chipped lisences, as yet?

_________________

When the government fears the People, that is Liberty.
When the People fear the Government, that is tyranny."
~ Thomas Jefferson
...................................
HOW TO FIX 2011 - REPEAT 1776


Top
 Profile  
 
 Post subject: Re: POSSIBLE ANSWER FOR FREETIME = Chips in official IDs raise p
PostPosted: Mon Jul 13, 2009 7:27 pm 
Offline
Senior Member
User avatar

Joined: Fri Sep 29, 2006 3:08 pm
Posts: 9164
Location: Hammond
Thanks for your help and interest in this subject, Martha.
I know info is not easy to come by.
I hope eceryone can see the threat these chips pose to our privacy.

_________________
"The truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth."

_________________


Top
 Profile  
 
 Post subject: Re: POSSIBLE ANSWER FOR FREETIME = Chips in official IDs raise p
PostPosted: Tue Jul 14, 2009 5:28 am 
Offline
Senior Member
User avatar

Joined: Tue Nov 14, 2006 4:17 pm
Posts: 3800
Modern technology continues to to improve our lives. Used correctly, RFID chips will allow police to solve crimes and prevent terrorist attacks, which is the purpose of placing the chips in ID's. One of the basic functions of government is to protect it's citizens. I'm glad to see our government is taking steps to make us more secure.

_________________
In the end, everything will be OK. If it's not OK, it's not the end.


Top
 Profile  
 
 Post subject: Re: POSSIBLE ANSWER FOR FREETIME = Chips in official IDs raise p
PostPosted: Tue Jul 14, 2009 6:14 am 
Offline
Senior Member
User avatar

Joined: Fri Sep 29, 2006 3:08 pm
Posts: 9164
Location: Hammond
I don't want to be tracked by RFID chip. I'll take my chances on "terrorists" and stay off the government radar.

_________________
"The truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth."

_________________


Top
 Profile  
 
 Post subject: Re: POSSIBLE ANSWER FOR FREETIME = Chips in official IDs raise p
PostPosted: Tue Jul 14, 2009 6:25 am 
Offline
Senior Member
User avatar

Joined: Tue Nov 14, 2006 4:17 pm
Posts: 3800
freetime wrote:
I don't want to be tracked by RFID chip. I'll take my chances on "terrorists" and stay off the government radar.

You're already being tracked by the signals your cell phones broadcasts to the nearest cell tower. I wonder what the families of the victims of the 9/11 attacks think about the way our government is using technology to make our country safer?

_________________
In the end, everything will be OK. If it's not OK, it's not the end.


Top
 Profile  
 
 Post subject: Re: POSSIBLE ANSWER FOR FREETIME = Chips in official IDs raise p
PostPosted: Tue Jul 14, 2009 7:39 am 
Offline
Senior Member
User avatar

Joined: Sun Jan 06, 2008 11:23 am
Posts: 1641
sparks wrote:
Modern technology continues to to improve our lives. Used correctly, RFID chips will allow police to solve crimes and prevent terrorist attacks, which is the purpose of placing the chips in ID's. One of the basic functions of government is to protect it's citizens. I'm glad to see our government is taking steps to make us more secure.
Just what we don't need...more government.

_________________
My sole purpose in life is to be an example for others not to follow.


Top
 Profile  
 
 Post subject: Re: POSSIBLE ANSWER FOR FREETIME = Chips in official IDs raise p
PostPosted: Tue Jul 14, 2009 9:03 am 
Offline
Senior Member
User avatar

Joined: Fri Sep 29, 2006 3:08 pm
Posts: 9164
Location: Hammond
We sure don't need to give the government-and anyone else with the proper scanner-a way of tracking our every move!
That's one reason I don't have, and never will, an I=Pass in my car.

_________________
"The truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth."

_________________


Top
 Profile  
 
 Post subject: Re: POSSIBLE ANSWER FOR FREETIME = Chips in official IDs raise p
PostPosted: Tue Jul 14, 2009 12:42 pm 
Offline
Senior Member

Joined: Mon Aug 11, 2008 10:32 am
Posts: 3789
sparks wrote:
Modern technology continues to to improve our lives. Used correctly, RFID chips will allow police to solve crimes and prevent terrorist attacks, which is the purpose of placing the chips in ID's. One of the basic functions of government is to protect it's citizens. I'm glad to see our government is taking steps to make us more secure.


Based on your above post, I will have to assume that you were perfectly OK with eavesdropping on phone calls by the Bush administration, so long as one half of the call originated outside of the U.S. That process, after all, was implemented to prevent terrorist attacks, as you claim this one will. But whereas the former was primarily designed to spy on the foreign half of the communication, this new plan, which you apparently love, will target U.S. citizens, and only U.S. citizens.
So, if I understand you correctly, you are A-OK with both procedures, correct?

_________________
“It’s very rare that I come to an event where I’m like the fifth- or sixth-most interesting person.”

Barack Obama


Top
 Profile  
 
 Post subject: Re: POSSIBLE ANSWER FOR FREETIME = Chips in official IDs raise p
PostPosted: Tue Jul 14, 2009 3:32 pm 
Offline
Banned

Joined: Tue Feb 24, 2009 1:09 pm
Posts: 643
happy jack wrote:
sparks wrote:
Modern technology continues to to improve our lives. Used correctly, RFID chips will allow police to solve crimes and prevent terrorist attacks, which is the purpose of placing the chips in ID's. One of the basic functions of government is to protect it's citizens. I'm glad to see our government is taking steps to make us more secure.


Based on your above post, I will have to assume that you were perfectly OK with eavesdropping on phone calls by the Bush administration, so long as one half of the call originated outside of the U.S. That process, after all, was implemented to prevent terrorist attacks, as you claim this one will. But whereas the former was primarily designed to spy on the foreign half of the communication, this new plan, which you apparently love, will target U.S. citizens, and only U.S. citizens.
So, if I understand you correctly, you are A-OK with both procedures, correct?


Well done jack.....we all know that squirts was a card carrying member of the "Bush is stealing our freedoms" club.


Top
 Profile  
 
 Post subject: Re: POSSIBLE ANSWER FOR FREETIME = Chips in official IDs raise p
PostPosted: Tue Jul 14, 2009 4:16 pm 
Offline
Senior Member
User avatar

Joined: Tue Nov 14, 2006 4:17 pm
Posts: 3800
happy jack wrote:
sparks wrote:
Modern technology continues to to improve our lives. Used correctly, RFID chips will allow police to solve crimes and prevent terrorist attacks, which is the purpose of placing the chips in ID's. One of the basic functions of government is to protect it's citizens. I'm glad to see our government is taking steps to make us more secure.


Based on your above post, I will have to assume that you were perfectly OK with eavesdropping on phone calls by the Bush administration, so long as one half of the call originated outside of the U.S. That process, after all, was implemented to prevent terrorist attacks, as you claim this one will. But whereas the former was primarily designed to spy on the foreign half of the communication, this new plan, which you apparently love, will target U.S. citizens, and only U.S. citizens.
So, if I understand you correctly, you are A-OK with both procedures, correct?

Placing RFID chips in driver's licenses and passports has nothing to do with wiretapping. The purpose of using this technology is to make it more difficult for terrorists or criminals to obtain false ID's. RFID chips don't target US citizens,they add another layer of security
for US citizens. Judging by the tone of your post,you really have your shorts in a bunch over this issue. It must be hard to spend your days cowering in fear over some imaginary threat you feel our government is trying to perpetrate against you. Listen to that wingnut stuff long enough and you might end up like this guy

_________________
In the end, everything will be OK. If it's not OK, it's not the end.


Top
 Profile  
 
 Post subject: Re: POSSIBLE ANSWER FOR FREETIME = Chips in official IDs raise p
PostPosted: Tue Jul 14, 2009 7:44 pm 
Offline
Senior Member
User avatar

Joined: Sat Aug 16, 2008 8:13 am
Posts: 475
The chips will be imbedded in AMERICAN drivers lisences, yes? The target is the American citizen, not the illegal alien who is on our roads with a foreign lisence, if any at all. 1984-George Orwell was a prophet.

_________________
Evil triumphs when good men do nothing.-Winston Churchill


Top
 Profile  
 
 Post subject: Re: POSSIBLE ANSWER FOR FREETIME = Chips in official IDs raise p
PostPosted: Tue Jul 14, 2009 9:13 pm 
Offline
Senior Member

Joined: Fri Aug 15, 2008 7:24 am
Posts: 2529
sparks wrote:
Placing RFID chips in driver's licenses and passports has nothing to do with wiretapping. The purpose of using this technology is to make it more difficult for terrorists or criminals to obtain false ID's. RFID chips don't target US citizens,they add another layer of security
for US citizens. Judging by the tone of your post,you really have your shorts in a bunch over this issue. It must be hard to spend your days cowering in fear over some imaginary threat you feel our government is trying to perpetrate against you. Listen to that wingnut stuff long enough and you might end up like this guy


Whatever their intentions, these are not the brightest kids on the block when it comes to security. RFID is easily hacked and identity thieves are exploiting the technology on an every day basis. Now only can they use receivers to gain access to my credit card information, but now they can get my address, my DOB, my DL number and more off of my RFID tagged Drivers License to complete my information. Lets add my SS# off my passport ... And they can just open new accounts left and right.

The security of RFID is just not there yet, and the government requiring it is putting my information at risk. Already RFID credit cards, transit cards, and passports have been hacked.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090711/ap_on_bi_ge/us_chipping_america_iv

Quote:
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 detected, then downloaded to his laptop, the unique serial numbers of two pedestrians' electronic U.S. passport cards embedded with radio frequency identification, or RFID, tags. Within an hour, he'd "skimmed" the identifiers of four more of the new, microchipped PASS cards from a distance of 20 feet.

Embedding identity documents — passports, drivers licenses, and the like — with RFID chips is a no-brainer to government officials. Increasingly, they are promoting it 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: That RFID, coupled with other technologies, could make people trackable without their knowledge or consent.


But then again ..... it's nothing that a hammer can't be used to disable .......

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/15.01/start.html?pg=9

Quote:
4) The best approach? Hammer time. Hitting the chip with a blunt, hard object should disable it. A nonworking RFID doesn’t invalidate the passport, so you can still use it.

_________________
In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act. --George Orwell

"None are so hopelessly enslaved as those who falsely believe they are free." Johann Wolfgang von Goethe


Top
 Profile  
 
Display posts from previous:  Sort by  
Post new topic Reply to topic  [ 20 posts ]  Go to page 1, 2  Next

All times are UTC - 6 hours


Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 4 guests


You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum

Search for:
Powered by phpBB © 2000, 2002, 2005, 2007 phpBB Group