[IP] New High-Tech Passports Raise Snooping Concerns
Begin forwarded message:
From: Bob Rosenberg <bob@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: November 26, 2004 6:06:58 AM EST
To: dave@xxxxxxxxxx
Subject: NYTimes: New High-Tech Passports Raise Snooping Concerns
Dave
IMHO, this NYT item deserves consideration for IP.
"This is like putting an invisible bull's-eye on Americans that can be
seen only
by the terrorists," said Barry Steinhardt, the director of the A.C.L.U.
Technology and Liberty Program. "If there's any nation in the world at
the
moment that could do without such a device, it is the United States."
Bob
--
Cordially,
Bob Rosenberg, Principal
R.G. Rosenberg & Assoc.
Public Policy Consulting & Advocacy and
eACE - eLearning Advocacy Civic Entrepreneur
P.O. Box 33023
Phoenix, AZ 85067-3023
LandLine: (602)274-3012
Mobile: (602)206-2856
bob@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
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New High-Tech Passports Raise Snooping Concerns
By MATTHEW L. WALD
Privacy advocates say that new passports that carry information about
the
traveler in a computer chip will be vulnerable to electronic snooping.
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/26/politics/26passport.html?th
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New High-Tech Passports Raise Snooping Concerns
By MATTHEW L. WALD
Published: November 26, 2004
ASHINGTON, Nov. 25 - The State Department will soon begin issuing
passports that
carry information about the traveler in a computer chip embedded in the
cardboard cover as well as on its printed pages.
Privacy advocates say the new format - developed in response to security
concerns after the Sept. 11 attacks - will be vulnerable to electronic
snooping
by anyone within several feet, a practice called skimming. Internal
State
Department documents, obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union
under the
Freedom of Information Act, show that Canada, Germany and Britain have
raised
the same concern.
"This is like putting an invisible bull's-eye on Americans that can be
seen only
by the terrorists," said Barry Steinhardt, the director of the A.C.L.U.
Technology and Liberty Program. "If there's any nation in the world at
the
moment that could do without such a device, it is the United States."
The organization wants the State Department to take security
precautions like
encrypting the data, so that even if it is downloaded by unauthorized
people,
it cannot be understood.
In a telephone interview, Frank E. Moss, deputy assistant secretary of
state for
passport services, said the skimming problem "can be dealt with."
"We are certainly still working hard on the question of whether
additional
security measures should be taken," he said.
The technology is familiar to the public in applications like highway
toll-collection systems and "smart cards" for entering buildings or
subway
turnstiles. In passports, the technology would be more sophisticated,
with a
computer having the ability to query the chip selectively for particular
information. The chip, expected to cost about $8, would hold 64
kilobytes of
data, the same as early personal computers.
Last month the Government Printing Office awarded $373,000 in contracts
to four
manufacturers to design the passports, which would contain chips that
stored
all the printed data on the passport, as well as digitized data on the
traveler's face.
At an airport immigration checkpoint, an antenna could read a passport
waved a
few inches away. A digital camera could look at the traveler's face and
compare
it with the data from the passport chip.
The problem, though, is that the passport might be read by others, too.
According to one document obtained by the A.C.L.U., a State Department
memo
from September detailing negotiations on the subject, the American
position is
that the data "should be able to be read by anyone who chooses to
invest in the
infrastructure to do so."
Mr. Steinhardt of the A.C.L.U. described a test in which a chip was
read from 30
feet away, but Mr. Moss of the State Department said that was in a
laboratory
and would be hard to duplicate in the field.
Government officials from the United States, Canada and western European
countries, and chip manufacturing experts, have been discussing
standards for
chips in passports for more than two years under the auspices of the
International Civil Aviation Organization, which is affiliated with the
United
Nations and promulgates a variety of standards for aviation. Mr.
Steinhardt
complained that the organization had ignored the civil liberties group's
request to participate in sessions when standards were discussed.
The State Department, which issues about seven million passports a
year, hopes
to begin issuing a limited number with chips early next year, initially
to
government employees.
To combat passport fraud and theft, the government will soon require all
visitors who do not need visas to enter the United States - those who
are
deemed low security risks because of the countries they come from - to
carry
passports that are machine-readable and contain "biometric" information
like
fingerprints or facial measurements.
Australia is already issuing passports with chips, and others will
follow soon,
Mr. Moss said. And since passport requirements are usually reciprocal,
the
United States anticipates that those countries will demand similar
features on
American passports.
Neville G. Pattinson, the director of business development, technology
and
government affairs at Axalto, one of the vendors, said the problem with
encryption was that the chip had to be readable by governments all over
the
world. But, he said, "there is a considerable concern over skimming."
The chips raise the possibility of someone "brushing against you with
the
equipment, in a briefcase or another disguise, and hoping they can read
it out
of your pocket or purse," Mr. Pattinson said. Another possibility is
someone
embedding a reader in a doorway, he said.
But he said low-cost fixes were available. One would incorporate a
layer of
metal foil into the cover of the passport so it could be read only when
opened.
Another would put a password into the printed information in the
passport. A
reader would optically scan for the password, which would be visible
only when
the passport was open, and then use it to obtain data from the chip.
Another possibility would be to keep the passport in a foil pouch, like
those
issued with highway toll-collection devices so they can be carried
through a
toll booth without being read. In multilateral discussions, though, some
experts said they feared that terrorists would use the pouches to
smuggle
weapons.
The A.C.L.U. is seeking to portray the new passports as part of a
continuing
loss of privacy.
In March, the A.C.L.U. and 12 other organizations from North America,
Europe and
Asia signed a letter to the aviation organization saying they were
"increasingly
concerned that the biometric travel document initiative is part and
parcel of a
larger surveillance infrastructure monitoring the movement of
individuals
globally."
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