RFID Technology, Privacy & Individual Liberties
The field of Radio-Frequency IDentification is rapidly expanding, with new applications being proposed for security, commercial distribution, and tracking of goods, information and individuals, on a constant basis. The US government has proposed requiring that all new passports carry RFID chips, either for efficiency, ease of use or for security, though none of these is clearly enhanced without a massive technological upgrade, across the world.
Standard RFID chips are “passive” at present, meaning they do not carry a power supply and “emit” information only when contacted and activated by a chip-reading device, at which point they emit a low-intensity radio signal readable at only a few feet or a few meters at most. The obvious security risk is that contact with the document itself (in the case of passports or ID cards) would not, in theory, be necessary, leaving hackers with a golden opportunity to get at information that would normally be readable only by direct contact, human eyesight or ink-pattern scanning technology (such as bar-codes).
So there is a serious question about whether RFID might actually increase the security risk inherent in personal identity documents, or put specific groups in jeopardy, if it can be discerned that their common RFID technology is detectable, no matter how secure. For instance, there are x number of Americans in that establishment, or people who have paid for such and such a special security pass. This is a serious concern and obviously must be resolved before the technology can be safely implemented for use by the general public.
But there are other privacy-related concerns as well: for instance, the same businesses that use RFID to track their inventory could adjust or enhance the technology to be able to interact with other objects in your home. For some people, this may be seen as beneficial, but the potential for aggregating mass amounts of intimate information about an individuals habits, possessions, and spending, poses new problems for how to secure that data and ensure against any potential misuse.
If RFID has any sort of viable (read: secure and with no negative impact on individual liberty or privacy) application, then it is likely that whole new sorts of information securing and management systems will need to be developed that give consumers enhanced control of all data related to themselves and their personal activities, that might filter its way out onto the world wide web, in one way or another, and the laws requiring protection of personal data are likely to become far more demanding and severe.
- Sentido.tv: “RFID TECHNOLOGY WILL BRING PERSONAL SPACE, TASTES UNDER CONSTANT SCRUTINY BY ANONYMOUS WATCHERS”
- Wired: “Microchips Everywhere: a Future Vision”
- Sentido.tv: “DATA SHADOWS & IMPROBABLE CONSENT”
jr3o @ February 7, 2008
In a controversial remark on the usefulness of biometric-loaded RFID-tagged national ID-cards, former UK prime minister Tony Blair said he envisioned the devices working as a tool to enable access to a wide range of services needed in the course of one’s daily life.
What he failed to note as he made the statement was the implied barrier the cards would set up: that in fact, instead of enhancing one’s access to the basic goods, services and spaces of everyday living, a nationwide mandatory system in which the cards become necessary to gain access, one is actually kept at a distance from the conveniences one needs to move easily through the daily grind of 21st century life.
Another important problem relates to the cards as a security measure: Microsoft warned the British government that the scheme as planned would likely lead to the largest boom in identity theft yet seen, as it would enable those with malicious intent to literally hack into unchangeable personal biological information, meaning that stolen ID information would be permanently useful, and therefore worth a lot more.
There is as yet no clear answer for how to solve the many security problems posed by electrifying the ID card process, but finding that solution is a near absolute necessity, for government, industry and the general public, if the free and open society is to continue serving our needs and safeguarding our rights as it currently does.
BIOMETRIC DEVICES MAY UNDERMINE INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY
AS GOVERNMENTS SCRAMBLE TO IMPLEMENT TECHNOLOGICALLY UNSTABLE, UNPROVEN SYSTEMS, INDIVIDUALS LIKELY TO SUFFER FRAUD, LIMITS ON MOVEMENT
26 October 2006
Sentido.tv :: In the wake of major terrorist attacks against densely populated civilian centers in several countries across Europe, Asia and America, governments and private industry are looking at ways of using biometric scanning technology to determine who should or should not have access to certain locations and services. The technology is complicated and highly advanced, but unproven, and potentially highly flawed.
There are concerns that RFID chips, which broadcast a weak but constant radio signal, could become a risk for irreversible identity theft. Irreversible, because if your iris-scan, fingerprints or genetic code are stolen off an electronic chip, it would be nearly impossible to correct flawed information generated by those posing as you.
But there are more ominous signs that the technology itself is planned not as a protection for the individual, but as a constraint on individual freedoms. UK prime minister Tony Blair declared in 2005 that he intended for a 13-element biometric national ID card to become the “single gateway” to everyday life, meaning that without it, you could be shut out of your own life, or made unequal to your fellow citizens, both in law and in practice. [Full Story]
[…] RFID —Radio Frequency IDentification— is one of the most controversial and well-debated new technologies whose implementation could both expand the scope of hyper-convergence in powerful ways and also subject the individual to unnecessary and ill-advised long-term risk of identity-theft or fraud. […]