RFID passports:

[Earth_First]

Question. When does this take effect? Secondly. Does 'zapping' your passport in the microwave render the RFID technology useless?

Thanks in advance!

[rockedthevoteinMA]

1. I think it takes effect at the beginning of 2006. eom

[7th_Sephiroth]

2. RFID chips are nothing more

than 4 or 5 magnetic strips laying on top of eachother that form a circut that releases a faint radio signature

[el_gato]

4. and?

I honestly don't want to walk around issueing a faint radio signal with all of my personal information on it.

[Earth_First]

5. Exactly.

Plain and simple. I am up to nothing more than living a responsible life and nothing more. I am not associated with any sort of criminal activity, domestic or international. I do not need my information stored electronically one way or another.

RFID passports is a step in the wrong direction, friend.

[7th_Sephiroth]

7. there is no info recorded to the signal itself

i dont think

[LifeDuringWartime]

3. as funny as it sounds,

keeping the passport wrapped in tinfoil might prevent the signal from being broadcasted

[AllegroRondo]

6. Its a passive system, it doesnt broadcast

the RFID tags for passport use dont have a battery and dont broadcast. They have to be within a few feet of the reader in order to give any information.

The ones that DO broadcast have to have a battery installed, and are about the size of a pack of cigarettes. Way too big for passport use.

[Angry Girl]

8. Yup, tin foil will work

http://www.jsonline.com/bym/tech/news/jan05/289738.asp

One rudimentary way to protect electronic passports from identity thieves is to wrap them in tinfoil, which blocks radio waves. A single size Doritos bag would do the trick. Protecting border control agents' readers with a metal shield would protect against eavesdropping.

http://www.iht.com/articles/541711.html

Proponents of the system claim that the chips can be read only from within a distance of a few centimeters, so there is no potential for abuse. This is a spectacularly naïve claim. All wireless protocols can work at much longer ranges than specified. In tests, RFID chips have been read by receivers 20 meters away. Improvements in technology are inevitable.
...
The Bush administration is deliberately choosing a less secure technology without justification. If there were a good offsetting reason to choose that technology over a contact chip, then the choice might make sense.

Unfortunately, there is only one possible reason: The administration wants surreptitious access themselves. It wants to be able to identify people in crowds. It wants to surreptitiously pick out the Americans, and pick out the foreigners. It wants to do the very thing that it insists, despite demonstrations to the contrary, can't be done.

Normally I am very careful before I ascribe such sinister motives to a government agency. Incompetence is the norm, and malevolence is much rarer. But this seems like a clear case of the Bush administration putting its own interests above the security and privacy of its citizens, and then lying about it.

[annabanana]

9. good to know............................n/t