Passport RFIDs cloned wholesale by $250 eBay auction spree. "Using inexpensive off-the-shelf components, an information security expert has built a mobile platform that can clone large numbers of the unique electronic identifiers used in US passport cards and next generation drivers licenses.
The $250 proof-of-concept device - which researcher Chris Paget built in his spare time - operates out of his vehicle and contains everything needed to sniff and then clone RFID, or radio frequency identification, tags. During a recent 20-minute drive in downtown San Francisco, it successfully copied the RFID tags of two passport cards without the knowledge of their owners."
[Via]
posted by homunculus
on Feb 3, 2009 -
24 comments
New "Hi - tech" passport cracked. Standards for the new passports were set by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (
ICAO) in 2003 and adopted by the waiver countries and the US. The UK Home Office has adopted a very high encryption technology called
3DES - that is, to a military-level data-encryption standard times three. However they used non-secret information actually published in the passport to create a 'secret key'. That is the equivalent of installing a solid steel front door to your house and then putting the key under the mat.
posted by adamvasco
on Nov 17, 2006 -
53 comments
Poignant Passports. At the beginning of the 20th century Hawaii sugar plantation owners began to recruit laborers of European background. Perhaps as many as 2,000 Russians and Ukrainians came to Hawaii. After the February Revolution in Petrograd some of these Russians were repatriated.
[more inside]
posted by tellurian
on Sep 13, 2005 -
2 comments
Heartless response An American couple survived while diving off Thailand during the tsunami. Because they had lost all their possessions, they had to have new passports issued. At the Bangkok airport other governments had set up booths to assist their citizens. The couple searched there for officials from the American consulate for three hours, before finding them in the VIP lounge. Oh, and
U.S. officials demanded payment before taking any passport pictures.
posted by fleener
on Dec 29, 2004 -
166 comments
After all the hoopla about increasing security, it seems that the requirement for biometric data to be included in passports of those entering the US from visa waiver countries will need to be
extended for two years to allow other countries to
catch up with the technology, as it seems most countries are
unable to meet the deadline. Some countries have put
on hold the new technology, while others seem committed to
going ahead with it, despite
doubts about the readiness of the technology. Of course, if civil liberties groups
get their way, the biometric passports may never see the
light of day. Specific religious issues
complicate the matter to some extent, also.
Given that, if the technology to produce biometric passports is available, will it really be that hard for forged passports to be created? Unless a massive world-wide database containing the biometric details of every person was used for data-matching, it is hard to see how these new measures will really make much difference to anyone apart from the companies selling the technology.
posted by dg
on Apr 26, 2004 -
4 comments
The Passport: the next step in its evolution may include
invisible information encoded into your mug shot, but if you are wondering where it all began, the Canadian
passport office identifies one Nehemiah of Persia, ca. 450 BC, as candidate for very first passport holder.
Some think that it was all downhill from there. Regardless, there might be very good
reasons for getting more than one passport, which you can do
legally, or
less so.
Lenin had a fake passport. So did
Hitler, though he didn't know it. (More inside.)
posted by taz
on Aug 10, 2002 -
5 comments
