U.S. Passports to Receive Electronic Identification Chips
October 28th, 2005 | Published in Politics, Technology | 1 Comment
Another example of the government wasting money on technology: U.S. passports are going to have implanted RFID chips after October 2006. Even though 98.5% of the comments the government received opposed the new technology, they didn’t seem to care:
But in a federal filing, the department said that 98.5 percent of the 2,335 comments it received since it issued proposed rules last spring opposed the program.
Technology experts have said that the data on the chips, which will be read at a short distance by electronic devices in a passport-control booth, could be electronically intercepted and potentially misused.
Some privacy groups also fear that the chips could be a prelude to tracking individuals’ movements.
But hey, it’s hip technology, and they have to figure out a way to spend all those billions of dollars on something next year.
October 31st, 2005 at 2:55 pm (#)
Hey, why don’t they put those fancy chips in our luggage so when when we return from overseas the airlines actually know where our suitcases went.