Roll credits and move on...-g-
When it get's really bad you'll be able to get implanted at the post office most likely. -ng-
Wonder how Tom Ridge is doing with his new business?
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Tom Ridge joins RFID firm Savi Tech
Posted on April 7th, 2005 by Clay McCarter
Savi Technology could gain an edge over its rivals in the lucrative Homeland Security market with the appointment of Tom Ridge, Former US Homeland Security secretary to its board of directors.
Ridge Says RFID Boosts Security
Mark Baard Email 04.12.05 | 2:00 AM
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CHICAGO -- Tom Ridge, the first secretary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, this week told the manufacturers and users of radio-frequency identification technologies that their work will protect Americans from terrorism.
It will also make inventory tracking more efficient for retailers like Wal-Mart and their thousands of suppliers, he said.
"That's one of the beautiful things about RFID," said Ridge. "It's another security measure embedded in the U.S. economy."
Ridge, who recently left his job as DHS chief, ushered the department through several RFID pilot programs, including programs that use tags to secure shipping containers from tampering, and those that use both RFID and biometrics to track workers entering secure airport facilities.
Ridge recently joined the board of Savi Technology, an RFID contractor for the DHS.
Some observers of RFID technology development are worried by Ridge's support for RFID technologies for tracking people.
At a conference in Chicago that brought together RFID tag manufacturers, software developers and freight-shipping managers, Ridge declared that "biometrics and RFID will make us safer."
Ridge called a recent test of RFID to identify passengers and cargo "an enormous success."
Ridge also said the government can be trusted to safeguard the personal data it gathers from RFID tags.
"We struggle with privacy a lot," said Ridge. "But with political and private-sector oversight (and digital firewall technologies), we can limit access to the data."
But Homeland Security may be moving too quickly to adopt RFID, especially as a tool in ID documents, said Jim Harper, director of information studies at the libertarian think tank the Cato Institute.
The market for RFID technology is overheating, said Harper.
"There is an RFID bubble under way," said Harper, "and the government is right there with it, even though there is no proven ROI (in terms of intelligence gathering) for using it. I just hope the bubble bursts early in homeland security for the use of RFID for people monitoring."
Harper also edits the free-market, pro-technology, privacy policy website Privacilla. He is a member of the DHS' recently formed Data Privacy and Integrity Advisory Committee.
Harper said businesses like Wal-Mart and government agencies like the U.S. Department of Defense should be allowed to use RFID to improve the tracking of goods in their massive supply chains. "That's where RFID seems to work," said Harper. "That's the wheelhouse of the technology."
But asked whether the Homeland Security Department should be allowed to carry out its plan to embed RFID chips in passports, Harper said, "No."
"It's unacceptable," said Harper. "In the U.S., it's a non-starter politically. And I'll do everything in my power to stop it from happening."
But the government does have legitimate reasons for tracking individuals with RFID, said Marc Roberti, editor of RFID Journal, which hosted the conference where Ridge spoke.
"Combined with biometrics and using encryption," said Roberti, "RFID can be faster and much more secure than mag stripes," referring to the magnetic strips found on the backs of many ID, credit and bank cards today.
While mag stripes can be easily copied, said Roberti, RFID chips are substantially more secure from such tampering.
DHS is using a type of RFID technology for which data encryption is an option.
That's why Roberti is puzzled by Homeland Security's refusal to use encryption on its new passport, nicknamed the e-passport, in order to ensure that RFID readers worldwide can read it.
Without encryption, many engineers believe the e-passport, for which the department is already soliciting bids from RFID suppliers, will be easily accessed by unauthorized individuals with RFID reader devices.
"That makes no sense," said Roberti. "The standard (to which the chips in the e-passport are expected to comply) is a universal standard. I really have no idea why they are not using encryption." |
