RFID passports less useful to machines too...

EPIC: "A document obtained by EPIC from the State Department reveals that 2004 government tests found passports with radio frequency identification (RFID) chips that are read 27% to 43% less successfully than the previous Machine Readable Zone technology (two lines of text printed at the bottom of the first page of a passport)."

"Recent reports by the Department of Homeland Security Data Privacy and Integrity Advisory Committee and European experts also recommend against the use of RFID tags in identity documents."


Not particularly surprising on the face of it. What is surprising is that in spite of the above reports (even within DHA), we're all marching headlong into requirements for a fundamentally flawed and insecure system in the name of theater. Blech.


(link via Schneier)