Electronic Passport Problems
I’m renewing my passport for a trip to Asia later this year. Apparently, based on the countries I will be visiting, my passport’s expiration date has to be 6 months or later from my time of travel. I completed the passport renewal form (DS-82) and saw the following “Electronic Passport Statement”:
The U.S. Department of State will begin issuing a new type of passport containing an embedded electronic chip and called an “Electronic Passport”. The new passport will continue to be proof of the bearer’s United States citizenship and identity, and will look and function in the same way as a passport without a chip. The addition of an electronic chip in the back cover will enable the new passport to carry a duplicate electronic copy of all information from the data page. The new passport will be usable at all ports-of-entry, including those that do not yet have electronic chip readers. Use of the electronic format will provide the traveler the additional security protections inherent in chip technology. Moreover, when used at ports-of-entry equipped with electronic chip readers, the new passport will provide for faster clearance through some of the port-of-entry processes.
Issuance of this new passport will be phased in during an 18-month period. It is expected that by late-2006 nearly all U.S. passports will be issued in this new format.
For a brief moment, I thought how the adoption of technology was a good thing, until I got to the part about a duplicate electronic copy of the passport information. The first things that ran through my head are the all the privacy violation possibilities.
But then I read this:
The new passport will not require special handling or treatment, but like previous versions should be protected from extreme bending and from immersion in water.
Such a tempting suggestion.
The statement also makes the following claim:
The electronic chip must be read using specially formatted readers, and is not susceptible to unauthorized reading.
That’s quite a bold statement seeing that any sort of DRM has been broken in the past. It has always been a question of when it will happen.
Technology can be a good thing, but it also often introduces a whole new set of problems.
“Use of the electronic format will provide the traveler the additional security protections inherent in chip technology.”
I have read this statement a few times in the passport literature. Could we please have a list of just what these “additional security protections” of chip technology are? I understand there are *other* features that make chip technology attractive, but what in the hell are the inherent security protections?