more on more on RealID: How to become an unperson.

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: hadmut () danisch de
Date: July 8, 2005 11:45:40 AM EDT
To: Ted Dolotta <Ted () Dolotta ORG>
Cc: dave () farber net, "Perry E. Metzger" <perry () piermont com>,  
Benjamin Kuipers <kuipers () cs utexas edu>, cryptography () metzdowd com
Subject: Re: [IP] more on RealID: How to become an unperson.



Hi,

On Thu, Jul 07, 2005 at 06:38:15PM -0400, Ted Dolotta wrote:

> Had there been a "foolproof" National ID system in Poland in 1943, I
> wouldn't be around to write this e-mail.


But wouldn't it have been much more important to prevent the Nazi
regime itself? Can this all be driven down just to a 'foolproof ID
system'? Would you compare today's United States with Poland 1943?

Any kind of technology available today that hasn't been available in
1943 would have made things worse. Imagine the Nazis would have had
computers, surveillance cameras, fingerprint scanners like today's US
immigration officers, jet planes, atomic bombs, satellites, internet,
or imagine 1943's people would have had machine readable license
plates at their cars, credit cards, online reputation databases, and
things like that. Imagine the Nazis would have had RFID chips.

So with any kind of technology you could argue that things had been
worse if the Nazis had it. On the very same way you could argue that
today's government must not have weapons, phones, typewriters,
computers, jet planes, satellites, etc.

You are absolutely right in saying that we have to learn our lesson
from history, I fully agree with you. But in europe we draw different
conclusions. E.g. we do care more about freedom of press, and we do
see with anxiety what happens with the press under the current
administration.

We have ID cards, but we do care much more about data mining and
reliable communication.

When I am at IETF meetings about Spam fighting, or yesterday at a
Workshop against unwanted Traffic at MIT in Boston, I am shocked every
time how easily and thoughtless americans tend to install reputation
databases, store identities, and censor traffic. Yesterday I had to
comment several proposals such that it would be unlawful to do this in
Germany, because it violated our laws for protection of individuals
privacy or confidence in telecommunication. Most americans were
completely surprised by my concerns. They didn't think about that.

So from a european point of view it is quite difficult to understand
why the americans randomly pick a single technical detail - a simple
plastic ID card - as a symbol of the evil, while at the same time
they build an uncontrolable heap of databases about their people and
anyone else on the world. CIA, FBI, NSA, DHS have large databases and
collect everything the can get their hands on.

Did you know that it is the US government which urges airlines
to pass all informations about passengers to them? That they even want
to know which kind of food you were ordering? Whether you wanted
vegetarian, arabian, or kosher food? That they do ask libraries about
which books you are reading? That it is them who installed Echelon?
That it is the US government which urged european countries to invent
Passports with biometric RFID chips?

Shouldn't someone with your historic experience consider this as much
more dangerous than a simple ID card? Don't you already carry plenty
of your ID cards (spell: credit card, driving license, customer cards)
with you? What's the difference between those n cards and the n+1st
card?


You are demanding not to invent ID cards in the US, but at the same
time your government urgens my one to equip passports with biometric
RFID chips.

Until today, nobody ever asked me for my fingerprints in Germany, they
have never been in any database. Never ever.

Since last November, the US have taken my fingerprints three times,
and I do not have the slightest idea to which databases my
fingerprints have gone to.

My passport expires in August. When I will apply for a new one, I will
get one of those new ones with the fingerprint-RFID-Chip. It is just
because the US government demands this.

Isn't that ridiculous? While american citizens don't need an official
ID card at all, I am required to have a biometric passport. First and
second class humans?


BTW, the US government demanded RFID chips which anyone could read
out. So when I enter a shop, anyone would know that I am a german (and
maybe raise prices for me or things like that). Anyone could sit at
the airport with a notebook computer and generate lists of
travellers without their knowledge.

It was the german government and the german privacy laws who conviced
the US to have a crypto protection in the chip to limit access to
authorized entities only.

Think about that.

regards
Hadmut










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