 Everyone's got the NO2ID Blair Hitler story (image) so we've got a different story from NO2ID.
Two simple words sum up the casual indifference and arrogant ignorance of the Home Office when responding to Steve Boggan's feature in the Guardian G2, in which we demonstrated serious flaws in the security of the UK's new 'biometric' ePassports. Once the government gets a copy of your personal information, it seems not particularly to care who else can get hold of it.
Bureaucratic convenience trumps personal security and privacy yet again.
The assessment of EU information society 'Network of Excellence' FIDIS is rather more realistic and appropriate. Its recent Budapest declaration clearly states that "by failing to implement an appropriate security architecture" the UK and other European governments have "dramatically decreased [citizens'] security and privacy and increased risk of identity theft".
Even more surprisingly, the draft summary of a US Department of Homeland Security report says that RFID (the chip technology in the passport) "increases risks to personal privacy and security, with no commensurate benefit for performance or national security." This, from the very government that has halted implementation of RFID technology in its own passports, despite insisting that our government foist it upon us.
That the Home Office doesn't care about the privacy of British citizens is already quite clear - that it doesn't care about the security of your personal data (a photograph and D.O.B. now, in a year or so, your fingerprints and home address...) is a damning indictment of a dysfunctional department that wishes to be responsible for holding the master copy of ALL your most important identity information.
Some of the vulnerabilities have previously been demonstrated in other countries' passports - but, working with experts such as Adam Laurie of The Bunker and academics from Cambridge Computer Laboratory, NO2ID has now shown how terrorists, people traffickers and organised criminals could go about creating perfect digital copies of YOUR passport, without you even suspecting it had been stolen.
Our passport reader was created with little more than a soldering iron and a kitchen knife from cheap off-the-shelf components - and a paperclip. Using freely-available software he wrote based on the published ICAO standards, Adam was able to read the chip on a passport from 30 feet away, relaying the data through two walls.
This was just the beginning.
Watch the media and this site (NO2ID) for further graphic demonstrations - starting on Monday 20th November, when you will be able to see the reader software in action for the first time on television in Henry Porter's 'Suspect Nation' at 9pm on More 4.
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