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Privacy Villain of the Week:Your driver's license!
Josey1
Member Posts: 9,598 ✭✭
Privacy Villain of the Week:
Your driver's license!
Take your driver's license out of your wallet and flip it over. Does it have a magnetic strip on the back, like a credit card? A bar code, like you might find on a supermarket product? About 40 states now have one or the other, and it won't be long before the rest do. What's going on here?
What's going on is that governments are embedding your personal information in digital form on the back of your driver's license -- often more information than is carried in analog format on the front. Your Social Security Number, for instance. It is indeed a good thing many states now deem it permissible for you to have a number printed on your license other than your SSN, your friendly neighborhood universal identifier and all-purpose identity fraud enabler. But it's still on there -- all you need is the right kind of tool to see it.
And such tools are becoming increasingly common. A number of products, from companies such as Logix Co., Intelli-check, can read the information off of the back of the card with a simple swipe. And it's not just state troopers at traffic stops buying the scanners -- bars, liquor stores, convenience stores and night clubs are getting in on the act more and more. Often the information gleaned from the digital government ID is stored for future use.
These scanner vendors recently sought to assuage consumer concerns by telling CNN that "They can be set so that only bits of information come up, not everything that's on the license." Which begs the question -- what else is on there? (And how easy is it to hack the scanners so that they do show everything?)
One hint of how much might be on your license was in a New York Times report back in March wherein we learned, "Police departments have called bars to see if certain names and Social Security numbers show up on their customer lists." Some police apparently prefer to go the real time route -- DC police have handheld units they take into bars to scan IDs they compel patrons to produce on demand.
There should be little surprise that The New York Times also reports that the impetus behind the digitalization of our identities was provided by our 'friends' at the AAMVA, the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators. The DMV bureaucrats' trade association wants your magnetic strip to contain biometric data encoding your fingerprints or eyescans -- data which also would be in a nationally-linked database.
As the situation now stands, governments have enabled the tracking of your movements and purchases, left license holders open to identity fraud, and many bureaucrats are determined to exacerbate the situation by encoding more and more personal data and larger and more networked databases. It's enough to leave consumers asking if they're carrying around a Privacy Villain in their back pocket.
The Privacy Villain of the Week and Privacy Hero of the Month are projects of the National Consumer Coalition's Privacy Group. Privacy Villain audio features now available from FCF News on Demand. For more information on the NCC Privacy Group, see www.nccprivacy.org or contact James Plummer at 202-467-5809 or via email.
http://nccprivacy.org/handv/020919villain.htm
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Your driver's license!
Take your driver's license out of your wallet and flip it over. Does it have a magnetic strip on the back, like a credit card? A bar code, like you might find on a supermarket product? About 40 states now have one or the other, and it won't be long before the rest do. What's going on here?
What's going on is that governments are embedding your personal information in digital form on the back of your driver's license -- often more information than is carried in analog format on the front. Your Social Security Number, for instance. It is indeed a good thing many states now deem it permissible for you to have a number printed on your license other than your SSN, your friendly neighborhood universal identifier and all-purpose identity fraud enabler. But it's still on there -- all you need is the right kind of tool to see it.
And such tools are becoming increasingly common. A number of products, from companies such as Logix Co., Intelli-check, can read the information off of the back of the card with a simple swipe. And it's not just state troopers at traffic stops buying the scanners -- bars, liquor stores, convenience stores and night clubs are getting in on the act more and more. Often the information gleaned from the digital government ID is stored for future use.
These scanner vendors recently sought to assuage consumer concerns by telling CNN that "They can be set so that only bits of information come up, not everything that's on the license." Which begs the question -- what else is on there? (And how easy is it to hack the scanners so that they do show everything?)
One hint of how much might be on your license was in a New York Times report back in March wherein we learned, "Police departments have called bars to see if certain names and Social Security numbers show up on their customer lists." Some police apparently prefer to go the real time route -- DC police have handheld units they take into bars to scan IDs they compel patrons to produce on demand.
There should be little surprise that The New York Times also reports that the impetus behind the digitalization of our identities was provided by our 'friends' at the AAMVA, the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators. The DMV bureaucrats' trade association wants your magnetic strip to contain biometric data encoding your fingerprints or eyescans -- data which also would be in a nationally-linked database.
As the situation now stands, governments have enabled the tracking of your movements and purchases, left license holders open to identity fraud, and many bureaucrats are determined to exacerbate the situation by encoding more and more personal data and larger and more networked databases. It's enough to leave consumers asking if they're carrying around a Privacy Villain in their back pocket.
The Privacy Villain of the Week and Privacy Hero of the Month are projects of the National Consumer Coalition's Privacy Group. Privacy Villain audio features now available from FCF News on Demand. For more information on the NCC Privacy Group, see www.nccprivacy.org or contact James Plummer at 202-467-5809 or via email.
http://nccprivacy.org/handv/020919villain.htm
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Comments
By MATTHEW ROY, The Virginian-Pilot
c September 19, 2002
NORFOLK -- Smile when you dump that old refrigerator in some out-of-the-way city lot.
You just might be on camera.
The city has purchased two all-weather surveillance cameras and will install them within weeks at spots popular with illegal dumpers.
City staffers have seen just about everything abandoned in lots: a sailboat with no mast, washing machines, construction debris, plain old garbage.
But the dumpers, who seem to favor dawn and dusk for quickly unloading truckloads of trash, are seldom caught in the act, said Scott Whitehurst.
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He's an environmental specialist with Norfolk's Department of Public Works Division of Environmental Storm Water Management, which cleaned up roughly 300 dump sites last year at a cost of more than $100,000.
The new equipment will capture images of furtive dumpers, providing a means to prosecute them.
Dumping trash can cause problems with odors, rodents and disease, said Sharon C. Harris, a public information specialist with the department.
One camera records in color and one in black and white -- more ideal for low-light conditions, Whitehurst said. They are sturdy and likely will be mounted on poles. The system cost nearly $10,000, he said.
Whitehurst declined to identify where the city will target dumpers. Still, he said, signs might be posted noting areas are under surveillance.
Those who dump face up to a year in jail and a $2,500 fine.
Norfolk isn't the first to try the approach.
In Kentucky, the state Natural Resources and Environmental Protection Cabinet has found the devices to be a deterrent, spokesman Mark York said.
``We've had excellent success,'' he said, adding that it's hard for those caught with their license plate and face on camera to dispute the offense. Cameras in Kentucky also reportedly have captured parked lovebirds. York dismissed that as ``more of a humorous item.''
Asked about privacy concerns, Harris said cameras are intended to capture dumping. ``My thinking is, it'll be focused on the site itself -- whoever's on that vacant lot,'' she said. She also said, ``Those people coming to areas and dumping are there to commit a crime.''
Mihir Kshirsagar, a policy analyst with the Washington-based Electronic Privacy Information Center, an organization devoted to civil liberties issues and protecting privacy, said it seemed ``crazy'' to resort to watching people with cameras to prevent dumping. He said the public should debate how the recordings would be treated and protected.
Reach Matthew Roy at mroy@pilotonline.com or 446-2540
http://www.pilotonline.com/news/nw0919dum.html
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
John
I might not always tell you the truth, but I will never lie to you!