Hi-tech Cassandras foresee trouble with ID cards

Labour's ID card scheme could be an expensive way of creating new security problems - and that's according to people likely to benefit from it, writes Mark Tran

Friday October 21, 2005

Technology companies stand to benefit from the government's plans for a national identity card - but they have turned out to be the unexpected Cassandras of the scheme.

A growing number of hi-tech firms say that far from improving security or cutting down fraud, the cards could actually create security risks. The warning comes as the government's contentious ID cards bill this week cleared the Commons - albeit with the government's majority slashed to its lowest margin since the election.

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"A national ID card for the UK is overly ambitious, extremely expensive and will not be a panacea against terrorism or fraud, although it will make a company like mine very happy," said Roberto Tavano, a biometrics specialist for Unisys, a US technology company that has worked on national identity schemes in South Africa and Malaysia.

Unisys, a company with experience in producing ID cards, is expected to be among the companies bidding for tenders if the government gets its way on ID cards in parliament, yet it is critical of the scheme. And it is not alone.

Earlier this week, Microsoft warned that the ID card posed a huge security risk that could increase the likelihood of confidential personal information falling into the hands of hackers and criminals.

Jerry Fishenden, national technology officer of Microsoft UK, told the website silicon.com: "I have concerns with the current architecture and the way it looks at aggregating so much personal information and biometrics in a single place.

"There are better ways of doing this. Even the biometrics industry says it is better to have biometrics stored locally."

While Microsoft underlined the allure of confidential information to criminals, Unisys has pointed to the technological hurdles. Unisys says a central database would be out of date as soon as it was set up and would be hugely expensive to update. [...]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/economicdispatch/story/0,12498,1597733,00.html

And yet, in spite of all of this, twenty five people was all it took to decide that the entire country should be subjected to this nonsense. Not twenty five nor twenty five thousand should have the right to enslave a single human being simply because they held a ballot.

Some have questioned why we republish explicit images of war

Some have questioned why we republish explicit, even gruesome, images of wartime violence. One only need look back to World War II when most images of dead soldiers were censored by the government, and no cameras were allowed on the battlefield. Such whitewashing of the truth is at odds with the First Amendment freedoms that this country enjoys. These soldiers fought to preserve our freedoms, and the truth has a way of coming out. As Time Magazine said when it published the first wartime casualty photos of 3 dead soldiers on a beach in New Guinea being washed up in the tide:

"Dead men have indeed died in vain if live men refuse to look at them."

We agree.

-NowThatsFuckedUp.com

Snake's Oil

During the 1980s two-thirds of Somalia was divided among Conoco, Amoco, Chevron and Philips oil. Thanks to pro-US military dictator Mohamed Siad Barre. Between 1977 and 1989 the US supported Barre at $100 million a year for economic and military aid. Barre was overthrown in January 1991.

Daddy Bush, then VP was on hand to officially open the Texas-based Hunt Oil Corporation's refinery in Yemen in April 1986. In his speech, which concluded a 10-day Middle East tour, Bush stressed “the growing strategic importance to the West of developing crude oil sources in the region." (Boy Bush also smiles at Texas Hunt Oil, appointing James Oberwetter as Saudi ambassador.)

As usual, when the locals finally tossed out the US dictator, the US entered to bring democracy, freedom, peace, and stability - yawn. Hollywood and the media glamorized the Daddy Bush fiasco with "Blackhawk Down" and portrayed Somalis as murdering Black warlords incapable of running their own country and too stupid to accept US and UN kindness. Another quest for oil sold as a humanitarian relief mission to feed the hungry, who starve thanks to US and its dictators (famines are government related, not due to drought, etc). A bungled Bushcapade becomes an American war story with heroes. Body count 18 us, 1000 them. And Clinton can take the blame since he called off the quest. (Blackhawk Down, from uber producer Jerry Bruckheimer, who seems to produce much of our heartwarming propaganda these days.)


UN Peacekeepers in Somalia, roasting a child.

As the oil grab under the guise of feeding the poor didn't work we now have the Brussels-based International Crisis Group (think tank) providing cover and warning Somalia is "a logistic centre for al-Qaeda." The consequences are serious, since the terrorists are still at large thanks to the protection given to them by ordinary Somalis, the ICG report concludes. Boy Bush froze assets November 2001 of Al-Barakaat Bank, Mogadishu; through which 80 percent of Somalis receive funds from family members working outside Somalia. Breathtaking isn't it that the US knew in less than 60 days after 9/11 where gobs of terrorists banked but can't trace anthrax letters or those 9/11 put options on stocks?

Since "them" ordinary Somalis wouldn't accept US empire with rice packets from Daddy Bush, "them" will have to be killed as terrorists in the "Struggle Against Violent Extremism." Step right up, buy it here. Benevolent oily white folks have to SAVE the world, again and again. [...]

This shameful farce isn't even victor's justice. It is a Soviet show trial. Because he was removed unjustly, Saddam Hussein is still the rightful ruler of Iraq. We had no right to invade Iraq, no right to continue occupying Iraq and no right to put the leader of a sovereign nation on trial. His alleged crimes are irrelevant. We cannot arbitrarily invade countries and try their leaders.
Tom, Cambridge [...]

"Have you ever been a judge before?" Saddam said. [...]

Amid some verbal sparring with the judge, the former Iraqi leader stated: "I preserve my constitutional rights as the president of Iraq. I do not recognise the body that has authorised you and I don't recognise this aggression. [...]

The process, which is known as promession, has been developed in Sweden and aims to address the shortage of burial spaces and reduce the mercury pollution created by dental fillings during cremation.

The Scottish Executive said last night that promession could be considered in its current review of burial and cremation legislation, after councillors in England revealed they were looking at adopting the procedure.

It involves freezing the coffin and body to -18C before lowering them into liquid nitrogen at -196C, which leaves them extremely brittle.

A vibrating pad is used to reduce the remains to a powder and a magnetic field then removes all traces of mercury and other metal residues from fillings or hip replacements.

The remains are then put into a biodegradable coffin made from vegetable matter and buried in a shallow grave, where they will be absorbed into the earth within six to 12 months.

Loved ones could plant a tree or shrub on top of the grave, to absorb nutrients from the remains, supporters of the promession system suggest.

The cost of the process is expected to be similar to that for a cremation - around one-third of the price of a grave plot and traditional burial. [...]

"Since it would not be covered by cremation law, I don't see why it shouldn't happen, as long as it is not offending against public health or local government regulations. Sooner or later we're going to have to stop burying people because all the space will be taken up. [...]

Clarke pledges ID card data will be limited
to information on passports

Alan Travis Home affairs editor
Tuesday October 18, 2005
The Guardian

The home secretary, Charles Clarke, will today guarantee that the personal
details contained on the national identity card will not go beyond those
currently held on passports.   He is to announce that he will write the
guarantee into the legislation which passes through its final stages in the
Commons today.

The bill specifies that only name, date and place of birth, gender,
address, nationality and immigration status can be recorded on the ID
database. To guard against "function creep" the home secretary has promised
that fresh primary legislation will have to be introduced if extra personal
details such as health records, criminal records or other background
information were to be added.

The guarantee will even extend to a ban on the inclusion of any numbers
that could lead to sensitive personal details being disclosed.
These include a personal code for the police national computer or an NHS
number which might enable a cross-check to be made with medical records.

Mr Clarke will also promise that everyone will be able to access their
entry on the national ID card database and see which organisations had been
verifying their identity.

At the same time ministers will table new government amendments to ensure
that those who access the national ID cards register will not be able to
tell who has a criminal record logged on the police national computer.

The home secretary is also to announce new powers to punish those who
tamper with the cards during their manufacture...

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/homeaffairs/story/0,11026,1594645,00.html

Mr Clarke will also promise that everyone will be able to access their
entry on the national ID card database and see which organisations had
been verifying their identity.

The guarantee will even extend to a ban on the inclusion of any numbers
that could lead to sensitive personal details being disclosed.

...home secretary has promised that fresh primary legislation will have
to be introduced if extra personal details such as health records,
 criminal records or other background information were to be added.

Key points
• Microsoft warned the scheme could generate a massive amount of ID fraud
• There may be a Commons rebellion over whether the bill should get a 3rd reading
• It is proposed the ID cards will carry 13 personal identifiers, such as iris scans and finger prints

Key quote
"Unlike other forms of information, such as credit card details, if core biometric details such as your fingerprints are compromised, it is not going to be possible to provide you with new ones," - Mr Fishenden, national technology officer for Microsoft

Story in full THE government's case for identity cards has been dealt a serious blow on the day of a crucial Commons vote after the software giant Microsoft warned that the proposals could generate "massive identity fraud" on a scale as yet unseen.[...]