Washington to pass RFID spying law
Washington state is scheduled to pass House Bill 1031 (pdf) , making it a class C felony to skim personal data from RFID cards and documents.
A person that intentionally scans another person’s identification device remotely, without that person’s prior knowledge and prior consent, for the purpose of fraud, identity theft, or for any other illegal purpose, shall be guilty of a class C felony.
This is good since Washington is one of the four states in cooperative agreements with the Department of Homeland Security to use the RFID technology in their enhanced drivers licenses as the national PASS Card which the federal government is making available to US citizens who frequently cross borders into Canada and Mexico.
I like to see the fact that at least criminals can now be prosecuted for committing a crime. But it still annoys me that the entire program is still only run around Gen-2 based RFID technology specifications. This leaves quite a few security holes still. Though for this specific program the State Department claims there is no threat due to the fact that they only store a unique ID number on the card, and no personal information. But what’s to keep these IDs from being compromised.
As our lives become “easier” and more “convenient”, we tend to overlook what we are giving up in trade off. But at least someone in the government is paying some kind of attention to technology, and making an attempt to help protect us.