Posted on 03/02/2003 6:52:16 PM PST by chance33_98
WKRN, Tennessee
Driver's license finger scan being considered
Public safety officials see a proposal requiring driver's license applicants to submit to a new kind of fingerprinting as a way to combat fraud, but civil libertarians have concerns.
The state Legislature is considering Senate Bill 423, under which a person's finger would be scanned. The scan will identify up to 40 unique points on the finger, said David Beatty, project director of the Department of Public Safety program.
Beatty called the it ``touch signature,'' but the American Civil Liberties Union of Oklahoma wonders who will have access to that information.
``It is a privacy issue, and we would have great concerns about what it would lead to,'' said Joann Bell, executive director of the ACLU of Oklahoma.
``There's a possibility under homeland security that the driver's license could become part of a national ID.''
Beatty disagreed, but said the driver's license has become accepted identification nationwide.
``The importance of the person holding the license and the person pictured on the license being the same is paramount. Society has dictated that,'' Beatty said.
The finger scan program would ensure the person who passes a driving test is the same person who goes to the tag agent to get a license, he said.
It also will ensure the person who goes to a tag agent to replace a lost driver's license is legitimate, Beatty said.
With the proposed new system, tag agents will be able to electronically check the license with the Public Safety Department to ensure the appropriate person receives the license.
Oklahoma issues four-year driver's licenses so it would take four years for all licenses in the state to be issued using a finger scan.
As of Dec. 31, 2.3 million people had driver's licenses and another 230,000 who don't drive had ID cards, Beatty said.
Senate Bill 423 is before the Senate and likely will be considered next week, said Sen. Robert M. Kerr, D-Altus, its author.
If the legislation becomes law, Oklahoma would join eight other states with a finger-imaging system: Colorado, Mississippi, Georgia, Hawaii, Kentucky, North Carolina, Texas and West Virginia.
What can I do to help this dream come true?
Gummi bears defeat fingerprint sensors
By John Leyden
Posted: 16/05/2002 at 12:29 GMTA Japanese cryptographer has demonstrated how fingerprint recognition devices can be fooled using a combination of low cunning, cheap kitchen supplies and a digital camera.
First Tsutomu Matsumoto used gelatine (as found in Gummi Bears and other sweets) and a plastic mould to create a fake finger, which he found fooled fingerprint detectors four times out of five.
Flushed with his success, he took latent fingerprints from a glass, which he enhanced with a cyanoacrylate adhesive (super-glue fumes) and photographed with a digital camera. Using PhotoShop, he improved the contrast of the image and printed the fingerprint onto a transparency sheet.
Here comes the clever bit.
Matsumoto took a photo-sensitive printed-circuit board (which can be found in many electronic hobby shops) and used the fingerprint transparency to etch the fingerprint into the copper.
From this he made a gelatine finger using the print on the PCB, using the same process as before. Again this fooled fingerprint detectors about 80 per cent of the time.
Fingerprint biometric devices, which attempt to identify people on the basis of their fingerprint, are touted as highly secure and almost impossible to fool but Matsumoto's work calls this comforting notion into question. The equipment he used is neither particularly hi-tech, nor expensive and if Matsumoto can pull off the trick what would corporate espionage boffins be capable of?
Matsumoto tried these attacks against eleven commercially available fingerprint biometric systems, and was able to reliably fool all of them.
Noted cryptographer Bruce Schneier, the founder and CTO of Counterpane Internet Security, described Matsumoto's work as more than impressive.
"The results are enough to scrap the systems completely, and to send the various fingerprint biometric companies packing," said Schneier in yesterday's edition of his Crypto-Gram newsletter, which first publicised the issue.
I'm still digging around on the NCDMV site, with no luck yet.
The only (vague) mention I've seen yet on the site to the Viisage™ technology is on this page:
North Carolina’s New Driver License and Identification Card
"A process called digital imaging is used to obtain and store customer portraits and signatures.
Along with digital-imaging, the new driver license is equipped with a bar code system that houses each customer’s personal data and can only be accessed by NCDMV and law enforcement agencies."
Yes, billbears, this fairly REEKS of Liddy.
Gag me with a third brake light!
Good night.
CD
Yes it appears so. Although NC is not listed on the FR recognition customer list, we are on the ID list and from that page it says:
Viisage's contract with the state of North Carolina started in April 1996 and continues through April 2001 at an approximate value of $ 10.6 million. As prime contractor, Viisage Technology has complete responsibility for the design, integration, installation, testing, maintenance, and performance of the state of North Carolina's over-the-counter Digitized Driver License and Image Database Systems.
Tasks:
Overall systems requirements analysis
Hardware architecture · Customized workstation OS/2 applications
Data collection and storage structured for TCP/IP communications network
Installation of 142 workstations for over-the-counter issuance of approximately two million driver licenses/ID cards annually
Installation of two Division of Motor Vehicle workstations for retrieval of licenses and "valid without photo license" documents
Installation of a Development Workstation for in-house training and testing
Installation of a Central Image Server for online storage and retrieval of all signatures and images via state network
Supply, distribution, and maintenance of consumable items for two million cards per year for five years.
Technologies, Innovations, and Accomplishments:
Implementing DDL/ID workstation in an IBM OS/2 operating system environment
Implementing both RAID magnetic [primary] and DLT tape [secondary] storage for data redundancy
Developing a secure inventory control system for distribution of sensitive materials
Developing telephone inquiry/FAX transmission capability from Central Image Server
Combining new digital image capture system with existing demographic database
Designing maintenance scheme to support 7 days/week, 24 hours/day customer service.
I don't know about you, but combining a digital image capture system with an existing demographic database sounds a whole lot like my pic is floating around some server in NC
Yes, billbears, this fairly REEKS of Liddy.
Shhhh, don't tell Howlin!! LOL. First Giddy kept the speed limit lowered to 55(against the wishes of the Reagan administration), then required seatbelts, then airbags, now a picture of every citizen. Howlin, sorry but this is somebody mucking around with my driving freedom and I don't like it one bit
Further, you can do this at home for cheap.
Only criminals will bother of course.. but, then again they are the ones the system is designed to catch.
So is McCain.
And as for Paul? Beauty is only skin deep, but stupidity goes straight to the bone.
Please cite the section of the Constituttion that enumerates a power to the fed to issue a national ID.
It is as easy to parse this statement semantically, just as it is easy to semantically parse the statement "I did not have sex with that woman, Monica Lewinksy".
It is also quite easy to recognize that each statement is a bald-faced lie.
The Chancellor will be with you as soon as his attendant is finished polishing his Penumbral Emanation Spectacles[tm]. He'll need them, as the item you've requested is one of those clauses that somehow evades the grosser vision of ordinary mortals.
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