They were told it was a bad idea.

[unixronin]

RFID passports, that is.  Little better supporting reason for actually implementing the scheme, due to go into service in the US in 2007 or 2008, has been given besides "because we can".

Well, it is reported (via schneier) that a year before the new RFID passports even enter service, someone has already figured out how to clone them, and demonstrated the technique today at the BlackHat hacker conference.  He says it only took him two weeks to figure it out, based solely on publicly available specifications of the ICAO standard, and tested the attack against a new EU German passport.

Comments

[ithildae.livejournal.com]

We told them about electronic voting machines too, what good did it do?

I just renewed my passport, partly because of this particular idiocy. Ten years before I need to get it replaced. Hopefully by then the idiots will have found something else to hyperventilate about.