Privacy Advocates Criticize Plan To Embed ID Chips in Passports

Discussion of RFID enabled passports has been going on for some time in the privacy community, but it is starting to hit the mainstream press:

Yahoo! News - Privacy Advocates Criticize Plan To Embed ID Chips in Passports:

"... State Department officials said the chips are part of a global effort to prevent passport fraud. Each chip will contain a digital record of all information printed on the passport, including the holder's name and document number. The chip will also contain the passport holder's photograph, enhanced by facial recognition technology. That way, even if the paper passport is altered, customs agents would be able to compare the information on the chip with the person presenting it....

"If you're walking around in Beirut, it would be well worth Al Qaeda's money to use one of these readers to pick out the Americans from the Swedes without any problem," said Barry Steinhardt, director of the American Civil Liberties Union's technology and liberty program...."