Smart ID Cards Planned for Sailors to Spot Terrorists

[Bill Stewart]

Bob - This isn't really cryptography-related, and I can't post to DCSB,
but this does seem like Cypherpunks material.
What an <insert several paragraphs of sailor-type language here/>
outrageous proposal!   Can't sail without some government
fingerprinting you, laser-scanning your eyes, and
throwing you in a huge database?  <more nautical language/>.

I'd expect the ILO to be socialist - they are a big union after all -
but I wouldn't expect them to be totalitarians.
Sure, it's a way to create a harder-to-avoid union card,
and a way for their biggest customers to be forced to hire their people
by using government pressure to enforce it.  It's also a surveillance
mechanism to let management keep track of sailors they dislike,
prevent politically incorrect people from getting jobs as sailors,
give governments additional control over sailors in port,
private sailors, and refugees who can't afford to travel on airplanes,
and gives large governments an increased excuse to interfere with
high-seas traffic between other countries under the pretense of
checking whether all the sailors are documented.

 From a technology perspective, the interesting paragraph is
         The plans have drawn criticism from seafarer's groups
         concerned that port authorities may insert information in
         so-called ``smart'' identification
         documents without the cardholder's knowledge.
Sure, smart cards with non-user-viewable data can easily have
extra data in them saying the user is a "Communist" or "union organizer"
or did scab labor or is a Muslim or a Jew or a Rastafarian.
And it's easy for port authorities to send copies of sailors' photos
to their local police in case they're wandering around town.

But with the Internet reaching everywhere, either by wire or satellite,
the information doesn't need to be hidden in the card.
The card says that you're "Sailor #12345678", so they can look you up
on any website they want - not just the ILO's "paid their union dues"
database, and Interpol's "Never been caught smoking dope" database,
and the shipping companies' "Not a union troublemaker" database",
and the "originally from _this_ country even though they're now American" 
database,
and Blacknet's databases on "gets in Bar Fights" and "scab laborers".

                         Bill Stewart

At 06:10 PM 07/03/2002 -0400, R. A. Hettinga wrote:
>http://quote.bloomberg.com/fgcgi.cgi?ptitle=Top%20World%20News&s1=blk&tp=ad_topright_topworld&T=markets_box.ht&s2=ad_right1_windex&bt=ad_position1_windex&box=ad_box_all&tag=worldnews&middle=ad_frame2_windex&s=APSMyZRY2U21hcnQg
>
>Bloomberg News
>
>Top World News
>
>07/03 13:20
>Smart ID Cards Planned for Sailors to Spot Terrorists (Update1)
>By Amy Strahan Butler
>
>Washington, July 3 (Bloomberg) -- The identities of more than 500,000
>commercial sailors worldwide would be verified through thumb or iris scans
>under tough, new anti-terrorism standards backed by the U.S. and other
>industrialized nations.
>
>``The whole idea is to come up with a worldwide system for positive,
>verifiable identification of seafarers,'' said Mary Covington, associate
>director of the Washington office of the International Labor Organization,
>a United Nations-affiliated group that's developing the standards.
>
>The labor organization got a big boost when representatives of the Group of
>Eight nations -- the U.S., Japan, Germany, the U.K., France, Canada, Italy
>and Russia -- endorsed the standards during a meeting in Canada last week.
>
>The plans have drawn criticism from seafarer's groups concerned that port
>authorities may insert information in so- called ``smart'' identification
>documents without the cardholder's knowledge.
>
>Those concerns are being swept aside as the drive to close loopholes in
>shipping security has gained momentum since Sept. 11 in the U.S., where
>less than 2 percent of cargo entering ports is inspected by the U.S.
>Customs Service.
>
>After the terrorist attacks, the Coast Guard began requiring ships to
>notify ports 96 hours prior to arrival and to submit a list of crew members.
>
>Card-Carrying Sailors
>
>Commercial sailors in countries that ratify the ILO standards would be
>required to carry identification cards similar to driver's licenses that
>also contain biometric information, such as a thumbprint or iris scan.
>Under the proposal, port authorities would be able to verify the identity
>of the card bearer by scanning his thumb or eye.
>
>The credentials could be issued to more than a half-million shipping
>employees as governments attempt to tighten port security to prevent
>terrorist activities.
>
>``This would help produce uniform treatment of seafarers,'' said Chris
>Koch, president of the World Shipping Council, a trade association
>representing more than 40 shipping companies, including Atlantic Container
>Line AB and Crowley Maritime Corp. ``That's in the interest of not only
>seafarers but of commerce.''
>
>The current ILO convention for identifying shipping employees entering
>foreign ports asks that countries to provide seafarers with documents, such
>as passports, that include their name, date of birth, nationality and photo.
>
>Technology Lag
>
>Once the identification standards are drafted, individual governments would
>be responsible for ratifying and enforcing them. Only 61 countries have
>ratified the ILO's existing documentation standards for commercial sailors.
>
>Critics of the proposal say that technology sophisticated enough to
>differentiate between the characteristics of thousands of irises, for
>example, is still years away.
>
>``There is no perfect biometrics technology,'' the Automatic Identification
>Manufacturers Association of Japan wrote to the ILO. An accurate system
>would lengthen inspection times while a cheaper, faster one would be more
>inaccurate and possibly a target for terrorists, the agency said.
>
>Still, it's important to set the standards and then let the technology
>catch up, said Joseph Cox, president of the Chamber of Shipping of America.
>Biometric characteristics within the identification cards are essential for
>security, Cox said.
>
>``There's no question we're going to have something like that,'' Cox said.
>``We will get there because we have to get there.''
>
>--
>-----------------
>R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah at ibuc.com>
>The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/>
>44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
>"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
>[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
>experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'
>
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