Surpriv: RFID Surveillance and Privacy

In a letter to the editor, California State Senator Simitian responds to an op-ed urging no legislated restrictions on RFID for IDs in California:

Privacy safeguards

Editor — Regarding “Fearing bits that don’t bite” (Sept. 22): I was bemused that an industry lobbyist would suggest that anyone who wants to protect privacy is hostile to change. That’s certainly not the view of seven of California’s largest newspapers, including The Chronicle, that have supported SB768.

I agree, of course, that RFID technology can be put to many good uses; but that’s not the question raised by SB768. The bill addresses a tougher question: Should state and local governments compel you to carry a government identification document that broadcasts your personal information?

In response to that question the bill does three things: (1) makes it unlawful to “read” your personal information without your knowledge; (2) establishes basic privacy and security safeguards to prevent unauthorized data-reading; and (3) requires the government to take a three-year timeout before embedding RFID in government-issued “mass distribution” documents such as driver’s licenses.

Industry opponents would do well to remember that public acceptance and commercial success of developing technologies require that we acknowledge and address legitimate privacy and security concerns, not ignore or deny them.

State Sen. JOE SIMITIAN

Palo Alto

Op-ed on RFID by Tim Heffernan, director of government relations and public affairs at Symbol Technologies and vice chair for the RFID working group of the Information Technology Industry Council.

“Afraid of its repercussions, China in the late 1990s severely restricted access to the Internet. With Senate Bill 768, state Sen. Joe Simitian, D-Palo Alto, is attempting to do something similar by restraining radio frequency identification — RFID — under the pretense of protecting ID privacy. The real reason for this bill is because the senator fears the same thing China did: change…”

MSNBC on lobbying to avert a ban on use of RFID in identity documents in California: http://msnbc.msn.com/id/9038305/

State Sen. Joe Simitian, D-Palo Alto, has introduced first-in-the-nation legislation that would ban for three years the use of government IDs that could be used to track the movement of California residents.

The bill, called the Identity Information Protection Act of 2005, would make it a misdemeanor to illegally obtain information from an RFID card — a process called skimming. It also would require what tech lobbyists call a high level of security for government-issued RFID cards and require any agency issuing RFID cards to tell users annually where the card readers for the devices are located.

“This bill is very accepting of the technology, but it admits that there are legitimate privacy concerns,” says Mr. Simitian.