What is Digg?61 Comments
- EntropyMan, on 10/11/2007, -4/+25What's paranoid about realizing that any method of tracking objects we wear or carry will inevitably result in a database of our whereabouts over time? Even if that database is generated indirectly, by merchants or Google, at some point, it will become ordinary that our positions and activities are public (at least government) knowledge.
At that point, we can either embrace our loss of privacy and lifelog ourselves completely, or we can drop out of society. That's our choice, but it's hardly a free choice.
All I want RFID makers to do is add some real security, not just lame encryption, such that an RFID chip provides NO identifying information, not even a serial number or a consistent challenge code, for someone else to exploit. And it only gives out such information when I want it to.
It's not too much to ask that any RFID chip we carry obeys its owner's instructions, is it?
This is like the DRM debate all over again. - ChessPieceFace, on 10/11/2007, -3/+18hmmm....and I thought that "dust" in the air had a strange metallic taste.
- EntropyMan, on 10/11/2007, -0/+10@johnhummel, that's where we're heading. But Brin may quite not get how easily it can be abused, and how unlikely it is for that abuse to be corrected, given the fact that people willfully distort the truth and never get called on it.
Look at how Clinton gets smeared with all of these suspicious deaths of people he knew. Statistically, he's not at all abnormal -- given the number of people he knows, at least that many should be dead, even of unusual circumstances. But if I know everything you do, and I want to smear you, all I have to do is edit out everything innocuous and make the rest look suspicious. If I knew everything you did, it would take no time at all to make you look like a terrorist. Did you know that at least 50 people you interacted with last week had criminal records? Probably not, but if I can show that and repeat it often enough, I can make you look a like a criminal by sheer association.
Sure, the real data is there. But does anyone care about real data anymore? Do people who play the lottery even understand something as complex as statistics? All Fox News has to do is put up the wrong picture of a Congressman and its viewers never know the difference.
Like I said, if people are willing to lie, cheat, and steal, and people are willing to listen to those people and not care, more data is just fodder for more *****. Defending yourself is hard, even when you're right. - EntropyMan, on 10/11/2007, -0/+9Right. Because a terrorist would never be able to get an ID that also says "NOT A TERRORIST."
But you keep on deluding yourself that if you do nothing wrong, you're fine. Tell that to everyone who's lost their jobs and their status, perhaps even hundreds of thousands of dollars, defending themselves from false charges. And tell that to anyone who's ever been on an FBI watchlist because of political activity. I'm not talking subversive, like overthrow the government. I'm talking subversive, like protesting for peace, equal rights, or against government corruption.
You just give the government the power to ruin your life on a whim and see if they use it or not. History says they will. - JD52, on 10/11/2007, -2/+10This makes me laugh.
What you get gypped into paying for overpriced diamond engagement ring ........ $4500
What the same diamond would cost you if it wasn't for the Debeers cartel ........ $15.95
Getting duped into paying extra for the special "RFID Security Device" on a worthless piece of jewelry...... Priceless!
Think I'm exaggerating? Try and sell a diamond lemme know how that works out for ya. - GilbertZ, on 10/11/2007, -0/+7RFID is a big issue to be sure. And I agree more needs to be done to protect We the People. As someone who has spent a fair amount of time consulting on data mining, the good news is that most companies (Google excluded), don't have the know how to do much with data mining. Security by obscurity. It's far from ideal, but the volume of data is enormous and you have to really work hard to get use out of it. On the other hand, in a police state, which we are far from being (despite some of the bad things happening lately), it is scary...
- AllenS, on 10/11/2007, -9/+16a little extra paranoia with your coffee this morning?
- gmason08, on 10/11/2007, -1/+8Yes GawkMilk, we keep having this nasty habit of understanding human nature and remembering history. Social Security Numbers are innocuous, they have never caused/facilitated any problems, like identity theft.
Do you own a bridge? No
Would you like to own a bridge? - polyGone, on 10/11/2007, -0/+6I am with Entropy man on this. Security is my number one concern. In my IST class, we sat there reprogramming RFID chips to say idiotic things that we made up. It's easy and anyone can get a kit to do it. Think about the proof of concept cell phone virus that infected an entire building. The same concept applies to RFID units. From virus spreading to data loss, the disadvantages seem to outweigh the advantages. I, also, don't trust a government, that can't create a simple database with billions at their disposal, to secure these things. I do expect them to try and make me believe that they can.
@GAWTMILK
I noticed you always seem, inexplicably, concerned with US politics, which I find odd because you don't even live here. Foreign policy, I can accept, but you seem to be awfully vocal about things regarding our civil liberties. - gmason08, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5Whatever back atcha, GawkMilk, you wish to live in study the trees in isolation world. I live in the real world where all those individual "Trees" form a "Forest".
You may like to look up the origin of the Nobel Prize. - EntropyMan, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5@GawtMilk, the US credit card system exchanges billions and you could say it works too, so what are we worried about? Only a small fraction of its users suffer from fraud.
But there are also laws in place that limit your personal liability to $50, and there's an incentive for CC companies to catch fraud early.
No system is perfect. The best way to approach it is to use the best technical design possible, and add legal protections for us average citizens to cover the rest. But the RFID industry has failed, IMO, on step 1: protecting privacy. They need to revisit this before we jump on board. - johnhummel, on 10/11/2007, -3/+8@EntropyMan: There is a third way. Mr. David Brin once wrote an interesting book about the transparent society - basically, the world you mention where everything is tracked, but the important thing is that the *tracking is open to everyone*, not just law enforcement, and not just to the rich. And, on top of that, the tracking can itself be tracked (so if someone says "Give me the data on John Hummel's whereabouts", John Hummel gets a notice saying "Entropyman is looking into your affairs".
- mattsidesinger, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4So all you are saying is that I'll need an RFID scanner to find married ones? How convenient.
- xtmno3, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4@jd52 (#7165109) said: "Try and sell a diamond lemme know how that works out for ya. "
Why do you think they say diamonds are forever? - EntropyMan, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4pepper is the new salt.
The RFID industry apparently doesn't understand security. - Heine3001, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4what happens if you snort a line of RFID's?
- gmason08, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4There was a story on Digg yesterday about an 18 year old that is charged under a New Hampshire(of all places) wiretapping law because while a passenger in a vehicle during a traffic stop he was filming the Cop(public official conducting official business). Of course as is essentially standard practice now the Police Cruiser camera was filming the private citizens but if the private citizens try to film their "public servants" they are committing a felony. The charge is based on a) that the filming included audio and b) the individual being recorded (the cop) had not given his consent. If cops are concerned about what they say during the course of their duties being recorded perhaps they want to retain the option to say things they should not being saying.
- Cyber_Akuma, on 10/11/2007, -1/+5"RFID chips the size of pepper"
*achoo*
"Did you just implant me?" - viviwanu, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4Trust me, it's not the jewelry they're trying to "protect"!
- peterzero, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3What if we put some electricity current thought? or heat? Most Jewelries are highly conductive and heat resistant, I wonder if the chip can do the same.
Again this can't stop crime. - spritom, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3"...making counterfeiting impossible."
Now that's funny! - williamdyer, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3Right. I mean only 80% of the people at Gitmo are poor schmucks who got sold by an "informant" and have no connection to terror, never mind the education to even reload a rifle. With an error rate that low, we can trust our government with almost anything.
But hey, those are just wogs. We do soooo much better here at home [ cough ] Innocence Project [ / cough ]. - chairlamp, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3sweet, now i can be tracked all the time!!
- eddiemun, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3They're planning to start using RFID chips in DVDs too.
http://www.engadget.com/2006/09/16/embedded-rfid-to-smack-down-dvd-piracy/ - DreKor, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3they say that because Debeers told them to
- sirjtaa, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Most likely all you'd have to do is electrify the jewelry you were illegally selling, or like, dip it in water and then electrify it, making the chip useless.
It is a step in the right direction though, those guys at Hitachi are always thinking of something new. - rouslan, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2I have read somewhere in a Digg article (passport RFID chips) that it's possible to destroy them by sending a small EMP pulse by shorting out a high voltage capacitor to a coil. Especially as RFID chips they get smaller, the electronics do too, which makes them more sensitive.
- gmason08, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2jd52-Your very correct/truthful comment, expressed in a creative fashion, highlights two important matters on the road to wisdom.
1. Recognizing that no one person can know everything that is important to know, yet what you do not know can hurt you.
2. Some proportion of people(always have always will) actually will conspire(the C word) to exploit other people for personal gain(Gasp it's TRUE). These types of schemes are not limited to petty crooks nor are they limited to simple plans. - jhub908, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2could you not just send it a really strong signal and blow out the circuit? Anti-shoplifting devices are de-activated like this.
- ZexMarquies01, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2yeah, they are NOT trying to protect Diamonds. Diamonds are soooo common, they *SHOULD* cost only a few bucks per rock. Dabeers has a monopoly over the diamond market. These chips will be used as a form of market data if anything.
- ElbridgeGerry, on 10/11/2007, -3/+5@nintendork
Says the guy with the avatar of the Soviet Union, the country that inspired George Orwell's 1984. - johnhummel, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2That's an interesting question. There are jokes on this, but Cory Doctorow wrote an interesting short story that involved at one point people having RFID's on their stuff, and putting it into boxes. Then, you could do a search on "Where are my keys", and the proper box would start to glow.
I can see a time where you can "tag" your own stuff inside your house, then go "OK - where is my copy of Java Programming 3rd edition", and your personal search engine would go "Upstairs bedroom, bookshelf, second shelf". Or use this to instantly inventory your cupboards before making a shopping list ("Hm - do I *need* mustard, or do I *have* mustard? Search engine, tell me."
Yeah, there are privacy concerns with RFID, but it's in hour they're used. Personally, I wouldn't mind using this for my personal stuff just so I could know where it was sometimes. - patricks, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2The size of pepper eh?
http://b20.net/images/pepper.jpg - hunter360, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3LOL! Ahahahahhahaa! Some stupid hotshot company backed by top VC's is gonna bring it to market, and a curious 14 year old will crack it. Then post how he did it on Digg.
- Asianwaste, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2Popular science. No such thing. More like Nerdular Nerdance
- Travelsonic, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2"if you're not doing any shady business, the government WON'T care. "
"Unless you're dealing drugs, killing people, buying weapons illegally, commiting a crime, plotting a terrorist attack, etc THEY DON'T CARE. "
Just because X seems unlikely doesn't make X impossible.
Also, history tells otherwise. - phlogiston99, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Somebody confused the word "protect" with the word "identify the origin if you happened to carry a RFID reader of the correct kind" and that's a pretty big confusion. Let's apply the same idea to a more pragmatic example:
Tattoo your own name on your forearm will protect you from assault by random meth addicts.
This makes just as much sense to me. - nipplestitch, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2nanotechnology is gonna put a lot of our current laws to the test
- Eugenis, on 01/13/2009, -0/+1Hundreds of jewelry articles: http://jewelry-newsline.com/articles/
- weebit, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1protect Jewelry my ass! protect their surveillance is more like it!
- GawtMilk, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1@polygone
I'm an American citizen. I'm still in High School, so I'm under my parent's control until I graduate or drop. I'll move back to the US in just two years time, and it'll be my home probably for the rest of my life. I've got plenty of reason to care about civil liberties, as I've still got hundreds of friends and family members in America. I use Octopus cards daily in Hong Kong, they're great. They also run RFID. I'd like to see them implemented in the US because they're so damn convinient.
Tell me, if someone really wanted to "get" the RFID companies, why not target the Octopus? Credit cards may exchange billions, but they're less safe than Octopus cards, AND they don't use RFID. What's your point? - rouslan, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1@crgnetworks
>In Soviet Russia RFID chips protect you!
You mean AK-47's and Polonium? - smiltee, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Nobody realised the utter stupidity of this? What if I walk on the street with a RFID reader? I can know you are wearing possibly valuable jewelry and perhaps even the value and the nature of it. Now, I just have to walk in a street, find a guy with a pretty good ring on him, follow him and steal it from him.
When the rocket scientists will realise their mistakes? - peterzero, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0Maybe a pocket size teaser or a cigarette lighter will do the trick
- urby86, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0It's scary how long it took me to find the pepper in that picture.
- KellyE, on 06/14/2008, -0/+0I think it would be great to be able to track your valuables this way. Maybe it could help me find that earring I lost!
- Cherry001, on 02/26/2009, -0/+0Wedding Jewelry website: http://www.emitations.com/
Fashion Jewelry articles,photos and care: http://wwwemitations.blogspot.com/ - KellyE, on 06/14/2008, -0/+0I think that is a great idea to protect your jewelry. Maybe it could help find the earring I lost in my house!
- chompuuu, on 12/07/2007, -0/+0diamond ring guide http://diamondringguide.wordpress.com/
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