(Copyright © 2005 T Bruce Tober)
Prime Minister Blair today (27 June 2005) asserted that his proposed ID cards will be secure.
Funny thing that. Secure technology is increasingly becoming known as an oxymoron.
For example, the banks are forcing us to use PINs every time we use our Charge or Debit cards for
purchases. They claim it's totally safe. They claim there have been significantly fewer cases of card fraud in
those areas in which "Chip'n'Pin" technology has been tested. Welllll, they would say that, wouldn't
they.
Sorry, but it's not more secure.
Not for the first time today I experienced just one more example of the technology's insecurity.
As so many times in the past, since the national launch of Chip'n'Pin, I was in a queue. And being by nature a
"people watcher" I was watching when the woman ahead of me typed in her PIN. I could see it clearly,
3554. In other cases I could (and did) hear a customer ahead of me say his number out loud as he typed it in. And
still other times I could see where the person "hid" the slip of paper on which they wrote their PIN
which they had to retrieve in order to type it in since they couldn't remember it otherwise.
With this in mind consider how easy it would be to commit fraud. I would just have to follow that person out of
the shop, steal his card and immediately use it to my heart's desire (or at least his credit limit). Whereas with
the old
system, having to sign the receipt, one would have to go home and practice forging the signature for a day or two,
during which time, in most cases, the card would be reported stolen and would be cancelled. No time for such a
cancellation now.
Secure Technology. Surely an oxymoron.