A Hungarian airport has been bilked into trying an insane scheme to RFID-track every passenger. This panopticon was invented by snake-oil salesmen from University College London. It will track every passenger to within one meter, and it will contain countermeasures to prevent passengers from removing or trading their snitch-tags. The idea is that "safety" is something abstract that can be enhanced by treating air travelers like rapists on day-release — as opposed to each traveller's personal security of being free, and un-spied-upon.
Imagine the things a terrorist could do with perfect knowledge of the location of every passenger in the airport: "I think we'll put the bomb there."
But potentially, said Dr Brennan, the tags could aid security by allowing airports to track the movement patterns of passengers deemed to be suspicious and prevent them from entering restricted areas.
(via William Gibson)
