(Repost from The Register) http://www.guardian.co.uk/idcards/story/0,,1950226,00.html

Fairly lengthy article, but gives a good overview of the methods they used to bypass the security. I mention because of concern over RFID passports in the US (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rfid_passport). Article summary:

Quote :

""The reader - I bought one for £250 - has to say hello to the chip and tell it that it is authorised to make contact. The key to that is in the date of birth, etc. Once they communicate, the conversation is encrypted, but I wrote some software in about 48 hours that made sense of it. "The Home Office has adopted a very high encryption technology called 3DES - that is, to a military-level data-encryption standard times three. So they are using strong cryptography to prevent conversations between the passport and the reader being eavesdropped, but they are then breaking one of the fundamental principles of encryption by using non-secret information actually published in the passport to create a 'secret key'. That is the equivalent of installing a solid steel front door to your house and then putting the key under the mat.""

11/17/2006 8:05:24 AM

been done yo

http://www.engadget.com/2006/08/03/german-hackers-clone-rfid-e-passports/

http://www.engadget.com/2006/02/03/dutch-rfid-e-passport-cracked-us-next/

11/17/2006 8:21:13 AM

i've been working in rfid space for a while - it is stupid to think it what they are doing wouldn't be cracked - the equivalent of saying WEP would always be secure

right now nobody is carrying around a reader and a laptop to crack passports without everyone being aware of it

it will just move to having a switch to turn your passport to an on state - and you will only turn it on in what has been deemed a secure location

it's easier to copy a passport now than it is to copy the rfid-enabled ones - the people that are worried about privacy typically don't understand the technology

11/17/2006 8:32:37 AM

http://carsonparris.com/RFID/RFID.html

Found that a while back..

11/17/2006 8:37:53 PM