On Sat, 27 Mar 2010 08:00:24 +0000
Roland Perry wrote:
It was an "urban myth" that blackhats had cracked WEP a few years back with
profuse denials from all the vested interests. The encryption on DVDs was
apparently uncrackable too wasn't it? Oyster could never be hacked said
TfL. GSM had military strength encyrption so they said. Until it was
cracked.

History does tend to repeat itself where encryption is concerned doesn't it?

I agree that with sufficient effort and incentive many kinds of
encryption have been cracked. But I'm not sure that the "enthusiast"
community has much incentive to crack passport encryption. And when they

Money is always an incentive. Most malware and viruses today arn't written by
some bored kid trying to impress his peers - its organised crime. The same
economics will apply to passport cracking not to mention foreign govns.

have, all they get is some public information. Meanwhile, the distant
RFID reading is in the realm of laws of physics, rather than
mathematics, and we know what Scotty says about those.

I guess you'd better tell that to the people rolling out RFID tags to replace
barcodes on supermarket products that can then be queered en mass while still
sitting in the trolley.

B2003

In message , at 17:22:15 on Sun, 28 Mar
2010, d remarked:
I agree that with sufficient effort and incentive many kinds of
encryption have been cracked. But I'm not sure that the "enthusiast"
community has much incentive to crack passport encryption. And when they

Money is always an incentive. Most malware and viruses today arn't written by
some bored kid trying to impress his peers - its organised crime. The same
economics will apply to passport cracking not to mention foreign govns.

All the examples you quoted have been cracked by enthusiasts.

have, all they get is some public information. Meanwhile, the distant
RFID reading is in the realm of laws of physics, rather than
mathematics, and we know what Scotty says about those.

I guess you'd better tell that to the people rolling out RFID tags to replace
barcodes on supermarket products that can then be queered en mass while still
sitting in the trolley.

Yes, sorry to have confusingly switched the topic to RFID, after all we
were talking about the impossibility of reading passports.
--
Roland Perry

On Sun, 28 Mar 2010 20:13:15 +0100
Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at 17:22:15 on Sun, 28 Mar
2010, d remarked:
I agree that with sufficient effort and incentive many kinds of
encryption have been cracked. But I'm not sure that the "enthusiast"
community has much incentive to crack passport encryption. And when they

Money is always an incentive. Most malware and viruses today arn't written by
some bored kid trying to impress his peers - its organised crime. The same
economics will apply to passport cracking not to mention foreign govns.

All the examples you quoted have been cracked by enthusiasts.

Does that make any difference? I'd be interested to know if the fake passports
that Mossad team that took out that guy in dubai were e-passports.

have, all they get is some public information. Meanwhile, the distant
RFID reading is in the realm of laws of physics, rather than
mathematics, and we know what Scotty says about those.

I guess you'd better tell that to the people rolling out RFID tags to replace
barcodes on supermarket products that can then be queered en mass while still
sitting in the trolley.

Yes, sorry to have confusingly switched the topic to RFID, after all we
were talking about the impossibility of reading passports.

Well quite , after all the technology is radically different. Oh, wait, its
exactly the same.

B2003

In message , at 08:25:34 on Mon, 29 Mar
2010, d remarked:

I agree that with sufficient effort and incentive many kinds of
encryption have been cracked. But I'm not sure that the "enthusiast"
community has much incentive to crack passport encryption. And when they

Money is always an incentive. Most malware and viruses today arn't written by
some bored kid trying to impress his peers - its organised crime. The same
economics will apply to passport cracking not to mention foreign govns.

All the examples you quoted have been cracked by enthusiasts.

Does that make any difference?

Yes, because the enthusiasts did it for a dare, not profit.

I'd be interested to know if the fake passports
that Mossad team that took out that guy in dubai were e-passports.

Unlikely. Many of the photos not being acceptable to the UK passport
office, so they didn't go to much trouble.

Yes, sorry to have confusingly switched the topic to RFID, after all we
were talking about the impossibility of reading passports.

Well quite , after all the technology is radically different. Oh, wait, its
exactly the same.

If you think that, I can see why we are at cross purposes.
--
Roland Perry

On Mon, 29 Mar 2010 09:47:06 +0100
Roland Perry wrote:
Does that make any difference?

Yes, because the enthusiasts did it for a dare, not profit.

And obviously if an organisation like the FSB with a load of bored and
unemployed russian hackers at its disposal will let everyone know if it
manages to crack a western encryption system. Just like they informed Estonia
and Georgia before the even about the cyber attacks they were going to
undertake against their infrastructure.

Not.

You seem rather naive to me.

Yes, sorry to have confusingly switched the topic to RFID, after all we
were talking about the impossibility of reading passports.

Well quite , after all the technology is radically different. Oh, wait, its
exactly the same.

If you think that, I can see why we are at cross purposes.

And the difference is what exactly? They can both use either RF or magnetic
fields to power up the chip. Simple RFID chips dish out an id number and thats
about it whereas things like Oyster and the passports are a bit more
intelligent. It makes no difference to the argument about remote powering up.

B2003

wrote in message

On Sun, 28 Mar 2010 20:13:15 +0100
Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at 17:22:15 on Sun, 28
Mar 2010, d remarked:
I agree that with sufficient effort and incentive many kinds of
encryption have been cracked. But I'm not sure that the
"enthusiast" community has much incentive to crack passport
encryption. And when they

Money is always an incentive. Most malware and viruses today arn't
written by some bored kid trying to impress his peers - its
organised crime. The same economics will apply to passport cracking
not to mention foreign govns.

All the examples you quoted have been cracked by enthusiasts.

Does that make any difference? I'd be interested to know if the fake
passports that Mossad team that took out that guy in dubai were
e-passports.

I believe that they were not. Apparently 11 of the 12 affected UK
citizens have now been issued with new biometric passports.

In message , at 09:05:54 on Mon, 29 Mar
2010, d remarked:
Does that make any difference?

Yes, because the enthusiasts did it for a dare, not profit.

And obviously if an organisation like the FSB with a load of bored and
unemployed russian hackers at its disposal will let everyone know if it
manages to crack a western encryption system. Just like they informed Estonia
and Georgia before the even about the cyber attacks they were going to
undertake against their infrastructure.

Not.

You seem rather naive to me.

Why would the FSB bother, they know the passport information already (if
they have an interest in someone).

Yes, sorry to have confusingly switched the topic to RFID, after all we
were talking about the impossibility of reading passports.

Well quite , after all the technology is radically different. Oh, wait, its
exactly the same.

If you think that, I can see why we are at cross purposes.

And the difference is what exactly? They can both use either RF or magnetic
fields to power up the chip. Simple RFID chips dish out an id number and thats
about it whereas things like Oyster and the passports are a bit more
intelligent. It makes no difference to the argument about remote powering up.

It's all about the power/antenna/etc required to make it a practical
proposition.
--
Roland Perry

On Tue, 30 Mar 2010 09:24:33 +0100
Roland Perry wrote:
Why would the FSB bother, they know the passport information already (if
they have an interest in someone).

Probably. But you never know.

And the difference is what exactly? They can both use either RF or magnetic
fields to power up the chip. Simple RFID chips dish out an id number and thats
about it whereas things like Oyster and the passports are a bit more
intelligent. It makes no difference to the argument about remote powering up.

It's all about the power/antenna/etc required to make it a practical
proposition.

Ok , we can debate whether my original assertion that it could be read
from metres away forever - but heres something much more likely. Someone
is sitting at an airport with their passport either in a case or their coat.
Someone else sits down right next to them with a briefcase containing a reader.
They could probably get it within inches of where they expect the passport
to be. Now don't tell me thats improbable and it wouldn't surprise me if
it hasn't already been done.

B2003