News on ID Cards, ID Badges and Photo ID Systems: 02/11/2007

VIEWPOINTS FROM DAR ES SALAAM

11:29 PM

In a note of irony, the press office is also off limits to the press. It is surrounded by Anglican Communion News Service personnel with red ID badges and stern expressions. Members of the Episcopal News Service share the indignities the rest of the hoi polloi, as they themselves are similarly excluded -- an indignity Episcopalians regard as extreme. In spite of all this, Communications Director James Rosenthal has been quite accommodating to visiting members of the press and readily answers the phone in the news room.The weather is hot but not unbearable. Bottled water is consumed by the gallon in upper 80-degree heat. Air conditioning is minimal. The Indian Ocean is very warm; the sands hot underfoot.From a strict media perspective, the news has been anything but exciting. Most of the media came expecting a blood bath with revisionist and orthodox body parts splattered on conference walls as Primates fired ecclesiastical, biblical and theological bullets at each other.It has not happened. Politeness has ruled the day. Anglicans, at heart, don't like war; they prefer gin and tonics before a lavish English dinner complete with expensive wines followed by Evening Prayer and a good night's sleep.The Anglican Way is that of obsessive civility, and despite a lot of blustering and posturing, everyone is doing their best to be polite and amiable.The only surprise attack was a salvo, fired by seven Primates over the invisible wall of steel into the province of Nigeria website, saying that they had refused to participate in the daily Eucharist with the Primate of the Episcopal Church because of that Church's recent sexuality views that are at variance with them and some 30 million Anglicans.

Full Article from VirtueOnline.org.

Friday, February 16, 2007

CA raising costs of Medical Cannabis ID cards: Where Is The Love?

11:28 PM

Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi has introduced a resolutin to reinstate the former city cards, bringing back a more affordable and more anonymous system for patients. However, Supervisor Ed Jew stalled the vote by having the resolution sent to committee for further consideration, which will happen in March ? after the fee hike takes effect. The fee hike is not the only problem with the State Card System. While we have been told things like the State Medical Cannabis ID Card would offer us better protection, especially when traveling outside SF County (but only in CA), as the Program continues, we have continued to learn more about it. One thing that we have learned is that while the City kept the patients? identification secret and only kept only our number on file, the State is doing just the opposite. We are being treated like criminals with an ID badge, a Star of David, a Pink Triangle if you will. All of our information is being stored in a public database, accessible to police officers and others anywhere in the world, as if we were common criminals not patients? isn?t this what they do with sex offenders? Also, even if one is stopped for a missing taillight lens, when this information comes up it gives the officer the reason he needs to search your vehicle. I myself do not own a vehicle, and my life is pretty much an open book ? I?ve nothing to hide that I can think of. But I am against this because it is profiling, sure as you?re born, there is nothing else to call it, and we as patients are outraged by it. Many patients have solved the problem by procuring a card in another county that still issues them and which is accepted at their preferred dispensaries. As I understand it, this practice would no longer be acceptable in SF after a dispensary has been permitted. Also, this being the case, it would seem obvious to me that our own SF City Attorney?s Office should have no problem giving reimplementation the go-ahead.

Full Article from Indybay.org.

Thursday, February 15, 2007

New visitor ID system looks to make hospital safer

11:27 PM

New technology will allow UK medical center officials to create instant photo ID badges for after-hours visitors, helping to keep the hospital complex more secure.The new Fast Pass System, which went into effect last month, scans driver's licenses and then stores all relevant information. It transfers the visitor's name, photo, number of the room they are visiting, and the date onto the badge.It's a more efficient system for the security staff to check in visitors, said Capt. Paul Grant of UK Police, who is in charge of UK Hospital and Medical Center Security. The new practice is not in reaction to any security problems at the hospital, but rather "just a better way to manage visitors," he said.

Full Article from Kykernel.com.

Wednesday, February 14, 2007

RFID Solutions for ID Badges and Access Control

11:26 PM

There are major deficiencies in the legacy solutions that use the traditional access control systems. Barcodes, magnetic stripes, and proximity readers all rely on the user to either make contact or place the badge very close to the reader. In addition, bar codes can only be read one at a time and the respective embedded information cannot be updated. Such limitations can be cumbersome and time consuming.An RFID access control system can provide an easy and efficient solution. RFID badges can be read from much further distances than other traditional technologies and the embedded electronic information for each badge can be over-written repeatedly. The increased reading distance thus enables other tracking technologies like surveillance cameras to be activated in conjunction with an employee being in their vicinity. Furthermore, multiple RFID badges can be read all at the same time. Information about employee access, attendance, and duties performed, can be easily and efficiently monitored and stored in a database. Access information can also be tied to a Windows Active Directory or LDAP for user authentication and therefore be synchronized to an authorized access scheme..

Full Article from Openpr.com.

Tuesday, February 13, 2007

SAN FRANCISCO - City medical marijuana ID cards proposed

11:25 PM

A state decision to increase the cost of medical marijuana ID cards from $13 a year to $142 has prompted a San Francisco supervisor to call for the city to issue its own cards at a lower cost. The idea is being floated by Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi, who authored legislation last year regulating medical cannabis dispensaries in San Francisco. He submitted a nonbinding resolution last month urging the city to issue its own ID cards for medical marijuana patients, referencing a $25 fee per card under San Francisco's old ID program. "The purpose of the resolution is to make sure that the state card program does not defeat its own purpose with a 1,000 percent price increase," Mirkarimi said. The state began issuing ID cards three years ago as part of California's Proposition 215, a measure approved by voters in 1996 that provides for the use of marijuana for a medical condition as recommended by a physician. The cards issued under a voluntary program are primarily used to protect patients from arrest and to indicate they have a legitimate medical use for marijuana they may be carrying. To date, 24 counties, including San Francisco, participate in the ID program. But the roughly 9,500 patients who have registered aren't enough to support its costs, prompting state officials to send out letters in December alerting patients to the fee increase starting March 1.

Full Article from Sfgate.com.

Monday, February 12, 2007

Jim Nolan: Heading for an identity crisis

11:24 PM

Who doesn't believe that, if it suits them, rogue states or their proxies would have the means to forge access cards? MI5's former director Stella Rimington said in November 2005: "My angle on ID cards is that they may be of some use, but only if they can be made unforgeable, and all our other documentation is quite easy to forge ... ID cards may be helpful in all kinds of things, but I don't think they are necessarily going to make us any safer." While Australian Federal Police Commissioner Mick Kelty says something must be done about identity fraud, he fails to explain why all the privacy-invasive technologies, since the introduction of wholesale data matching, have not worked. As no government spokesman or report seems able to offer anything other than generalisations and speculation about the likely returns for services such as social security and Medicare, what's the rush? Bitter recent experience over projections for benefits from infrastructure projects should make even the wettest liberal, let alone the champions of economic rationalism, pause before writing blank cheques on the taxpayer for the expensive access card. But the Australia Card fiasco demonstrated that nothing is quite so jelly-like as a government schmoozed by the bureaucracy when a project such as this is in the offing. In the face of mere assertion that billions will be recovered from welfare cheats, even the hard men (and women) wilt.

Full Article from TheAustralian.com.

Sunday, February 11, 2007

Collins throws up roadblock for Real ID act

11:23 PM

Collins, the ranking Republican on the committee that oversees homeland security, said Friday that the 9-11 Commission Report pointed out shortcomings in the current system for issuing identification cards. Seven of the Sept. 11, 2001, hijackers obtained driver's licenses and ID cards by submitting sworn statements instead of proof of residency or identity. They used them as identity cards for purchasing airline tickets. Despite the need for the ID cards, Collins said she understands that it's unrealistic to think all states could meet the 2008 deadline. Her bill would give the Department of Homeland Security the authority to delay or waive the requirements for Real ID compliance if states are having difficulty complying. In addition, it would create a panel of federal officials, state officials, privacy advocates and other interested parties to review the proposed regulations and to suggest modifications. DHS would have to take these concerns into account, she said.

Full Article from Concordmonitor.com.

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