No, that’s not some sick April Fool joke. In fact it’s a headline from the respected silicon.com
The article reports that civil liberties groups worldwide are objecting to plans by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) to incorporate biometrics and RFID chips in all passports. This would be linked to a global identity database.
The plans, to be discussed by the ICAO next week, would make biometrics and tagging compulsory by 2015.
The ICAO’s preferred biometric is facial recognition, which was recently described by the Economist Intelligence Unit as having the potential to ensure that “privacy, as it has existed in the public sphere, will in effect be wiped out”.
Cross-posted from The RFID Scanner