I should however be watching my back for satellites tracking my every move. The controversial RFID chips that are to be placed in future American and European passports, and are currently causing waves amongst those concerned with privacy, have already found their way into mine. And not just a hidden chip somewhere in the cover either - it's a full page size clump of unbendable card about 1 millimetre thick stitched right into the centre with "WARNING! IC CHIP!" written in big letters on both sides. However, unlike my cousins overseas, the information stored on the chip is extremely limited. It's basically personal information and a scanned photo, the exact same information you'd find printed in the passport and nothing more. There's no fingerprints (I know, because I never gave any, and wore gloves when I filled the form in to be safe), blood type, medical history, DNA samples, nothing. In fact, having the picture in there could even work to my advantage - for some reason people don't expect somebody with a mug like mine to have a Japanese passport, and the RFID chip basically proves I'm not having the nice men at immigration on.
Sunday, May 14, 2006
Hands up who has a Japanese passport!
I should however be watching my back for satellites tracking my every move. The controversial RFID chips that are to be placed in future American and European passports, and are currently causing waves amongst those concerned with privacy, have already found their way into mine. And not just a hidden chip somewhere in the cover either - it's a full page size clump of unbendable card about 1 millimetre thick stitched right into the centre with "WARNING! IC CHIP!" written in big letters on both sides. However, unlike my cousins overseas, the information stored on the chip is extremely limited. It's basically personal information and a scanned photo, the exact same information you'd find printed in the passport and nothing more. There's no fingerprints (I know, because I never gave any, and wore gloves when I filled the form in to be safe), blood type, medical history, DNA samples, nothing. In fact, having the picture in there could even work to my advantage - for some reason people don't expect somebody with a mug like mine to have a Japanese passport, and the RFID chip basically proves I'm not having the nice men at immigration on.
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Congrats!
ReplyDelete-Rick.
Well done sir! A very big otsukaresama for that!
ReplyDeleteBTW I like the open-necked shirt - Cool Biz for summer? ;)
Glen
Naturally, you're all aware that the passport is merely a travel document. The hard part was over back in early April. Still, at least I got it before you got your visa sorted, so I win the race!
ReplyDeletehey!! congrats!!
ReplyDeletequestion: what motivated you to become Japanese? and another one: how did you do it?