Saturday, July 28, 2012

Bad News for Annie Walker (and James Bond)

The ability of spies to travel under different false passports may become almost impossible. The spreading use of biometric scanners at border control points would flag them if they repeatedly showed up with different identities.
on or about

3 comments:

  1. BadTux7/29/2012 1:57 AM

    Easy Peasy. The biometric scanners at the border only detect that the biometric data matches that attached to the name in the database. The current state of the art still requires a significant amount of time to compare that biometric data against all other biometric data in the database and by the time it says "sayyyyy, someone else *also* has that iris scan!", James is already in-country and infiltrating the Big Bad's compound where the Big Bad sits stroking his white Persian kitty.

    Plus, this also assumes that the biometrics database is incorruptible. SNORT! Just ask the Iranians about how "incorruptible" supposedly "secure" computer systems are, when the CIA and Mossad really want into them. Err, yeah, right :).

    - Badtux the Geek Penguin

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    Replies
    1. Comrade Misfit7/29/2012 8:10 AM

      Even so, then ol' James's cover ID then becomes the subject of a BOLO. And the fact that the CIA/Mossad/MI6 hacked into a database becomes public knowledge. It gets harder and harder to do as time goes on.

      Even Stuxnet only delayed things, everyone knows who was behind it and the Iranians have copies of it. Can you be sure that the people who were able to spoof a RQ-170 drone aren't technically capable of redirecting Stuxnet?

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    2. BadTux7/29/2012 1:26 PM

      There was recently a scandal where the biometric driver's licenses in one state were found in the pockets of illegals. Turns out that these were genuine driver's licenses being sold on the side by state employees.

      OF course, given how incompetent the CIA and Mossad have been of late (compromising the entire Dubai section of Mossad to hit Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh? Really?), that may not be an option...

      Regarding Iran's technical skills, they are quite first-rate. But I won't tell you how many technology companies here in the Silicon Valley get hit by viruses and such despite having the best computer geeks in the world on staff. The usual situation is when some person who is *not* technically astute gets fooled into putting his login credentials into some requester he shouldn't have put them into, a.k.a. "phishing". That compromised login is then used to exploit vulnerable computers elsewhere on the network -- and there's *always* out-of-date computers on a network, some because they're running critical applications that simply won't run with the latest and greatest. Why don't you hear about this on the news? Because it's fugging *embarrassing*, that's why, so we cover it up and never report it to law enforcement. Doh!

      - Badtux the Silicon Valley Penguin

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