My brother just got his slick new U.S. passport in the mail a few weeks ago. Embedded right in the blue cover is a little radio frequency identification chip which the government says are easier to scan and designed to deter passport forgers. Most people might not even have noticed that their new passport has a chip. Starting in January, all newly issued passports have them. This makes me slightly uncomfortable.
Now let me present this hypothetical scenario. What if you personally could be tracked everywhere you went on campus? From the time you parked your 1999 Camry to your walk through the Oval, your bathroom break in Arps and your final destination in Ramseyer 166. You might think this already happens and in some cases, this is true through the use of cameras on campus. Yes, we know Big Brother is watching us. However, is he also tracking us too?
RFID can do exactly that. The toll booth technology that allows for special "speed lanes" relies on this. So what if your Buck ID had a chip in it? Most of us carry it all the time. Scanners could easily be placed on every doorway in every building. It could be possible to track your every campus move which can easily identify you. Unlike security cameras where unless something bad occurs, we often remain somewhat anonymous, the RFIDs can follow your every move. Creepy in my book. So I have an ounce of Ron Paul blood in me.
Sure, this is an extreme example but the point is to get you to think about what the future might hold. Pekoe the Irish Setter and Pumpkin your fat tabby cat may already have chips implanted in them. I believe this is a good idea in case you are separated from your beloved pet (think of the pets reunited after Hurricane Katrina) or Simba takes herself for a walk while you left the front door open. No matter how intelligent Lu the Maltepoo is, it can not speak for itself, thus the chip implant is a good thing.
Now what if we all had chips implanted with our personal information? Is this good for medical emergencies? Who do we know is scanning and reading us? Ah, the conversation becomes more ethical and more complex. What value to do we place on our own privacy? I do not mind when my passport is scanned at U.S. Customs when I enter or leave a country. I think that is because I have direct control of this in terms of I know it is happening and I can physically see it.
If I had the new passport, I do not know though if I walk in to a building in London it could be potentially be read. That would freak me out to be tracked like that. Of course the argument of Big Brother has always been people not doing anything wrong have nothing to worry about. I find that a better argument for security cameras. One would have to spend significant time to attach a name to the countless hours of film footage. However with an RFID, all you would have to do is use the computer technology to conduct a Google-style search. You could print out every single person who walked in to the Younkin Center today. This is different than with the card readers the residence halls have or other buildings on campus for security purposes. In these situations, you are well aware that this is happening.
With these tracking chips, you might not know if you are being tracked (or even if something you own has one). Although we may say there will be such encryption and other protections in place to secure the data, I find little comfort here. It did not take hackers a heck of a lot of time to make mince meat of the Apple iPhone. Security breaches of our private information at our colleges and universities seem to be a weekly debacle that may end up in the Vegas betting boards soon. Place your bets now, folks - what is your privacy worth?
Seth Fishman is a doctoral student in higher education administration. He can be reached at fishman.31@osu.edu.
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