Monday, 7 August 2006

Biometrics Passport can be Easily Hacked

UK’s 415 million euros biometric scheme to load passports with information such as fingerprints, facial scans and iris patterns is in jeopardy now. Reportedly, the biometric solution, used by UK and other countries, have been cloned by a German security consultant.

According to Lukas Grunwald, a consultant with DN-Systems, told a Defcon security conference in Las Vegas that the data, stored on RFID chips, could be copied on to blank chips which could then be used in fake passports.

Lukas ruled out the various claims that information copied on RFID is safe and cannot be copied. He said the investment in RFID is a complete waste as it is not going to help address the security solution.

Lukas said that he discovered the flaw in just two weeks and it would not take long for the hackers to follow suit to hack any new British passport.

This biometric solution was started with the aimed of helping officials distinguish between official documents and forged ones. The chip is signed by the issuing country contain RFID chips with physical identification information.

Though the information cannot be changed when entered on to a blank chip; the cloned chip can allow an automated entry. Changing the information in a clone chip would immediately alert the authorities.