Chertoff on REAL ID – a Little Off on IT

by on April 4, 2008 · 0 comments

I have a new blog post on Cato@Liberty about a recent sit-down that DHS Secretary Chertoff had with a select group of bloggers. Below the video, a further item:

TLF-exclusive update!: I just noticed that Secretary Chertoff describes the machine-readable zone in REAL ID as if it is literally the sequence of letters and numbers in the MRZ of the passport. In fact, the REAL ID regulation calls for the use of a 2D barcode standard. A 2D barcode can hold quite a bit more information per unit of surface area and, of course, it can’t be interpreted by the eye as the MRZ on a passport can.

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About Jim Harper

Jim Harper is the Director of Information Policy Studies at The Cato Institute, the Editor of Web-based privacy think-tank Privacilla.org, and the Webmaster of WashingtonWatch.com. A Poli Sci major at the University of California at Santa Barbara, Jim served as Editor-in-Chief of the Hastings Constitutional Law Quarterly in his final year at Hastings College of the Law. Prior to becoming a policy analyst and advocate, Jim served as counsel to committees in both the U.S. House and Senate. He avoids genuine life experience by watching lots and lots of reality TV.

Read more articles by Jim Harper.

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