An Olympic-Sized Privacy Issue

In hopes of deterring demonstrations (such as unfurling a Tibetan flag) or terrorist attacks at the Olympic games in Beijing this summer, Chinese officials have embedded microchips in the tickets for the opening and closing ceremonies, according to an article posted by The Canadian Press. On the chip will be stored a treasure trove of personal information about the ticket holder, including his or her photograph, passport details, addresses, e-mail and telephone numbers.

The Chinese will use radio frequency identification technology to read the information off the tickets electronically. Privacy experts fear the information can be lifted from the tickets by positioning an RFID reader close enough to a ticket holder to download the information. The criminal can use the information to steal identities.

Some also fear that the checking of identities could cause long lines into the 91,000-seat National Stadium and other venues. (Tickets for all Olympic events have the embedded chips, but the event tickets do not have photos or passport information stored on them.) Germany tried the same technology for soccer’s 2006 World Cup matches and experienced long delays. Officials ended up checking only about 500 to 1,000 tickets per game.

But there may be a bigger shortcoming here, as Roger Clarke, an Australian security professional with the Xamax Consultancy firm in Canberra, points out in the article. Clarke said:

They should be concentrating on sniffing out the kinds of dangerous stuff rather than worrying about the identity of the people with the tickets. The way in which you recognize an evildoer, somebody who wants to throw a bomb, somebody who wants to unfurl a Tibet flag is not on the basis of their identity. It's the act that they perform and it's the materials they carry with them.