Here is an interesting article where Cait Murphy, points out some interesting facts about The Kyoto Treaty and how much America is hated for avoiding it, but in reality, other countries should harbor blame just as much.

But is it? Take a close squint at the numbers, and frankly it looks as if many of the countries that did sign Kyoto share Bush’s concern that the economic pain might outweigh the green gain.

Look at those nice people north of the border: Canada agreed to cut emissions by 6 percent. Whoops. The country is running 24 percent ahead, a lot more than the United States, which is 15.8 percent above 1990 levels. Japan has the same 6 percent target, and is also missing big, by about 13 percent.

–Are you shocked Canadians? Take your comments here.

Source: Fortune

Imagine being overseas and your identity being available for the taking - your nationality, your name, your passport number. Everything.

That’s the fear of privacy and security specialists now that the State Department plans to issue “e-Passports” to American travelers beginning in late August.

Radio Frequency Identification technology, indicated by the symbol, is to be standard in U.S. passports by August 2006.

Here are steps you can take in case you join millions of other Americans and get the bad news. (more)

Privacy experts’ wish list

If these advocates had their way, consumers would gain far more control over their information. (more)

Your ID for sale
From credit bureaus to grocers to unscrupulous brokers, there’s a healthy trade in your good name. (more)

They’ll have radio frequency identification (RFID) tags and are meant to cut down on human error of immigration officials, speed the processing of visitors and safeguard against counterfeit passports.

Yet critics are concerned that the security benefit of RFID technology, which combines silicon chips with antennas to make data accessible via radio waves, could be vastly outweighed by security threats to the passport holder.

“Basically, you’ve given everybody a little radio-frequency doodad that silently declares ‘Hey, I’m a foreigner,’” says author and futurist Bruce Sterling, who lectures on the future of RFID technology. “If nobody bothers to listen, great. If people figure out they can listen to passport IDs, there will be a lot of strange and inventive ways to exploit that for criminal purposes.”

RFID chips are used in security passes many companies issue to employees. They don’t have to be touched to a reader-machine, only waved near it. Following initial objections by security and privacy experts, the State Department added several security precautions.

But experts still fear the data could be “skimmed,” or read remotely without the bearer’s knowledge.

Kidnappers, identity thieves and terrorists could all conceivably commit “contactless” crimes against victims who wouldn’t know they’ve been violated until after the fact.

“The basic problem with RFID is surreptitious access to ID,” said Bruce Schneier security technologist, author and chief technology officer of Counterpane Internet Security, a technology security consultancy. “The odds are zero that RFID passport technology won’t be hackable.”

Source: CNNMoney