Thursday, March 30, 2006

Fingerprinting schoolchildren

Reminding us that unquestioning acceptance of technology by authority should be a major concern, The Guardian reports schools fingerprinting children

The problem with these schemes is that they tend to be promoted by glib salesmen whose only interest is making quota that month to technologically naive administrators who want the latest shiny toys. It only takes a few people discovering unforseen privacy holes to create a serious backlash.

I do not know whether Diebold's election systems are secure against tampering or not. But I am confidident that at this point it does not matter a jot. It is not a question of if the whole lot ends up in the landfill but when. Public confidence has been lost, it is unlikely to be recovered.

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