Driver's license swipe. Driver’s license swipe.DENVILLE, NJ — (EXCLUSIVE) — Parents in a New Jersey school district have been notified that visits inside their children’s school will require now an electronic scan of their drivers’ licenses — and soon, a full background check.A letter dated April 21, 2014, explains the new security measures, as decided by the Denville Township Board of Education. In order to keep “students and faculty safe,” the school wishes to record digital information from the visitors’ state-issued ID cards upon each visit beyond the main office.The letter states that each swipe will log the owner’s personal data and will generate a visitor badge.Read the letter below: Police State USA obtained one of the letters from a Denville parent named Dan. After finding the letter in his daughter’s backpack, he expressed concerns over the necessity and effectiveness of such security measures, saying that school tragedies were being used to impose unnecessary restrictions on parents. “A driver’s license scan and background check would not have prevented Adam Lanza from committing the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting No swipe sign-in system would have stopped him.”“A driver’s license scan and background check would not have prevented Adam Lanza from committing the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting,” Dan. “Lanza shot his way through a glass panel next to the locked front entrance doors of the school.
No swipe sign-in system would have stopped him.”The Denville father ‘s objections appear to be founded, as it is unclear how a violent criminal would have been hindered by a lack of a visitor badge. At best, the system should be criticized for offering a false sense of “keeping students and faculty safe” when it will do nothing of the sort. At worst, the swipes represent an unwelcome invasion of privacy and a compromise of personal ID security.“It is offensive that they are using the deaths of 20 children as an excuse to tighten their grip,” Dan said.The Denville Township School District is comprised of two elementary schools (grades K-5), and one middle school (grades 6-8). The security measures will affect the parents of approximately 2,000 students.That is, unless citizens object loudly before the system is launched. Contact information for the district superintendent is listed below.Accountability CheckAre ID scans a fair, effective, and desirable policy?
Let the Board of Education know.Catherine Mozak:Phone: (973) 983-6530. Am frustrated as to what to do about this; our school district in South-central Pennsylvania is contracting with the Raptor system, violating dunno-how-many Constitutional amendments, yet it seems everyone around the country is accepting this warrentless search as fine, since it’s to “protect the children.” (Quick question: how many people who wish to do harm to our children register in the office in teh first place?)Is there any organized resistance to this nonsense? Or are the few of us who refuse to allow this nonsense all on our own?
I was at a Target store recently and threw a bottle of wine in my cart to bring as a gift to a party. Later, when I got to the register, the cashier asked to see my ID. That in itself was silly, because it’s safe to say I’m a few years past the point where anyone might mistake me for someone under 21. But whatever; alcohol age-enforcement has gotten bureaucratic beyond all reason.
I held the ID up for her to see. Before I could react, she took my license from my fingers, held it up to a scanner, and BEEP! Presto: all the information on my license (I had to assume) was flashed into Target Corporation’s computer system. In my state that includes height, weight, sex, date of birth, full legal name, address, driver’s license number, need for corrective lenses, and organ donor status. Some states’ licenses contain even more information. But the only thing the cashier really needed was to see the year of birth on my license—actually, just the last two digits would be enough. “I didn’t give you permission to do that!” I objected to her.
But the deed was done. At a minimum, this aggressive grabbing of my personal information by Target was just plain rude. It was also a potentially significant invasion of my privacy (more on this issue and ). There are a lot of permissionless seizures of our private information taking place these days, but usually they don’t take such a physical form. Target’s, unlike many companies’, does address not only their web site but also their offline practices.
But (like so many other companies’) it is so broad that it imposes few restrictions on what they do. Bars, of course, also routinely ask people for their IDs—and the scanning of licenses by some bars has been reported for years. In 2002, the NYT that some bars were using data from patrons’ licenses to compile databases for marketing purposes. There are reports of bars in the US and Canada moving toward using this infrastructure to of supposed troublemakers (which raises not only privacy but also abuse and due process concerns). European colleagues report that several countries there have made towards combining ID checks and blacklists in order to block alleged “troublemakers” from traveling to or visiting certain areas. Other private-sector blacklists are also being created.
Some retailers, for example, require customers who are returning an item to permit their driver’s licenses to be swiped so that their returns can be tracked and a of individuals who have made too many returns. Not long after the Target incident, I went to a meeting hosted in a fancy Washington, D.C. Law firm building that, judging by its security procedures, apparently thinks it’s #1 on Al Qaeda’s hit list. As in many buildings, the security guard asked to see my ID—standard silly security—and once again, before I could object: BEEP! My license was data-dumped. I never expected this from a building security checkpoint. I was very annoyed, and started to give the guard a piece of my mind, but like the Target cashier, he was of course just following the instructions he’d been given, and there was nothing to be done.
So now I have to presume that the security people at some unnamed building management company have all the information on my driver’s license. (The guard claimed the information was not retained but just used to print me out a temporary badge, but I can’t know how much credence to put in that.) “Enough of this,” I thought, and while I was upstairs in that meeting, I took the very simple step of tearing a strip off my “Hello my name is” nametag sticker and covering up the barcodes on the back of my driver’s license. Here is a picture of the back of my license: The back of my driver’s license, with sticker covering bar codes That should thwart the next person who tries to grab all my ID information without permission.
At the very least, I am now able to enter into a negotiation before any swiping takes place. If someone has a need to scan my license that I recognize as legitimate, such as a police officer who has pulled me over for speeding, the sticker is easily removable. (State laws usually ban “altering” a driver’s license, but it would be hard to imagine anyone claiming that placement of a temporary, easily removable sticker on the back surface of one’s license, with no fraudulent intent, could be a violation of such laws.
However, any kind of more permanent erasure of a barcode is probably not a good idea.) Note that a few states, including California, and, have passed laws limiting third-party access to, and retention of, information on driver’s licenses. The American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators has proposed imposing such restrictions, but it is not clear that many states have adopted it.
There are a couple of broader points to make about this experience. First, this is one of those all-too-rare cases in which you can take a simple and direct action to protect a little bit of your privacy, which so often is a matter of social policy over which the individual has little control other than through the democratic political process. There’s not much you can do to prevent records being kept of your comings and goings if you use an electronic toll pass, for example—or, credit cards. Second, this incident is a reminder of our need for comprehensive data privacy laws that institute the —rules recognized around the world as minimum standards for fair treatment of individuals.
Finally, there has been talk from time to time about putting RFID chips into driver’s licenses. We have fought for a number of years against the inclusion of RFIDs in identity documents of any kind, not only because of the they raise, but also because of just the kind of thing I’m talking about here—the potential that stores, restaurants and bars, office buildings, etc., will install devices for routinely reading these IDs, leading to an infrastructure for pervasive tracking—and following that, control (for example, through the use of blacklists to exclude certain people from certain places). Passports and Enhanced Driver’s Licenses used for border crossing in some states such as New York, Vermont, Michigan and Washington, already contain RFID chips, but they are probably not common enough that stores or bars would invest in the infrastructure for reading them – at least so far, that we’ve heard of. It’s bad enough to have someone scan your driver’s license without asking—at least you can take control of that as I have done. It would be far worse if they could do so from across the room without you even knowing, or being able to stop it. Recently, I went back to Target, and added a bottle of wine to my cart to see how they would handle my new, sticker-sporting license.
This time, the cashier was ordered by her computer to get my ID from me because I was buying a bottle of soda—before I’d even taken the wine out of my cart. “This happens a lot,” said the nice cashier, adding that while the soda appeared to be some kind of bug, there were other non-alcohol products that persistently required that the cashiers scan IDs.
Internet reports indicate some stores are requiring ID scans for sales and even, for example. She took my ID and tried to scan it; when it didn’t work she didn’t bat an eye, as apparently it’s routine that some IDs are “non-scannable.” She had to call a supervisor to over-ride her computer’s insistence that she scan an ID.
I called Target to ask them about their policy and they emailed me a statement that said: Swiping a guest’s ID allows Target to verify the age or identity of guests with a simple process. It also allows Target to control the sale and distribution of restricted products. When swiping a guest’s ID, Target only retains the data that is relevant to the type of transaction. For example, in the case of your alcohol purchase, only your date of birth was retained with the receipt. Information obtained during the ID swipe is not used for any other purposes.
It is very good to hear that they don’t retain all the data from scanned licenses or use it for other purposes. Though, I don’t see why they have to retain date of birth, which is a powerful piece of information frequently used to uniquely identify a person and disentangle their data from others’. I am going to leave that sticker on my license.
Companies are in the business of making money, and as long as nobody stops them, they are likely to continue using every stratagem at hand to collect our personal information that is so valuable to them. There are two ways to stop them: A) enacting laws, and B) consumer pressure. The first is vital, and we need to keep working on that, but meanwhile shoppers should take whatever small steps they can to defend their data from grasping hands. In Utah they made a change in liquor laws but had to make some negotiations with The Church of Jesus Christ of Later Day Saints to do so. Utah use to require membership in a bar or club before you can buy any liquor. This was removed and in it's place is a law requiring bars and clubs to scan a persons drivers license in order to stop underage drinkers from forging license which was a concern by the LDS church if the membership requirement was dropped.
In addition, the police received and are currently using state of the art license plate scanners in the parking lots of bars. With the drivers license information and platescans, I wouldn't be surprised if the local police have compiled a database of people who frequent bars to treat as potential DUI drivers for frequenting bars even if the person could be a designated driver and not drink. It's scary what is collected and stored by the government and private industry and there should be privacy laws to protect us from abuses by all levels of the Government and also private industry. Seeking an attorney to begin a class action suit against Target Stores for this unauthorized ID scanning debacle.
A website can be established and then upset customers, like me and hundreds or thousands of others, will contribute a few dollars that in the aggregate will cover attorney’s fees to get this started. Target cashiers are obviously under some distress over being forced by supervisors to do the unauthorized scanning. Their deposition testimony will be interesting. Subpoena’s of Target’s scanned ID data will also be very interesting.
Rather than simply bitch on these complaint websites, let’s get organized and stand up for what’s right! I have in the past successfully requested that my license is inspected visually by a supervisor, upon which the supervisor enters my d.o.b. And her id code to authorize the scan override.
This almost always works. Today however, the supervisor claimed it could not be done. She refused to even try. I left all my merchandise at the register (everything, not just the item that required ID) and walked out. After I got home I lodged a complaint with the complaint dept. I am not too worried about giving my date of birth because I pay cash so it's useless information.
But I really like the sticky strip. I will do that in case they try pull a fast one on me. Another option is not to let the license leave your hand. Ok conspiracy theorists, get a life. As a target cashier, people like you make me hate my job. The government has no access to your information, as told by target privacy policy. If you're so goddamn unhappy with people scanning your license, your doomed to shop happily anywhere.
There's more important things to scanning a license than your hissy fit, like kids overdosing on medicines or dying from an attempt at getting high off of compressed air, or the meth lab in your neighborhood due to an over buying of NyQuil/DayQuil. Get over yourself and stop attempting to put millions of target employees out of work by a fucking lawsuit.
Do both of us a favor and stop shopping there. Please an thank you.
Ps you're a paranoid freak. It is not necessary to scan a driver's license to verify your age or compile a list of shoppers who purchase things such as Sudafed (for which they could use your driver's license number as it is more anonymous than your name yet identifiable by law enforcement if need be). They are collecting your name, address, ht, wt, gender and FACIAL RECOGNITION information (this data is coded into your license) and retaining every bit of it. They have the ability to tie it to your receipt, the items you purchased, your in store 'customer loyalty card,' any charge cards you use for payment AND a facial recognition program that sees you the moment you enter the store. They can use it to send your phone targeted advertising paid for by the good folks at Johnson & Johnson, Nestle or Coca-Cola, depending on what your spending habits are. Your purchase records can also be used against you in court (been done already). Finally, CEO compensation and upper level management greed is what takes money from the working man, not lawsuits brought about by people spending their valuable time to protect my rights.
Anyone who has scanned your license can change their privacy policies, get hacked, or otherwise compromise your basic right to privacy and anonymity at any time. They are compiling valuable personal data that once out of the bag cannot be put back in. It is not necessary to scan a driver's license to verify your age or compile a list of shoppers who purchase things such as Sudafed (for which they could use your driver's license number as it is more anonymous than your name yet identifiable by law enforcement if need be). They are collecting your name, address, ht, wt, gender and FACIAL RECOGNITION information (this data is coded into your license) and linking it to your receipt, the items purchased, your in store 'customer loyalty card,' any charge cards you use for payment AND a facial recognition program that sees you the moment you enter the store.
They can send your phone targeted advertising paid for by the good folks at Johnson & Johnson, Nestle or Coca-Cola depending on how you shop. Your purchase records can also be used against you in court (been done already). Anyone who has scanned your license can change their privacy policies, get hacked, or otherwise compromise your basic right to privacy and anonymity at any time. They are compiling valuable personal data that once out of the bag cannot be put back in. Finally, CEO compensation and upper level management greed is what takes money from the working man, not lawsuits brought about by people spending their valuable time to protect my rights.