TechDirt reports:
In a letter sent recently from Senator Ron Wyden to two of his colleagues who head the Committee on Rules & Administration, it's noted that (incredibly) the ID cards used by Senate Staffers only appear to have a smart chip in them. Instead of the real thing, some genius just decided to put a photo of a smart chip [PDF] on each card, rather than an actual smart chip. This isn't security by obscurity, it's... bad security through cheap Photoshopping. From our Senate.
Moreover, in contrast to the executive branch's widespread adoption of PIV cards with a smart chip, most Senate staff ID cards have a photo of a chip printed on them, rather than a real chip. Given the significant investment by the executive branch in smart chip based two-factor authentication, we should strongly consider issuing our staff real chip-based ID cards and then using those chips as a second factor.
(Score: 4, Funny) by VLM on Monday May 08 2017, @12:44PM
Note, when you're taking the IT certification test for "Personal Identity Verification", a reasonably effective form of birth control is a photocopy of a picture of a condom. The good news is if the photograph fails (hole torn in it, maybe a pinhole in the photograph, etc), the result is merely a photograph of a baby. My wallet came with a photograph of a baby in the picture holders, first, is my wife trying to tell me something, and second, makes me wonder about the source of the wallet's soft smooth leather.