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MartijnHols · 10 months ago
One thing to consider is that if you were to succeed in placing hidden text/image on an ID card, it may fail manual forgery checks at airports and police stations. One of the many ways IDs are checked is with different types of lighting[1]. This might have made this stand out as an artifact, which could result in an officer doubting its legitimacy.

[1] https://www.airport-suppliers.com/supplier-press-release/the...

tW4r · 10 months ago
weinzierl · 10 months ago
In Germany there is a discussion about only allowing approved photographers for passport photos and them sending the pictures directly to the authorities.

They are also very picky about the images here. When I got a new passport recently they investigated my images thoroughly with a magnifying glass and almost rejected them because of a few white pixels you could not see with the naked eye. Only when they saw that the pixels were different between multiple copies they conclude that it was probably a printer issue and found one copy that had almost none which they accepted.

I think authorities are well aware of the risk mentioned in the article here.

thesimon · 10 months ago
> In Germany there is a discussion

The discussion concluded with it being codified into law. How it's gonna work apparently is that the image will be stored E2E-encrypted in the cloud and at the photographer you'll get a barcode that contains the URL to the image and the key to decrypt it. To upload the image into the cloud, the photographer will need to use a secure ID card to sign in.

https://www.bsi.bund.de/SharedDocs/Downloads/DE/BSI/Publikat...

Was kinda interested in building software for this, but it feels like you need to pay a lot of people for fancy audits.

WelcomeShorty · 10 months ago
In Switzerland we're one step ahead: ID photos get taken at the counter where they're issued.

You get 2, 3 takes and pick the best. Efficient and secure.

docdeek · 10 months ago
France has already got something similar: the e-photo. https://refugies.info/en/procedure/63528e00976acb4f7bcd37ad
pomian · 10 months ago
Very cool discussion and ideas. A true HN article. Need to translate though - unless of course you are Polish.
antonpirker · 10 months ago
This reminds me of Nico Alm who was wearing a colander as hat on his picture of his passport. He argued that religious hats are allowed and he is a pastafari :-)
poisonborz · 10 months ago
Why use the most often scanned and scrutinized item in your inventory? Why not a family photo in your wallet or a fake discount card?

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