Topic: Secret Code in Color Printers Lets Government Track You

[Pandora]

Tiny Dots Show Where and When You Made Your Print

San Francisco - A research team led by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) recently broke the code behind tiny tracking dots that some color laser printers secretly hide in every document.

The U.S. Secret Service admitted that the tracking information is part of a deal struck with selected color laser printer manufacturers, ostensibly to identify counterfeiters. However, the nature of the private information encoded in each document was not previously known.

"We've found that the dots from at least one line of printers encode the date and time your document was printed, as well as the serial number of the printer," said EFF Staff Technologist Seth David Schoen.

You can see the dots on color prints from machines made by Xerox, Canon, and other manufacturers (for a list of the printers we investigated so far, see: http://www.eff.org/Privacy/printers/list.php). The dots are yellow, less than one millimeter in diameter, and are typically repeated over each page of a document. In order to see the pattern, you need a blue light, a magnifying glass, or a microscope (for instructions on how to see the dots, see: http://www.eff.org/Privacy/printers/docucolor/).

...

You can decode your own Xerox DocuColor prints using EFF's automated program at http://www.eff.org/Privacy/printers/docucolor/index.php#program.

Xerox previously admitted that it provided these tracking dots to the government, but indicated that only the Secret Service had the ability to read the code. The Secret Service maintains that it only uses the information for criminal counterfeit investigations. However, there are no laws to prevent the government from abusing this information.

"Underground democracy movements that produce political or religious pamphlets and flyers, like the Russian samizdat of the 1980s, will always need the anonymity of simple paper documents, but this technology makes it easier for governments to find dissenters," said EFF Senior Staff Attorney Lee Tien. "Even worse, it shows how the government and private industry make backroom deals to weaken our privacy by compromising everyday equipment like printers. The logical next question is: what other deals have been or are being made to ensure that our technology rats on us?"

EFF is still working on cracking the codes from other printers and we need the public's help. Find out how you can make your own test pages to be included in our research at http://www.eff.org/Privacy/printers/wp.php#testsheets.

H/T Vox Populi

[Weisshaupt]

Hey did you know that most Hotels have "business centers"  for the guests to pop in and print out airline boarding passes and such, and that often these are located just off the lobby, and unless you look like a hobo, no one will question you using them?  Likewise, did you know that most hotels offer free wireless internet without login in the lobby as well?

Seriously though,  I can't see how they would track the code to a specific printer without a search.  I suppose they could eventually get a public IP off a networked machine, which could give them a hint, but a printer used in isolation would have to be found physically.  Of course now the code is known, I would expect "clean" roms to show up you can load that will eradicate the dots.

Sort of reminds me of Orson Scott Cards's Ender books. The characters  started embedding a code in images, just changing a pixel here and there  and then posting it.  Seriously,  just because the government can monitor/record  you, doesn't mean they have the means or manpower to  finding and decrypting conversations. The internet is the largest and best weapon and defense against the government we have-- which is why they are so keen on trying to find ways of shutting it down.


 

[Pandora]

Hey did you know that most Hotels have "business centers"  for the guests to pop in and print out airline boarding passes and such, and that often these are located just off the lobby, and unless you look like a hobo, no one will question you using them?  Likewise, did you know that most hotels offer free wireless internet without login in the lobby as well?

Hey, no, I did not know that.  That's very interesting.

Seriously though,  I can't see how they would track the code to a specific printer without a search.  I suppose they could eventually get a public IP off a networked machine, which could give them a hint, but a printer used in isolation would have to be found physically.  Of course now the code is known, I would expect "clean" roms to show up you can load that will eradicate the dots.

Oh, it would take a search, in more ways than one, but if they've got the printer's serial number (that is recorded by some machines), I do not believe it is that difficult to find.

Sort of reminds me of Orson Scott Cards's Ender books. The characters  started embedding a code in images, just changing a pixel here and there  and then posting it.  Seriously,  just because the government can monitor/record  you, doesn't mean they have the means or manpower to  finding and decrypting conversations. The internet is the largest and best weapon and defense against the government we have-- which is why they are so keen on trying to find ways of shutting it down.

Yes it is, and yes they do.  It is important to me, though, to know about this as "it shows how the government and private industry make backroom deals to weaken our privacy by compromising everyday equipment like printers".


 

[Alphabet Soup]

Maybe I should change my tagline back to "Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to get you"...

I checked the list - my printer isn't on it. No matter since there's no paper on it anyway - I bartered for it.

We've known for years that the libs who faithfully maintain the porno-pool - AKA public library computers - offer the easiest anonymous conduit to the intarwebz. I can go that one better. I learned a while ago how to run a laptop off of a CD-ROM. There's no 'paper trail' because there's no personalization. No cookies because there's nowhere for the OS to write them. No tracking info. Perform whatever task you need to perform and then shut it down and everything you did is erased from your machine never to be reclaimed.

...just sayin 

[Libertas]

Just think what else is out there we don't know about...