RFID in Japan

Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) is planning to introduce so-called "IC Resident Cards" for foreign residents in Japan. The cards would contain personal information such as: passport info, resident status, nationality, address and school/work info (fingerprint data would not be mandatory). These cards would also be used for improving some services for foreign residents (e.g., at local goverment offices), however, this doesn't seem like the primary objective for introducing the cards, or is it?

A couple of articles I found (including the one below) were not clear as to whether RFID would likely be used or not. I'd like to know which - isn't it important?

via Nikkei Net, June 7, 2005, in Japanese

Posted by konomi at June 7, 2005 11:10 PM | TrackBack