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Who wants to watch a match at the 2006 World Cup will have to let himself be probed to the core. First, there will be personal profiles made through a questionnaire, profiles which can then be linked to a movement profile by a spychip (RFID) in the ticket. “The World Cup is being abused by sponsors and the surveillance industry to introduce snooping-technology and to spy on the fans,” Rena Tangens, co-director of FoeBuD e.V. from Bielefeld (Germany), criticises. And this affects not only the lucky few who will actually gain entrance to the stadiums but everyone who tries to apply for one of the tickets from 1 February onwards. Applications can only be made through the internet and many fans will be left empty-handed in the end.
Not only will fans spark their teams – each and every one of their entrance tickets sends out waves, too. Small RFID-spychips (RFID = Radio Frequency IDentification) will, allegedly, enhance security at the World Cup matches – a miracle cure against terrorists, hooligans and black marketers they are.
Or are they? “Spychips will prevent no brawls, no scuffles, no assaults, no outbursts of fury,” says padeluun, another board member of Germany-based association of data-protection and civil rights advocates FoeBuD e.V.. “On the contrary, they create the illusion that surveillance is the same as security.”
Starting on Monday, 24 Jan. 2005, the Organising Committee of the FIFA World Cup will publish details on the ordering of tickets. What has leaked out already is that the tickets can be “applied for” (and only) via the internet from 1 Feb. onwards. Already in the relating questionnaire (lately the officials have resorted to euphemistically calling it “wish list”) you have to lay open a lot of personal data, e.g. your date of birth, passport number, telephone and fax number, e-mail, bank or credit-card data, as well as your team and club preferances. And fans are not only to hand over their own data but also that of others in whose name they want to order tickets. These data will then not only be used for your application but also made accessible to the sponsors and other countries which are participating in the World Cup. “Who in Nigeria has got any legitimate concern with my data? Why does sponsor Philips need to know which club I am a fan of? And what right do I have to pass on personal data of my friend for whom I am ordering a ticket as a birthday gift?”, FoeBuD co-director padeluun criticises.
Officials try to justify this disproportionate hoarding of data by saying that one wants to sift out notorious trouble makers. And many millions of fans are supposed to have themselves X-rayed for that. “It is preposterous that DFB (the German Football Association) and FIFA will hand out the tickets only if one exposes sensitive data of oneself and others. The fans should not submit to this,” is FoeBuD’s Rena Tangens’ advice. “They should demand from the DFB that this procedure be changed and the questionnaire be reduced to the actually relevant data needed, such as the return address for the ticket. Till then fans should boycott the World Championship, for their own security. There are considerable threats to their privacy. Data that have been given away can never be got back.”
The tickets, which by the way will be issued only a short time before the actual matches in spring 2006, are to be equipped with RFID chips. (More about the technology in our FAQ). These chips can be read out secretly, which means that the fans will no longer notice when, where and by whom they will be controlled. This makes the establishment of perfect profiles of movement through the stadium possible. Reading devices can be placed not only at the entrance but also at the gates to the individual blocks, at the fan-merchandising shop, at the toilets. Security personnel could even carry handheld readers. And the people responsible (DFB? FIFA? Private security services? Other services?) will know at any time who is where. This generates masses of data which again can be made accessible to all who are involved with the World Cup and which might be of considerable interest to the sponsors.
All that this technology is about is spying upon the fans, says Helmut Baeumler, former Data Protection Officer of the German Federal State of Schleswig-Holstein. In an interview with German TV network ARD he said already some months ago:
“It isn’t about the ticket so much, the ticket itself is not important. It is ‘which person is in the stadium’ what one wants to find out. And as much as I understand that one wants to recognise and ward off hooligans in time - here one can see what this technology leads to, namely, surveillance of the people.”
Resistance is forming already. The German “Buendnis Aktiver Fussball-Fans” (Association of Active Football Fans, "BAFF") held a conference in December 2004, titled: "Datenschutz, Ueberwachung und WM 2006 - Fussball-Fans als Versuchskaninchen?" (“Data Protection, Surveillance and the 2006 Football World Championship: Football Fans as Guinea Pigs?”) And that resistance does make a difference was shown early in 2004 by the “Metro”-example (“Metro” is one of the world’s five biggest retail conglomerates): After FoeBuD’s protests the company had to recall its RFID-bugged customer cards.
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