Uncle Sam wants to scan your iris and collect your DNA, citizen or not • Hacker News Board

Re: Uncle Sam wants to scan your iris and collect your DNA, citizen or not

#281

Post by lo_zamoyski » Fri, Nov 07, 2025, 2:32 PM UTC

adastra22 wrote: post #277

lo_zamoyski wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not a cause. That's a tautological assertion that obscured by the use of the word "because".

And you have an implied axiomatic assertion that everything must have a cause, even though that necessarily results in an infinite recursion of cause-finding.

Nowhere did I say or imply everything needs a cause. That's your baggage. In fact, it is the exact opposite: that because an infinite regress is incoherent and impossible, there must be some necessary uncaused cause where the buck stops.

"The universe" cannot be that cause, as the universe and everything in it is contingent.

Re: Uncle Sam wants to scan your iris and collect your DNA, citizen or not

#282

Post by caseysoftware » Fri, Nov 07, 2025, 4:23 PM UTC

nozzlegear wrote: post #93

caseysoftware wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The TSA uses facial recognition right now at most US airports. While they claim to not store the pictures, they've "accidentally" stored data many other times they promised not to so consider me skeptical.

I haven't been through an airport in over 10 years, but it was my understanding that you could opt out of the facial scanning stuff? I've asked my wife to do it each time she flies to California, just to see what happens, but she doesn't want to be a nuisance. :\

Yes, I've opted out of it every time so far this year (40+ flights) BUT that only covers the security checkpoint.

Delta also uses it at boarding time and who knows who does what via cameras in the airport as a whole.

Re: Uncle Sam wants to scan your iris and collect your DNA, citizen or not

#283

Post by clanky » Sun, Nov 09, 2025, 9:18 PM UTC

jimbo808 wrote: post #271

clanky wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Do you not realize how much of a constant, non-trivial challenge identifying foreign nationals is for immigration officials? ... These are not citizens, these are foreigners electing to seek the privilege of entering a country that is not their own. Who cares? You used to not even need a passport at all for international travel.

Yeah because international travel was fucking hard, took weeks or months, killed half your party, and I'm going to go out on a limb and guess you didn't exactly have a welcoming party anywhere you went. What a wild take.

Welcoming parties aren't actually a thing, but if you think they are we could always just get rid of those.