Electronic passports – from secure specifications to secure implementations

For some years more and more countries have been introducing electronic passports. A reason for that is the need of higher security of travel documents in an age where people fear terrorism and crime. There are the US requirements for VISA Waiver countries to issue biometric enabled Passports and the European Commission's decision for a chip based storage of facial image and fingerprints in passports issued by EU member states. In this article standards for ePassports in terms of security and the implementations of security mechanisms are analysed.