Outsourcing Passports and Outsourcing Security

One of the benefits of outsourcing to foreign countries is that there is a financial saving. Nevertheless, there is a cost. For the financial benefits, the company or country relinquishes some control. The regulatory legislations are determined by a foreign government. That has been a consistent concern whenever the issue of outsourcing has been raised.

That concern, along with a myriad of security issues, arises when the manufacture of passport components is outsourced to a foreign country. For the average citizen, the passport is one of the most important pieces of documentation. It holds sensitive, confidential information. It is a document that most citizens would guard closely.

Would citizens not be concerned that this guarded document has components outsourced to a foreign country? The probability of counterfeit increases enormously.

“…GPO had contracted with two European companies to produce computer chips with a wire antenna assembled at a plant in Thailand. The company in Thailand, Smartrac, charged in a court filing in Netherlands last year that its technology was stolen by China.”

link: Outsourced passport work scrutinized

Is there no American company that can be financially competitive? With a piece of documentation that most citizens would want secured to the highest degree, what ever happened to “Made in the U.S.A.”?

Catherine Forsythe
Director of Operations
FlyingHamster: http://flyinghamster.com/

Tags: outsourcing, passports, security, made in the u.s.a.