If your passport is due to expire soon, you might want to consider renewing it earlier than usual-- like now. The State Department has plans to put an embedded computer chip in passports, as early as next year, that raise serious privacy concerns. Critics charge the information can be viewed from several feet away by utlizing a practice called "skimming." It's not just the ACLU that is concerned: Britain, Canada and Germany are chiming in as well.

This is like putting an invisible bull's-eye on Americans that can be seen only by the terrorists," said Barry Steinhardt, the director of the A.C.L.U. Technology and Liberty Program. "If there's any nation in the world at the moment that could do without such a device, it is the United States."

The organization wants the State Department to take security precautions like encrypting the data, so that even if it is downloaded by unauthorized people, it cannot be understood.

Think of it like a "smart card" used at the subway turnstiles or toll booths. The card will soon be required of all visitors to the U.S. who are considered low security (because of the country they are traveling from)and don't need a visa: