Passports with radio frequency identification (RFID) chips will be issued by the U.S. Department in August 2007, despite concerns raised by a number of security experts. The department will start distribution from its Denver, CO, office. The rest of the agencys 17 passport facilities will have them by mid-2007. The goal is to have all U.S. passports incorporated with personal biometric information by 2017. The passports will conform to the standards of the Montreal-based International Civil Aviation Organization, a standards body within the United Nations. The passports also gained support from some 27 countries. Security experts warned that passports using so-called contactless chips can be accessed by hackers because they can only be read by a scanner within four inches. Security analysts are wary that a technology could be developed to read a contactless RFID chip from long distances. However, other security experts think that such fears over RFID chips are not realistic, saying that it would be far more difficult for terrorists to have valid passports now. The electronic passports feature a unique identifying number that will make it easy for law enforcement agencies to track the chip. The RFID chip also offers an extra memory space that allows additional biometric information such as fingerprint images to be stored in the future. By issuing the electronic passports, the State Department has met its deadline after a successful beta-testing in 2005.