|
|
|
| Apprehension over radio frequency ID tags in shops |
| Saturday, April 08, 2006 at 17:07 by Simon Spicer |
Supermarkets are introducing a new technology called an RFID tag (radio frequency ID tag), which are smart labels that consist of a tiny chip surrounded by a coiled antenna. The RFID will be the replacement of the barcode we are all familiar with, however While barcodes need to be manually scanned, the RFID simply broadcasts its data to electronic readers.
This has some benefits for both companies and the consumer, but many people are worried about the use of the data by big brother.
People are concerned that these labels may be used not to keep track of the produce, but of the person who bought the product, for example you may discard some rubbish in a bin which later becomes a crime scene thus linking you to the scene of that crime. You might purchase a private or sensitive product which could be tracked and linked to you personally and once the price of the technology drops you start to ask yourself who has the ability to read these chips and what will they do with the information gathered?
One solution being floated is the idea of killing the code on the chip as customers leave the shop, the main problem here being how do you know when the signal is dead?
Whatever happens it's looking like your shopping trips will never be the same again. |
|
| |
 
|
|
| If the chip is on the packaging like the barcode it should not be a serious problem. |
|
|
| I dont like this. Its too Orwellian. |
|
|
| I say destroy the tags yourself. Don't depend on the store to do it for you. If you live in an area where incinerators are legal, burn your trash. If not, I guess you could just throw it in the wood chipper. Mulched garbage! On a serious note, even if an RFID tag is in every product you buy there will be a point when sifting through your trash would be easier to do physically than with an RFID scanner, particularly if you know what you're looking for. |
|
|
| The privacy concerns are a bit vague.....if you discard some rubbish and it's then near a crime scene, how does that relate back to you? The RFID chip contains no information about you. Then when it says, you purchase a private and sensitive product which could be tracked and linked to you personally....what exactly is that product? Mobile phones in america are already mandated to have to record location information about themselves, and your personal details are registered against the phone, so that is a much more obvious threat than RFID.
|
|
|
| It can be related back to you pretty simply, actually. You pull the RFID tag from the item, which should allow you to identify which store it was bought from. Shouldn't be hard to track from sales records which debit or credit card purchased that particular item.
Personally, linking RFID to stuff like "your discarded items may link you to a crime scene" is somewhat of a stretch; the emphasis should be on, how are they going to use RFID to track individual movements? The area where I work is looking at that very subject, justifying it as "we need to be able to track people during emergency evacuations." |
|
|
| There is a concern that RFID tags embedded in credit cards and driver's licenses may make the presence and contents of such cards detectable by anyone with an RFID reader.
To answer that concern, we have an easy way to make RFID tagged cards normally invisible, but active when you want them to be.
Background: RFID tags are appearing everywhere. They can be
embedded in plastic cards such as credit cards, id cards, passports and other places. There are privacy concerns about these tags being read without the owners knowledge.
Solution: "RFID Shield" lets you choose when your tags are readable.
Information about the RFID Shield is at:
http://smarttools.home.att.net/rfshield.htm |
|
|
| Actually, as was put out about a week or two ago, simply wrapping your cards in aluminum foil will interfere with the signal.
Kind of like the old 60's-70's thing about wrapping your head in foil.... |
|
|
| I understand (I think) how this would make life easier on the compaines, with things like... stocking the shelves. But really, how does this make life easier on me or you? What's so hard about the bar code? All that's required is some ink to label the package. Where does this help the consumer at? |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
