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RFID Technology: Where We Are and Where We Might Be
10/18/2004
Some of the first concerns were that RFID tags on clothing might not get "turned off" when purchasers leave a store and thus wearers could be tracked by RFID readers. Those concerns were dismissed by some since RFID is built to work at such close range that readers would have to be practically on top of consumers to identity the tag on their boxer shorts. On the other hand, when students can work with a standard WiFi transmitter and creatively using antennae extend its range out to hundreds of miles, that's a panacea that d'esn't work for me.
The biggest problem with RFID privacy is that so many consumers will want their belongings to be tagged. Now, that works on several levels. I'll address one adult, mature level-and then one from the Millennials (or younger) generation.
Power Supplies and Related Cords!
Just think: What if every detachable piece of a power supply or related cord came tagged with an unremovable, invisible, tiny little RFID tag. In a few years I might be able to wave my PDA at the two complete dresser drawers full of tangled black and white cords (like baby snakes in a snake den) and power boxes in my house and immediately identify which one belongs to the scanner that I last used two years ago and would like to use again. (I know I didn't have to get too graphic at describing that pile because you have one or more like it, too.)
In a really mundane sense, RFID tags might actually let you always use as a pair the same two black socks that you bought at one time-despite their being washed in a load with 15 other "identical-to-the-eye" pairs.
Now, to Party Fun!
Now to our current students, and the new ones coming along. They have their own Web sites, love logos on the instant messenger screen, and leave expressive p'etry as "away" messages. They constantly want to make "statements" about themselves, and what better way than to turn back on the RFID tags on all your belongings so that when you walk into an area, everyone there can immediately understand what your preferences are. Don't think this won't happen. It will.
On the other hand, and perhaps this marks me as a geek (an older geek): Can
you imagine how cool it would be to walk into that party in, say, 2015, wearing
clothes purchased in 2004 and thus being, to the personal area network (PAN)
systems of the other party-g'ers, a figure of deep mystery, unidentifiable with
regard to your consumer choices. That is, unless by then personal grooming products
impart nano-tags that "stick" as you use them and can identify-to
anyone whose PAN can perceive the data-as a user of Breck shampoo, Listerine
mouthwash, "Gray-No-More," and
I'm sure that you can get creative and think of lots of consumer uses of RFID tags. One that I recently read gave the inner child in me great pleasure. It involved using a PDA to read and alter tags inside a large department store. Another suggestion was to dump a box of cockroaches with read/write RFID tags glued to then loose in the same store-after writing the identity of store products onto the mobile tags. Sometimes I wish I could write fiction-there are some good stories there.
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