RFID Will Stop Terrorists?

W33dz writes "Retailers and manufacturers around the world are enamored with the new radio frequency identification, or RFID, devices. The problem? What about when a thief or the police want to find out what you have in your house? Oddly enough, according to a Wired magazine article, the United States' largest food companies and retailers will try to win Dept of Homeland Security approval for radio identification devices by portraying the technology as an essential tool for keeping the nation's food supply safe from terrorists. This will give them blanket immunity from all law suits related to the product."

Comments

Article has wrong focus

[corebreech]

The danger isn't in criminals scanning your home to see what you have, but rather the government installing/having access to scanners in public places that will allow them to track your movements.

Obviously, these things aren't just going to be attached to foodstuffs. They'll be used in clothing and other personal effects that you'll carry with you at all times.

The article fails to mention this. Frankly, the article reads like the sort of propaganda piece the industry would put out.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[robmandu]

Yah... illegal search & seizure and all that jazz.

Think how cool it would be for the individual though. You could instantaneously inventory your belongings. Lost your keys... just whistle up the RFID embedded in your keychain.

What I'd like to see is a way to uniquely setup "ownership" of RFIDs. Like you enter your uid and pwd into a scanner, and all of "your" RFIDs in range reply.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you might want to loosen that tinfoil a bit. It's cutting off circulation to your brain.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[corebreech]

What you describe sounds an awful lot like WozNet.

And that would be great, provided it wasn't corrupted too, that is, that governments weren't able to hijack the system and use it to track its citizens.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[b-baggins]

Illegal being the key word in your post. It would be an illegal search and seizure. That means against the law. Quit watching so much TV and get a life. Not every cop or government bureaucrat is part of some conspiratorial covert operation to track your every movement. For one, the government isn't that competent, and secondly, you simply aren't worth the effort, your own delusions of grandeur notwithstanding.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[swordofstars]

Thank you. Is refreshing to see that there are people out there who realize the fundimental problem with government doing ANYTHING is that it takes inneumerable signatures, and approvals before it goes forward. The whole process is more bloated than an MS product.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[kableh]

Right, unless it involves "suspected terrorists", then you don't even need a warrent.

Thanks for Ashcroft, asshat. You obviously vote Republican.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[chill]

Thank you. Is refreshing to see that there are people out there who realize the fundimental problem with government doing ANYTHING is that it takes inneumerable signatures, and approvals before it goes forward. The whole process is more bloated than an MS product.

But once all those signatures ARE in place, all it takes is one bored tech to browse through the system. It happens all the time at the IRS -- bored employees checking the financial statements of celebrities, friends and enemies. Cops doing intensive background checks on their ex-girlfriends, etc.

Government initiative are like a massive boulder. A bitch to get moving, but once it is going almost impossible to stop.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Knife_Edge]

So, you are saying that it would work like this. I go to the store, and buy a pair of shoes with a credit card. The RFID in the shoes is scanned in order to bring up a price to charge my card. So conceivably there could be a database somewhere that matches my financial info, including my name and address, etc, to an RFID tag in my shoes. Presuming the government could get access to a database like this, they could track people with some kind of device that could read the RFID tags from a distance. Thereby tracking my movements with my shoes.

With each step in this process I have detailed, things become more and more implausible. Retail store having database records of purchases, likely, I am willing to believe. Government getting access to database, not too likely but possible with warrants or something. Government having device that can read the tags from a distance great enough to use it to effectively track your movements, probably next to impossible. I doubt these things are detectable at a range that would make tracking people practical. If you are willing to believe the government has the resources to put the trackers everywhere, on every streetcorner, without anyone knowing or getting upset, for budgetary if not privacy reasons, well...

Another obvious problem is what happens if I resell my shoes, or donate them to charity, or any number of other things that could cause inaccurate information in the database.

Finally, isn't it legal to observe people in public places? That is the very definition of public, a place where you cannot control being observed by others. The government might as well be looking at you if ten or twenty people you don't know personally are. I'm not saying that if you have done nothing wrong, you have nothing to hide, or some other silly thing. I just think expecting privacy in public is unrealistic.

However, such a system would make this exchange possible -

Spook #1: Hey, she's going to the mall again.
Spook #2: Looks like the shoe store. Lemme see, yep, she's buying more shoes.
Spook #1: Why does she keep selling them off for cash? It makes her harder to track.
Spook #2: Dunno, maybe she likes to keep up with shoe trends.
Spook #1: I think she's a goddamn terrorist.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[MunchMunch]

Chiiilll man.

I think the article sounds pretty skeptical to me. Title is "Claim: RFID Will Stop Terrorists"--already they're distancing themselves from that assertion. In fact, I'd say the article is pretty cut & dry in saying "RFID companies are trying to speciously use the issue of terrorism to push privacy-eroding RFID into nationwide use."

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

They will be used in high value items that are widely counterfeited. This is what corporations are interested in. I know because I research these issues for a huge company.

You need a way to help detect fake or shoddy products before they get sold to consumers, These tags are one way that will be accomplished during international shipping. Also they can be used in the case of a product defect to identify when the product was manufactured and where, which is immensely valuable.

Nobody cares what you have in your house.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

My keys already have an RFID. Makes it harder to steal my car. How much harder? I don't really know.

--
me

Re:Article has wrong focus

[ncc74656]

Thanks for Ashcroft, asshat. You obviously vote Republican.

You say that like there's something wrong with it.

Score: -1, Flamebait.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[martyn s]

This is not about absolute values or anything. Sure, in theory you are observed and recorded (by memory) in public, but this information is not easily searchable. Even though making it more easily searchable seems like a small difference: just making things easier for law enforcement, it is actually a total and complete change into a totally different catergory. Allowing this kind of easy search is the difference between searching for a criminal (the old way) and SURVEILLANCE. This technology allows for surveillance, that is, watching ordinary citizens before they do anything wrong or just watching them in general. We can't allow that.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

The danger isn't in criminals scanning your home to see what you have, but rather the government installing/having access to scanners in public places that will allow them to track your movements.

Actually they've already implanted a radio transmitter in my brain that tracks me everywhere I go!

Well, ok, actually it's my cell phone, but since I carry it everyday, it might as well be implanted in my brain. I'm sorry, but you're an idiot if you think the government will track people using RFID tags which cannot be read from more than a few metres away, when people already use devices that literally broadcast their position to stations that are kilometres away.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Knife_Edge]

I am astonished by the seriousness of your reply. Firstly, I doubt very much that this technology exists, at least in such a way that really would allow tracking. Secondly, such tracking is not substantially different than having cops patrolling a beat, or any other people looking at you, etc. Even writing surveillance in all caps is not enough to frighten me. What do people do when looking around? One might say they survey the situation. But if their looking around is helped by technology (surveillance), it must be an overstepping of bounds. Guess we had better take all the cameras out of convenience stores, out of respect for the public privacy of the people who rob them. Give me a break, you antisocial paranoid. Just because you don't like anyone looking at you for any reason doesn't mean nobody ever should.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[martyn s]

Well, I'm also astonished by the seriousness of my reply. I know this technology is not possible yet, but I think it's silly to deny that it might be possible one day, and I think it's helpful to talk about it. Descartes talked about robots, after all.

Now you may disagree with me, but the very essence of my post was that such tracking IS VERY DIFFERENT than cops patrolling a beat. This kind of tracking finds patterns in your behavior, it profiles you, it can think three steps ahead, putting you into a statistical model based on the books you read and the shows you watch and the people you talk to, in order to assess your THREAT LEVEL. Cops on a beat can only do one thing: see if you're doing anything wrong RIGHT NOW.

Listen, maybe this kind of surveillance is good for our society, for our species. You're entitled to think so. Maybe just like in the evolution of the universe, atoms lost their identity when cells developed, and cells lost their identity when organisms developed, maybe in the same way individuals will lose their identity for the greater cause of "society". Maybe all of this is a good thing, and like I said, you're entitled to think so. But don't deny that this is actually happening. It will happen. If we allow this to happen, for better or worse, we will be tracked, and profiled and surveilled to make sure we are not doing anything that threatens those in power.

I can make a case for why this is a bad thing, but that's not even the point. You won't even accept that it's happening at all, so it would be pointless for me to tell you why it's bad.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[stripe]

One person could potentially have a tag in his pants, underwear, shirt, wallet, belt, shoes, jacket, cellphone, pda, pager etc.. So 1 guy could have a minimum of 5-10 tags on him. The passive tags are small with very limited range. How are the scanners going to discriminate between him and the thousands of other people walking past the scanner?
I am sure someone will sell little hand held RFID detetctors that will locate the tags so you can remove them. If not I am sure a simple EMP type device can be constructed to fry the circuitry easilly.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Senator_B]

I don't think the government would need a long range scanning device if they wanted to track someone that had an rfid on them. I imagine it would be more likely that certain public places (train stations, airports, highway rest stops) would have close range detection devices at the doorways. These would then be linked to a central database. This senario would be a lot like the movie Minority Report, where tom cruise's character was tracked from place to place (although they used retinal scanners instead of rfid's). Do I think a system like this could ever come to fruition? It's plausible, but I don't think we'll see something like this in the near future.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

They can put Rfids attached to food items and clothing all they want. The problems comes when people have become used to them that they start putting them in things like, Driver license's, Car's, Social security cards...thats when the real tracking will begin

Re:Article has wrong focus

[s.fontinalis]

There's a very simple way to defeat RFID's. An EM pulse. Real easy - so easy in fact, some stores are considering doing it at the check out counter to allay customers worries. Of course then they'd track you because you don't have a tag implanted in your clothing (LOL!)

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

The plain and simple reason this sort of thing is wrong is because once they have all of the data connected in computers the only thing stopping them from monitoring every action for every person is money. If we fight to keep the basic tools out of their hands we don't have to worry about it.
Without these tools it is simply too costly to pay for enough police to follow everyone around. Once the intrastructure is in place it may only cost a couple of bucks per person per year to do.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Catbeller]

Doesn't work, at least for the non-powered RFID tags. There's nothing there to burn out. A non-powered RFID tag is sort of a retransmitter that broadcasts a signal hardwired into its very shape; to read it a signal is broadcast by a reader, and the RFID tag sort of bounces the signal back, modulated by the very shape of the coil inside the chip.

You could fire a electron beam at the thing, and it wouldn't get damaged. Radio signals of whatever strength won't hurt it.

To destroy it, it must be physcially crushed to powder.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[quizwedge]

Works well, until you lose your RFID scanner.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Knife_Edge]

I understand better now. Yes, I can see why constant profiling of every citizen at the levels you suggest would be bad, particularly if the profiles were acted on based on future actions they predicted. That is more than a bit fuzzy legally and morally. Initially we were talking about how it might be possible for movements to be tracked with RFID tags. Now you speak of tracking that is an order of magnitude more complex: books read, people talked, tv watched. I reiterate that I strongly doubt that this will be possible in the near future. Think about it, how could this be efficiently implemented? Chips in our brains, monitored by a godlike artificial intelligence? Very implausible.

To a great degree, we already give up much of our personal identities in order to function in society. In order to get something we want, we generally have to behave in a fashion that will give other people what they want. This is true for everybody. Never forget that ultimately those in power are there because of the consent of others. This is why I think your argument is antisocial - When this system attempts to prevent threats to those in power, it is attempting to prevent threats to the society as a whole. Yet the core of the social contract is between individuals. Generally in American society we hesitate very much to sacrifice individuals for the good of society, unless there is concrete evidence against that individual, ie they are certainly a criminal.

Now with the recent developments, we are starting to become concerned with people who do not give any concrete evidence of being criminals, right up until the moment they commit atrocities. Even with the new procedures created to attempt to contend with such people, I think we are a long way away from the creation of the thought crimes you fear.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Kallahar]

Apparently you haven't heard of Catalina Marketing... They're one of the companies behind those store cards that get you discounts. In return for getting that discount, you're letting them put your buying habits into a giant database (250 million transactions per week for Catalina). It's already tied to who you are, and it already tracks what you've bought and when and where. The government doesn't have to get a search warrant for every store you visit, they just need one for the giant corporation that collects all that info from its clients.

I'm sure they can come up with an algorithm for when you sell/give something. Say you're always carrying 15 RFID's at a time, if one of those shows up on another person then it'll get flagged as being shared.

The more you think they can't do it, the more they're able to do it without you noticing.

Privacy is not a crime.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Valar]

They'll be used in clothing and other personal effects that you'll carry with you at all times.

Make your own clothes. Specifically, a nive big, thick tin foil hat. ;)

Re:Article has wrong focus

[martyn s]

it's true, we are a long way from it, but what's a long way? I'll be alive in 30 years, so if it might happen by then I oughtta be concerned. Even if it takes 100 years, a time when I'll probably be gone, I'm still concerned for the inheritors of these problems. Maybe I went outside the scope of the article, and maybe I'm going outside the scope of what we should be concerned with, today, right now, but this is a real issue, and it's going to happen unless strong people, strong leaders, make deliberate efforts to prevent it.

Threats to those in power are not the same as threats to society. Please, if there's anything you gain from this post, understand that point. If you don't understand or agree, spend some time trying to reconcile it with what you believe, because I think it's the truth. Every revolutionary or rebel is a threat to those in power, but our country was founded by those types. They were a threat to the "natural order" and they caused a little chaos, but I think they did more good than harm.

Now, you mention terrorists, and this is something that is really hard to get into and something I can't even defend right here right now, but I think that terrorism happens only when there is some fundamental injustice in the world. I am not a terrorist, and I don't defend terrorism, but I don't think it's right to resign yourself to the fact that terrorism is inevitable. Terrorism is not inevitable. And like you said, the terrorists didn't even present as criminals, so I still maintain that being tracked will be a bad thing for everyone.

We definitely are a long way away from the creation of these thought crimes I'm talking about. But I see our society, our nation, on this inevitable course and I think we should discuss it before it actually happens. I agree we are still pretty far from this horrible future (though not as far as I would like) but I also think that if action is not taken, such a future is INEVITABLE.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Mikeytsi]

It doesn't broadcast your exact position, dumbass, the system isn't capable of that. All they can do is say you're within the operable range of x transmitter. In order to try to find you, they'd have to try to use other transmitters in the area to try to locate your signal as well, and see if they can triangulate your location.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Knife_Edge]

I think that terrorism happens only when there is some fundamental injustice in the world.

I wish I could agree. I think that terrorism, and most serious crimes, happen because some people are, for lack of a better description, innately evil. Perhaps they are responding to injustice, but their response is to amplify it, not to fix it. There have always been people like this, who are frequently incorrigible in their behaviors. Unfortunately, they do not respond to kindness, even though nearly everybody does. We will always have to have ways of controlling these people, and I will resign myself to that.

Whether a threat to those who run a society is a threat to the society as a whole depends on how just the society is to begin with. I like to think I live in a pretty just society, even if there are some exceptions.

And even though the American Revolution produced great benefits for the American people, it is not hard to find counterexamples of revolutions and revolutionaries who subjected countless people to death and misery. I'm thinking of such leaders as Hitler, Mao, and Castro. I hope we never reach such a low point where social revolution is the only option for us, because it has such unpredictable outcomes. There are always people around that think that social revolution is the only way to fix whatever they think is wrong with society, but they often fail to realize that it comes at a terrible price. In most cases, allowing them to have their way would be to distort the priorities of society away from just goals, not towards. Therefore I am opposed to revolution in general and I do not think it is reasonable for it to be possible in modern America. If our society were falling apart at the seams, I might think differently, but to be realistic means to see that it is not.

All sorts of things are inevitable, but the decline of our society due to increasingly rigid control by those in power is not. Enough of the populace is well educated and alert to this kind of thing to prevent true abuses. We have extrapolated very far in this discussion, with only the glimmer of a possibility raised by a technology as a stimulus. Other people think of these things too, I assure you, and don't like them any more than we do. That keeps me from worrying too much.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

The danger isn't in criminals scanning your home to see what you have, but rather the government installing/having access to scanners in public places that will allow them to track your movements.

Not to sound bitchy ( don't like the idea of being tracked myself), but I'd love to see a quantitative study on government employees' level of caring when it comes to tracking people. The popular viewpoint seems to be that the government and other big organizations are single minded entities out to destroy people. (They might be...) The government, including law enforcement officials, is made up of hard working citizens. I doubt very much that they sit around all night thinking of ways to increase their workloads. Hell, they probably long for the end-of-the-day whistle more than more than I do. I'm not saying that you all are wrong for criticizing the gvt, I just wish that the people in government would get at least SOME respect. They are allowed to make shitty decisions occasionally, and yes, it is your duty to inform them when they do.

If you know any govt people, ask yourself who would be more likely to take advantage of some high tech toy for tracking people: Government employees, or the slashdot crowd?

My guess is that the minute that a lot of you got your hands on a piece of hardware or software that could do something cool (like track people using their cell phones), you would do it, if for no other reason than to try it.

There isn't some FBI guy/gal sitting in the basement tracking your every move. There never will be-- unless you are in fact someone they really want to watch. At most, there will be a computer that raises flags when you something "interesting," and yeah, that's shitty. The idea is shitty. Not the FBI employees. On Friday at 5:00, they don't give a crap about what you are doing.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

How correct you are. I've unwillingly been subjected to countless readings of UCR (I think that's the correct acronym) data from my county's databases. Think local sex offenders, persons on probation, you name it.

You see, a couple of friends work as low-level techs for the county, and like to supplement their evening's entertainment with a perusal of the day's juicy printouts. Oh, and yes, these come off a system interlinked with systems at the state and federal level, all locked down with RSA smart card access.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[s.fontinalis]

Hmm. The article I read in the Economist a month or so ago differed. I'll have to research.

I would venture to say it doesn't have to be physically destroyed though, merely modified, i.e. trimming the tag slightly.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Knife_Edge]

There have been a lot of responses to this post - the two that were modded up both insist that tracking people via RFIDs is possible. Both miss the point I made when I said it was unlikely that the government could do this. Look, whether or not they want to, are determined to, and have the legal means, and the databases, and everything else, they are also going to have to get long-range, high-quality radio signals out of a tiny device that is powered only by other radio waves. They are going to have to have the ability to distinguish between thousands of devices, and triangulate them quickly.

I wish an EE or ham radio guy or somebody could help me out here, because I have a gut feeling the range of RFIDs is going to be measured in feet, not the miles it would take to use them for large-scale surveillance of this type. Has anyone heard of a proposed application for these little things that involves signals traveling more than a few feet? Inventory control in warehouses and supermarkets sure doesn't do that.

The government cannot change the laws of physics. Unless you are really paranoid.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Knife_Edge]

Truly, much effective tracking could be done at close range. It would not be pervasive, but still could be very comprehensive, covering not every place you would go, but most places you would. The problem here is, what good is such a system, except for tracking uninteresting information? Serious criminals would figure out how to get around it, and perhaps even concerned citizens would as well. Maybe you could solve more bank and convenience store robberies by having records of exactly who went into these establishments. Perhaps fugitives could be more easily tracked if you knew who went into gas stations and highway rest stops.

But you could still get mugged, raped, or even murdered in some dark alley somewhere, where there was no scanning device nearby. And the costly system would therefore be useless in the minds of most people, or at least not useful enough to justify the expense of putting tracking hotspots in most places. Particularly given the amount of worthless data it would collect that many people would just as soon not have collected.

I think this wouldn't be popular unless it cut the unsolved murder rate to 2% or made some other similar drastic improvement.

Still, you'll get no argument from me that short-range tracking could be doable, provided you had a comprehensive database of who bought what, which is reasonably likely.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry bub, the fact is: even if every business implemented RFID readers at entrances and exits and provided the information (AND all purchase information) directly to Uncle Sam, it would still be easier, cheaper, and more accurate to track folks using their cell phones.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Ryosen]

>> You obviously vote Republican.

You obviously have no idea as to what the political position is of anyone in office. Democrats are just as "guilty" of poorly thought-out legistlation as Republicans. Members of both parties are given to rash, ill-advised, and hasty decisions made in the name of "National Security." A little education might be in order before you go making such blanket statements as the one above. I suggest you start here, here or here.

And how you got modded as Informative and not as a Troll is beyond me. Makes me wish that I hadn't burned up my mod points yesterday.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[aardvarkjoe]

The government cannot change the laws of physics. Unless you are really paranoid.

Hello, user #582068! I see that you are new here. Welcome to Slashdot!

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

If you are willing to believe the government has the resources to put the trackers everywhere, on every streetcorner, without anyone knowing or getting upset, for budgetary if not privacy reasons, well...

Homeland-fucking-security, fool. They'll get money for any damned thing they want.

Finally, isn't it legal to observe people in public places? That is the very definition of public, a place where you cannot control being observed by others. The government might as well be looking at you if ten or twenty people you don't know personally are. I'm not saying that if you have done nothing wrong, you have nothing to hide, or some other silly thing. I just think expecting privacy in public is unrealistic.

Not a silly thing??? Larry Ellison lives you, you little sheep, for extending the reach of his favorite fallacy.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

Give me a break, you antisocial paranoid. Just because you don't like anyone looking at you for any reason doesn't mean nobody ever should.

Give me a break, you motherfucking totalitarian bastard. Don't you understand the difference between a cop looking at you (or a convenience store cam taking your picture) and automated SURVEILLANCE (yes it should be in caps) which can be centrally scanned and stored for correlation with other similar records from other places? What you're describing is nothing short of Stalin's wettest imaginable dream.

It's exactly because of lunatics like you that we should ALL be paranoid.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

I understand better now. Yes, I can see why constant profiling of every citizen at the levels you suggest would be bad, particularly if the profiles were acted on based on future actions they predicted. That is more than a bit fuzzy legally and morally. Initially we were talking about how it might be possible for movements to be tracked with RFID tags. Now you speak of tracking that is an order of magnitude more complex: books read, people talked, tv watched. I reiterate that I strongly doubt that this will be possible in the near future. Think about it, how could this be efficiently implemented? Chips in our brains, monitored by a godlike artificial intelligence? Very implausible.

No, dumb shit -- books, tires, damned near anything that someone might want to track, even on the factory floor, will have the rfid chips. Unless they're guaranteed to be deactivated upon purchase, they can continue to be tracked.

How about, for starters, the mall decides to track clothing bought by you for "marketing research" into your shopping patterns? How about you getting picked up because you happened to go into the same five stores where others did and items turned up missing from all those stores? Suddenly you (and the others) are all in the position of proving your innocence.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

Never forget that ultimately those in power are there because of the consent of others.

Never forget, silly child, that there are a hell of a lot of people in power because they did everything in the book to get there, in many cases totally against the consent of others. The "others" were simply crushed in the bastards' rush to get into power.

What the fuck are you -- something like five years old -- to believe that kind of horseshit?

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

We definitely are a long way away from the creation of these thought crimes I'm talking about.

Sorry, friend, but we are exactly in the midst of those thought crimes. Ever heard of the dissenter at work being immediately branded "not a team player" for not falling into line?

Look what happened in Burlingame, CA recently when someone decided to do a "yellow ribbon" thing on all the lampposts in the city until the soldiers who took a wrong turn in Iraq came home. The city agreed that the lampposts were public property and should not be thus used to promote some group's agenda, but said it was OK unless someone complained. Someone did, their name and address were made public, and they were subjected to all sorts of (illegal) abuse for their "thought crime", that of asserting their right to only authorized use of public property. Of course the cowards who abused them and their property did so anonymously.

If you really care to find the citation, google on "works at all times and in all nations". You'll end up reading the words of Goebbels at the Nuremburg trials. He was saying, in short, that marginalizing dissenters by branding them as unpatriotic "works at all times and in all nations". This is the basic definition of thought crime.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

All sorts of things are inevitable, but the decline of our society due to increasingly rigid control by those in power is not. Enough of the populace is well educated and alert to this kind of thing to prevent true abuses.

... whereby you demonstrate profound ignorance of both the DMCA and the USA Patriot act.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

I wish I could agree. I think that terrorism, and most serious crimes, happen because some people are, for lack of a better description, innately evil. Perhaps they are responding to injustice, but their response is to amplify it, not to fix it.

This is typical of the "two wrongs don't make a right" school of thought. While it may be fundamentally true, it's norrmally trotted out to suppress rebellion by the injured against those guilty of continuing the injury. Instead of focusing on stopping the ongoing injustice, we're expected to condone it and instead try to prevent the injured from having redress.

As long as they can't find redress under laws set in place by their oppressors, they're supposed to "vote and change the system from within". Unfortunately, this is a prescription for the oppressed to consider voting with AK47s.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

The government doesn't have to get a search warrant for every store you visit, they just need one for the giant corporation that collects all that info from its clients.

In fact, they've proved already that they don't even need a sub poena for that. Some government agencies, prohibited by law from (themselves) gathering information on private citizens, have done an end run by simply going to the compilers of databases and buying the information on the open market. No penalty as long as they don't actually gather the information themselves.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[JamochasWitness]

Bored employees may reveal information on common people (ex-girlfriend), but "important people" (e.g., celebrities, politicians, sports figures, ...) require a higher level of clearance than your average police officer. I don't know if the same goes for IRS employees.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

I wish I could agree. I think that terrorism, and most serious crimes, happen because some people are, for lack of a better description, innately evil.

Do yourself a favour and pick up a book about the political effects of globalization around the world. I recommend "The New Rulers of the World" by john Pilger.

The whole concept of "inately evil" is wrong and dangerous.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[IWannaBeAnAC]

I think the danger is not su much that government(s) themselves will set this sort of thing up, but shops (especially large mega-chains) are undoubtedly very interested.

For example, put an RFID scanner at the door of the shop, supposedly to make sure the people walking out with a pair of jeans under their arm has actually paid for them. But an added bonus: you also know the instant someone walks into the store wearing a competitor's brand of jeans. This could easily be linked to in-store advertising (eg, anyone walking into the store wearing OTHER-brand jeans instantly gets bombarded by videos and promos for NAME-brand jeans). No civil rights abuse? Probably not, just more intrusive adversising, nothing that could not be done by a sufficiently pushy salesperson anyway.

But the problem is that if the store puts this stuff in a database, then the government has access to it (in the name of 'fighting terrorism' - if RFID tags are given the go-ahead based on the antiterrorism card, then this will probably be mandated). There is no reason for them to have this data, and it is hard to dream up a way that the current government (or even short/medium term governments) could abuse it.

But the point is that it allows very large scale and very scary abuse. For example, suppose you are at a G8 protest and the riot police charge into the crowd. You flee, only to get caught some minutes later by a cop with access to the real-time RFID database (yes, you were already listed in the database as a potential terrorist).

Unrealistic, but (1) technically possible, even in the near future, and (2) not illegal.

Once this type of surveilence is in place, copuled with strong powers to crack down on dissidents (which Ashcroft already has), there is very little protection to stop the state sliding into a 1984-type system. Yes, this is the worst-case scenario but to deny that it could happen is to ignore history.

And yes, the range of RFID tags is always going to be measured in inches or feet, rather than miles. Big technical limitation, but you can partially work around it by having more receivers.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[IWannaBeAnAC]

No, you are right, the parent comment is talking nonsense.

RFID tags are susceptible to everything that other electronics is - extreme high/low temperature, EM pulses, large currents ('large' in this context may in fact be rather small),cosmic rays (only an issue for very sensitive devices) etc etc.

Of course, you can try to build the circuit in such a way that it behaves well when subject to interference. Bypass capacitors and so on. Whether it is worth the expense (or even desirable) to do this for RFID tags is another story.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

> the article reads like the sort of propaganda piece the industry would put out.

haven't read many of the tech 'journals' for the last 10 or 15 yeas, have you? 'Cause if you had, this wouldn't come as much of a surprise.....

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Anonymous Coward]

George Orwell
1984 Europa Dr.
(real city, state, and zip)

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Knife_Edge]

No, I am considerably older than five. Let me reiterate, people who wield power do so because other people obey them. There is no other reason. They may have means of compelling people to obey - but these depend on the lack of moral development of the people subjugated. Ie, if I resist this person, I will be killed, but my children and their children will have a chance of living free from oppression. Or, if I obey, I will live another day, regardless of how terrible a society I will live in. Most people go for 'living another day.'

Or to put it another way, most people cannot endure temporary consequences in pursuit of long term goals. Frequently the consequences are much better than death, but they avoid them anyway, even if avoiding them means society is taken in unpleasant directions.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Knife_Edge]

How dare you call me a sheep, you pathetic little anonymous coward! I have my own thoughts, and I am not afraid to stand behind them with a username and risk my own karma. Just because you disagree with me does not make me a fool, or a sheep, or whatever.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[Kallahar]

Have you seen the movie Minority Report? They don't have to have a few centralized scanners that can scan a whole city, they need millions of small ones deployed at every hallway, every intersection, every supermarket. I don't doubt that the processing power needed to correlate all that would be substantial, but our computers are getting faster and faster every day.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[kableh]

While my comment was obviously inflammatory - and I find it just as absurd it got modded up - I was just blown away by the parent's assumption that any government policy can't have too much bite because bureaucracy will keep it reigned in. People blew off Ashcroft's detractors as alarmist, but look at the state of civil rights in the US now.

The fact that very few politicians voiced an opposition or even a word of caution is just another example of the sorry state of politics these days. Everyone is so worried about being demonized in the press that they dare not say a word, until the tide of public opinion sways of course.

While I'm well aware that the Republicans aren't the only ones to push inane national security initiatives, I'm just as apt to think that people who vote straight Republican don't give a second thought to the effect they have. And now we've ended up with a bunch of crazed right-wind loonies ruling the GOP and the country. That is dangerous for freedom, but I don't think anyone cares anymore.

Re:Article has wrong focus

[martyn s]

The whole concept of "inately evil" is wrong and dangerous.

Yes, it is very dangerous. Some people think it's unfortunate that people are innately evil, as they believe, but that it's the truth. But it's not the truth at all. In another world, people might be innately evil, but it is simply a fact: people are NOT innately evil.

No Supprise.

[Irvu]

Having watched the SSSCA (now CBDTPA) run through the paces this makes perfect sense. If you have a bill that you want to sell, wrap it in the current craze so that anyone who passes it can claim that "they have worked on X" where X is the issue dujour.

The way the game is played.

So if ...

[Rick.C]

a terrorist doesn't have a can of Campbell's Tomato Soup in his cupboard, then he's obviously poisoned the tomato soup supply!

Drown him!

Re:So if ...

[karnal]

In what? Campbell's Tomato Soup? :)

Re:So if ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmm, shouldn't we see if he weighs as much as a duck first? ;)

Prediction

[Anonymous Coward]

Tin foil will replace vinyl siding as most popular home exterior.

Re:Prediction

[in7ane]

Once again, will rolls of tin foil have RFID's in them?

Re: Prediction

[Black Parrot]

> Once again, will rolls of tin foil have RFID's in them?

Surely you're not so trusting as to buy your tin foil at a supermarket!

Re:Prediction

[jo42]

Four words: Black market tin foil.

Great... You Want Chips With That?

[spun]

I can see it now... Immune from lawsuits, they start putting chips in the food, "To keep it safe" of course. Eat the food, eat the chips, instant tracking implants in everyone.

Sorry, let my paranoid side get the better of me for a minute. I'm sure it's all for the best ;-)

Re:Great... You Want Chips With That?

[taniwha]

well the chips are in the packaging ... and if someone's going to tamper with the food they are probably going to use the same packaging anyway - I don't understand how this really helps.

Besides - if the legal protection is only for if the object (rfid) fails during a terrorist attack I don't see the point - surely it would only fail .... by working (and therefore giving a false positive)

Re:Great... You Want Chips With That?

[spun]

I don't usually reply to my own comments, but, at the risk of my karma: Mods, that's not insightful. It's meant to be a joke. I really doubt rfid chips would function from inside your gut. Besides, they already put rfid chips in shampoo to track you, why would they need to put them in food?

Re:Great... You Want Chips With That?

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps these chips might uncover rogue polyps or malignant sleeper cells.

Re:Great... You Want Chips With That?

[southpolesammy]

Of course when the thought police comes looking for me and tracks me down to the bottom of container #4 at the city's waste processing plant, I'll have the last laugh....

Re:Great... You Want Chips With That?

[rev_sanchez]

and will these chips come in barbecue?

Re:Great... You Want Chips With That?

[Gulik]

Eat the food, eat the chips, instant tracking implants in everyone.

Well, until I, um, relieve myself of the tracking implant. Of course, this makes me worry that they'll start installing RFID readers in the sewers and selling the data to manufacturers of digestive aids. All of a sudden, I'll be getting coupons for Bean-O in my mail and have not the faintest idea why.

Re:Great... You Want Chips With That?

[gweihir]

...and if someone's going to tamper with the food they are probably going to use the same packaging anyway - I don't understand how this really helps.

That is because you are solving the wrong problem. This is not about terrorism but about earning money. RFID tags have no influence on terrorism at all, but with the level of understanding the public has of these things, they are just trying it. Remember when the US gouvernment claimed that outlawing encryption would prevent terrorism? Turns out that terrorists don't use encryption!

The basic principle behind this is to create the following chain of association: RFID-tags are against terrorism --> you are against RFID-tags --> you are supporting terrorism!

Re:Great... You Want Chips With That?

[monkeydo]

Too bad the submitter got his facts wrong. From the story:

They also may get legal protection under the Safety Act of 2002 -- a tort-reform law that offers blanket lawsuit protections to makers of antiterrorism devices, should those devices fail during a terrorist attack.

IOW you can't sue Lay's if your potato chips fail to protect you from small pox. Nobody has "blanket immunity" from anything. What is it going to take for the editors to read the stories and check the submitter's comment for accuracy?

Re:Great... You Want Chips With That?

[luzrek]

I can think of at least one case. Most product tampering cases did use the original packaging (the tylenol poisoner for example). If the packaging was equiped with RFIDs, and the store tracked them. The store would then know that the RFID came back into the store after being sold, and they would certainly know when it was sold a second time. Even if the store didn't allert the customer who bought the tampered product, the police would know the proces through which the product was poisoned (even if they didn't know the identity of the tamperer).

Re:Great... You Want Chips With That?

[spun]

I don't know where to begin correcting this. Okay, first, editors don't check submitter's comments, moderators do. With your relatively low ID, you should know that. Second, IT'S A JOKE! thus the winking emoticon and admission of paranoia.

See, you came back with a fact based rejoinder, indicating you had read the article. Again, with your low ID, I would have thought that you would know that stuff doesn't fly around here. This is slashdot, we want our comments quick and witty without a lick of sense in them.

You SHOULD have posted something along the lines of:

Sorry, let my paranoid side get the better of me for a minute. I'm sure it's all for the best ;-)


Yeah, but I'm sure that's just the chips talking.

See, you too could engage in witty repartee rather than being a big fact checking fuddy duddy, if you wanted to. I even left you a straight line!

Re:Great... You Want Chips With That?

[Catbeller]

Yes, they would work from your gut. The strength of the signal is not dependent on the chip, but rather the raw power of the exterior detector. The chip merely modulates the incoming signal before it "echoes" it. Using a powerful enough detector, they could probably track you from blocks away.

Remember, these things are designed to be detectable in the bottom of a stack of pallets. Your gut ain't no problem.

Re:Great... You Want Chips With That?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry, let my paranoid side get the better of me for a minute. I'm sure it's all for the best ;-)

Yeah, but I'm sure that's just the chips talking.

Re:Great... You Want Chips With That?

[nanojath]

Hey, it's all about consumer choice, man. If you don't want the chip in your food, we're happy to implant it right into YOU! Choose any unique 3 digit ID combination from our expansive database of identifiers. Select from 5+1, 12/2, 13-7, the square root of 36... the fun possibilities are endless! Attractively implanted in your forhead... OR the back of your hand! See? It's all about choices, choices, choices.

Re:Great... You Want Chips With That?

[canajin56]

Because if you only have them in shampoo, you won't be able to track a fair number of /. readers, for one ;). Put them in Cheetos, on the other hand...
And the only reason they wouldn't work in your gut would be if the stomach acid broke them down, as I don't think a few inches of flesh would block the signal. Encase them in something that doesn't disolve in hydrochloric acid, and you're all set.

Re:Great... You Want Chips With That?

[Ashtead]

Except ... how long do these things stay in the gut? Even assuming they would not be damaged by the acids and the rest of the chemical process in the digestive tract, these tags would eventually make their way out, so any spooks would have to update the info frequently lest they end up looking for their targets in the sewage works.

And if the chip were not eventually excreted, we would have ourselves an interesting new disease on our hands: RFID-chip poisoning.

This scheme appears broken either way.

Re:Great... You Want Chips With That?

[Catbeller]

Oh, I don't think it would be workable as a long term option, either. It just would work as long as it was in the body, if course.

Those chips can be millimeters in size. Scary, hm?

Re:RFID, Terrorists, and other slashdot.com stuff

[Hellraisr]

Don't you mean DURING a long hard work day?

Yes! Ultimate Solution!

[Kenshin]

Just put an RFID tag on all terrorists. That way when they try to board a plane, you can detect them!

Or maybe not...

Re:Yes! Ultimate Solution!

[in7ane]

Yes, and set the evil bit in the RFID tags...

Re:Yes! Ultimate Solution!

[Anonymous Coward]

But who's going to bell^H^H^H^H RFID the cat^H^H^H terrorists?

Hmmm...

[Robert Hayden]

So they just arrest everybody that buys the fixins to make falafels?

Re:Hmmm...

[Anonymous Coward]

We know you're not a terrorist, because an A-rab would never say "fixins." :)

~~~

Re:Hmmm...

[Anonymous Coward]

I can see the headlines now: Frenchman fubar'd for fixing falafels!

Re:Hmmm...

[ab0mb88]

What I want to know is why you think vegetarians are terrorists? I bet it has to do with all that testosterone from the red meat you consume. We need to be tracking hamburger and steak not falafel.

Re:Hmmm...

[KReilly]

Being a white guy, I can assure you, when I buy a falafel, I get much more attention than any muslim.

Re:Hmmm...

[anteater424]

I'm guessing that Al Queda doesn't buy plutonium or nerve gas precursors at Walmart. I really don't see how this helps the war on terror(ism).

Re:Hmmm...

[Anonymous Coward]

That's because it has nothing to do with helping the war on terror, it's all about turning the US into a police state. The war on terror is being used as a front to fool the majority into taking it.

Re:Hmmm...

[Anonymous Coward]

falafels thats a funny word

Re:Hmmm...

[jo42]

Bio sniffers: Anyone who smells of curried goat is a terrorist!

hmmm.

[garcia]

With Ridge's approval for RFID, the food and drug companies and retailers hope to win over a wary public. They also may get legal protection under the Safety Act of 2002 -- a tort-reform law that offers blanket lawsuit protections to makers of antiterrorism devices, should those devices fail during a terrorist attack.

What major backlash is coming from the "weary public"? I have said this a billion times before. No one outside of our geek culture has any idea what this is. If it's not on Network TV's latest reality show, it's not real. I am too lazy to find my other posts about my attempted discussions with co-workers about their privacy being invaded with Patriot I and II and how they look at me as if I am speaking Greek. "You mean you do something other than watch Paradise Hotel?" (this isn't a slight exaggeration).

People have NO FUCKING clue what is going on in the world around them. I deal w/100's of people daily who freely give out their SSN to me to look up their records. I specifically ask if they know their student ID first (even though it's a unique identifier, it's not as bad as just throwing out your SSN everywhere) and people just utter, "uhhh, no, but I know my SSN!"

So if people are so willing to just give up their nationally unique identifier, you really think that they are paying attention to RFIDs? Go outside of your cube and ask any non-geek, "do you know what an RFID and how it impacts you personally?" or possibly, "do you know what the Patriot Act is?" I guarantee that they won't have a clue what an RFID is and they will say something like "do you also talk in letters?" and they will seriously believe that the Patriot Act is something having to do with the military giving missles to another country (if they are even THAT clueful).

Post your results here please, I am seriously interested if this is just a localized phenominon here where I live (my gf, her co-workers, my friends, and my co-workers are 100% clueless when it comes to anything privacy related), I would like to know what the rest of the non-geek world sees.

Re:hmmm.

[TroyFoley]

Dude they were right the first time. Wary as in cautious, not weary as in tired.

Re:hmmm.

[garcia]

you are not so much smarter than everyone else that you are the only one who gets it

I want you to show me where in my post I said that I was?

I want you to get a clue, and re-read and then re-think what you said. Obviously you are trolling.

What I did say was that NO ONE PAYS ATTENTION to this stuff. No one reads anything outside of the sports section and the front page. No one is scouring the net looking for what information they can find about what is going on "behind the scenes".

People these days want to watch their "reality TV" a "escape reality" (I have heard people say that too many times not to laugh).

They want to ignore what is really out there and would rather be forcefed a bunch of made up, scripted, bullshit on network/cable TV.

I might not be smarted, but I am certainly more informed and more concerned (and rightly so) of anything that might infringe on the anonymous past we had.

Re:hmmm.

[GoofyBoy]

In life there are huge numbers of issues, which are important, but people are of the opinion that they not worth their time. (e.g. physical looks, financial situation, the plight of the aboriginal peoples of the Antartic.)

Respect their opinion and don't get too excited about things you can't control. You'll live longer and get along with people much better.

Re:hmmm.

[reaper_354]

I try to spread the Knowledge of Privacy and Consumer Rights to as many people as I can and they never care or See or Understand just how much it's affects there daily Life........ There Level of Concern is on a Nano Scale....until they learn how it directly affects them!!!!

Re:hmmm.

[Anonymous Coward]

who said they weren't?

Re:hmmm.

[PIPBoy3000]

That means you accept students SSN as a valid proof of identity? I work for a healthcare organization and we come across this issue all the time.

SSN is a wonderful identifier. The problem isn't that someone knows my SSN, the problem is that far too many organizations use it as a password. That, IMHO, is a very bad thing.

As for radio tags, I think of them as cookies in the physical world. If they were encrypted properly, you could even block other people from knowing what the tag really says. All you'd know is that there were x items with tags on it, but only the person with the private key could see what it was.

Not that I think it's necessarily a good idea, except possibly if they were required to be removed before leaving the store.

Re:hmmm.

[Igmuth]

Who be these aboriginal peoples that reside in the antartic? Last I checked the only people living on Antartica were scientists.

Re:hmmm.

[garcia]

That means you accept students SSN as a valid proof of identity?

We go above and beyond was is required of us by FERPA.

Re:hmmm.

[GoofyBoy]

I find your ignorance of the once mightly and proud peoples of the Antarctica to be a shocking statement of the level of intellegence of today's society. Just because they aren't on a "reality tv" show doesn't mean that they aren't real.

Perhaps you should spend a few hours searching the 'Net on their culture and history and how they effect your personal life and what steps you can take to restore their society.

Re:hmmm.

[Anonymous Coward]

This coming from someone calling themselves b-baggins.

You are not bilbo baggins. You are an idiot. Shut up please.

Re:hmmm.

[kableh]

As cynical as I am, it's not as dismal as it seems. I find once I find something that strikes the right chord with a friend or family member, they get it, and what's more they tend to be very indignant because it was right under their noses.

Re:hmmm.

[Anonymous Coward]

This is nothing compared to the crap homeland security is pulling with aircraft security. They are subjecting people from non-visa countries like Canada and most of western Europe to very close scrutiny and extra security checks, as well as building a database to track everyone's movements. They admit that this would not have done anything to help in the past, and this will damage the US economy because it will make it more difficult to travel here on business.

It's also very expensive, so they're drastically cutting the air marshall program that was introduced after 9/11. They've already stopped training air marshalls and they've eliminated them from most flights. The air marshalls would have been able to prevent 9/11 and have already stopped a few attempted hijackings since then. Homeland Security is a bunch of psychopaths who are more interested in destroying america than saving it.

Re:hmmm.

[Nexzus]

Not just privacy, basic rights as well.

Couple years back when I was in high school, the school officials and the police liason officer did a school-wide locker search one day. I stood in front of mine, asking to see a search warrant for my particular locker. They had none. I asked if they had any evidence that there were drugs in my locker. They had none. I said you can't search my locker. They said they could do want they want, it's school property. I said, fine, look through the locker, but not the bag and jacket, which were my property. They restrained me, *thoroughly* searched my bag and jacket, found nothing, and let me go.

I was repeatedly asked why I made such a stink even though I had nothing to hide. I always responded "Where does it end? Would you let them search your car or home at anytime, without provocation, even if you had nothing to hide." Sadly most people didn't seem to care.

Re:hmmm.

[Catbeller]

One can understand an opinion but not respect it. You can respect the right to an opinion, but the opinion itself is up there for the judging.

For instance: people who don't understand what the Patriot act is? I don't respect their opinions. The opinions are based on grotesque ignorance, and are worthless.

And the people who hold such uninformed opinions are dangerous to people who are informed: this Wired article makes it plain. Privacy advocates were on the winning side of the issue, so the compulsive watchers made it a "Homeland Security" issue, and thus beyond the will or rights of the people. Uninformed people either have no opinion of this issue, or are so mis- or underinformed that they think it's a swell idea.

I'm not saying that after learning the truth, people can't learn. I am saying that until then, their opinions aren't worthy of respect.

Re:hmmm.

[Catbeller]

Damn. They finally learned of us.

Summon the dinosaur calvary! It's time to invade the Warmlanders!

Re:hmmm.

[CracktownHts]

The Patriot Act? Isn't that the new Broadway show with Matthew Broderick and Mel Gibson? The NY Post said it was "laugh out loud funny". Are you giving away free tickets? Form? What form? Oh sure.

Alexei Credulus
23-70 83rd Street, #27
Flushing NY 11423
(718) 673-0483
SSN 781-23-6557
9/7/76
Employer name:
Quixtar Corp.
17-34 21st Road
Long Island City, NY 11003

Here's my credit card number. You'll mail them? Thanks man, I love musicals!

Re:hmmm.

[jc42]

I have said this a billion times before. No one outside of our geek culture has any idea what this is.

And I've told you a billion times: Don't exaggerate!

Re:hmmm.

[jc42]

What I did say was that NO ONE PAYS ATTENTION to this stuff. No one reads anything outside of the sports section and the front page. No one is scouring the net looking for what information they can find about what is going on "behind the scenes".

Um, it appears that you do. And I do. And, from the messages here, it's obvious that at least a few /. readers do.

Politics isn't much influenced by the masses that don't pay attention. It's influenced by the activists of all sorts who get out there and do something.

Of course, making a reasonable, informed argument in a forum like this may seem like spitting into the wind. But you're doing something.

So you can really claim that NO ONE is paying attention. The question is whether there are enough of us to make a difference.

Re:hmmm.

[10am-bedtime]

what is the right chord of which you speak?

Re:hmmm.

[Travoltus]

[populus Romanus] qui dabat olim imperium, fasces, legiones, omnia, nunc se continet atque duas tantum res anxius optat, PANEM ET CIRCENSES"

"The people who had once bestowed commands, consulships, legions, and all else now longs eagerly for just two things, bread and circus games."
- Juvenal

Re:hmmm.

[Lord Ender]

Could you please chill out and think of an RFID tag as a slightly-longer-ranged barcode? It uses radio instead of lazers to read the number, and it can be read from a few meters away instead of a few inches, but it is otherwise just a barcode! And just as you can scratch out a barcode, you can break, or microwae, or whatever an RFID tag. Don't get your panties in a bunch.

Re:hmmm.

[garcia]

no. it's a device that can communicate with another device without having to be manually passed over a reader.

A barcode must be passed directly over a barcode reader (and it is already difficult enough to get them to scan -- USCAN), and RFID tags can be read from a distance.

I *can* defeat the effectiveness of the RFID tag, but 99.999% of the population doesn't know any better.

That's the point.

Re:hmmm.

[ScrewMaster]

This comes under the heading of the "so what did you expect" department. Other national populations may be different, but we are so complacent here in the "world's only remaining superpower" that we don't want to hear anything that might upset our delicate emotional applecarts. Forget anything that might take research and some actual thinking. To be honest, the whole flapdoodle over 9/11 just astonishes me. The average Israeli or Palestinian citizen wouldn't have been particularly bothered by the attack, at least not on a personal threat level. Collectively, neither of those two societies would have allowed their entire economies to tank over a single terrorist attack. We, on the other hand, completely overreacted, have allowed the government to pass numerous Draconian laws in the name of anti-terrorism, willingly kissed our privacy good bye (if we even saw it leave) and generally behaved like headless chickens. Frankly, I'm not real impressed with how we handled ourselves in the aftermath of September 11th.

The only thing we have to fear, is fear itself.

Re:hmmm.

[b-baggins]

>People these days want to watch their "reality TV" a "escape reality" (I have heard people say that too many times not to laugh).

They want to ignore what is really out there and would rather be forcefed a bunch of made up, scripted, bullshit on network/cable TV.

Translation: Those people are idiots, and I'm smarter than they are.

You know you said it, you know you think it, and you think we're stupid enough to buy it when you deny it.

And the fact you were modded up as insightful for basically proving my original point in trying to deny my point shows that the idiots are not the ones outside the slashdot community.

Re:hmmm.

[Cecil]

I probably am not being watched. I am not important. Does that mean I should just lay back and ignore the possibility that they are tracking people they feel important?

As Martin Niemller said:

"When Hitler attacked the Jews I was not a Jew, therefore I was not concerned. And when Hitler attacked the Catholics, I was not a Catholic, and therefore, I was not concerned. And when Hitler attacked the unions and the industrialists, I was not a member of the unions and I was not concerned. Then Hitler attacked me and the Protestant church -- and there was nobody left to be concerned."

Is that where you want to end up?

Re:hmmm.

[dvdeug]

Other national populations may be different, but we are so complacent here in the "world's only remaining superpower"

Right; the "complacent Americans" line. Never mind that we're about the only First world country that insists on the right to carry guns, and often justifies that on a need to defend against a tyrannical government. Never mind that we rate politican's trustworthness about that of a used car salesman in surveys. We are so complacent.

Forget anything that might take research and some actual thinking.

Most people aren't great thinkers, and have learned to let other people do that. Furthermore, how many people actually sit down and do research on something that isn't part of their job, and isn't something that hits them directly, for whatever personal reason?

Also, RFIDs are technical, and even to me, someone who frequently visits the ALCU webpage, most of the arguments seem distant and slighly paranoid.

The average Israeli or Palestinian citizen wouldn't have been particularly bothered by the attack,

Right; a terrorist attack that kills 5,000 people and is a direct attack on the central government, and you don't think they would have been particularly bothered by it? Also, if a thousand cases of malaria appeared in your town over night, would you be unconcerned, even if someone from west Africa might concider it just another day?

We, on the other hand, completely overreacted, have allowed the government to pass numerous Draconian laws in the name of anti-terrorism, willingly kissed our privacy good bye (if we even saw it leave) and generally behaved like headless chickens.

Honestly, how much have we really done? Sure, a couple laws were passed which shouldn't have. There were a couple overly paranoid reactions. But there have been a lot of counter-reactions, and the proposals to overturn the Bill of Rights have been for flag burning and school prayer, not to stop the terrorists.

Re:hmmm.

[Anonymous Coward]

You really are a moron. If you try to argue that you aren't complacent because you have the fucking right to bear arms, you've just proven how complacent you really are. "But... But... I can bear arms!" Never mind that you'll get thrown into a jail if you even joke about killing the Prez.

Fruthermore, your rating of a politician's trustworthyness is just another proof of how complacent you really are: Americans rate those people worse than they rate car salesmen, but they *still elect them again and aghain*! Or maybe they just don't vote at all, giving up their rights, and then get cynical when assholes get elected? *That's* complacent.

Re:hmmm.

[scifiber_phil]

I have been complaining about supermarkets etc. collecting data linked to us for quite a while now, and nobody cares. Indeed, they love the supermarket cards. Once when the clerk asked me if I had their store card, I said no, and if I had my way, they would be illegal, as they extorted data from me just so I could buy the very food that kept me alive. He just looked at me and laughed. I asked if anyone else had ever expressed these sentiments. He said that I was the first.

Re:hmmm.

[kableh]

Well as an example: A coworker and I discuss the sorry state of politics in this country often, and often he lamented that his parents and relatives in general were oblivious to what Bush & Co were up to. But just recently his mom sent him a story about a man who lived near them, who got questioned by the FBI after someone spotted him reading something "subversive" in a coffeeshop. It was an email his father had sent him, titled "Weapons of Mass Stupidity" or something similar. I seemed to recall having a similar email forwarded to me. Well this scared the hell out of his mom, since my friend had sent the same article to her!

In this case, it was the fact that someone local to their area was directly affected by inane legislation and the general climate of fear in this country, and how close to home it hit.

I'm fortunate in that my mom is a child of the 60s to begin with, so my passion for the truth I just inherited from her. I don't have as much trouble showing her the light =D.

Re:hmmm.

[Anonymous Coward]

And the fact you were modded up as insightful for basically proving my original point in trying to deny my point shows that the idiots are not the ones outside the slashdot community.

Whenever a post gets modded up as insightful, an idiot gets his wings and discovers slashdot, and thus isn't outside slashdot?

Re:RFID, Terrorists, and other slashdot.com stuff

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually by "work day" I mean basically going back and forth from my couch to the fridge to get more mountain dew. So I cant really browse on slashdot.com while I am walking around. I need to get one of those Zauro PDA devices I keep reading about here on slashdot.com.

HAHAHAHA, yea right

[dubrie]

yeaaaaaaa, if you could just go ahead and do that from on that would be great

Food recalls are rare

[GoofyBoy]

They hardly ever do it and only after threats from goverment agencies.

For meat products, by the time that they do get around to recalling things, the vast majority of the product is already sold. The longer the companies wait, the less they have to accept as returns.

Don't forget, RFID will save the children, too!

[kaltkalt]

Not ONLY will RFID prevent terrorism, but it will save our children in the process. If that's not reason enough to let companies see what products are inside our homes (after all, what do you have to hide?? eh??) I don't know what is.

:(

RFIDS are not invincible

[Amadaeus]

RFIDs, like bar codes, are not emitting devices, meaning that they don't send out signals. They interact with an external data source, like a scanner, to retreive data and to respond to data requests.

As such, they can easily be evaded. In fact, it's easier to tamper with RFIDs than barcodes simply because of the fact that tampered RFIDs are as not visually identifiable as barcodes (i.e. The naked eye can see if someone's ripped out the barcode or taped something over it). Any man with motivation can buy a RFIDs reprogrammer on EBay, walk into Walmart, and effectively make all boxes of whole wheat cheerios identify as gold-pressed latinum. Imagine the riots that could occur at the checkout lines when old ladies have to pay thousands of dollars to satisfy their daily intake of fibre.

All that tampering can be done without drawing attention to the culprit: you can hear a person cut or rip a box apart, but you can't hear binary code being reprogrammed through a contactless RFIDs programmer.

There are greater dangers than old ladies not getting their recommended daily intake of fibre.

Re:RFIDS are not invincible

[silas_moeckel]

Funny most of the RFID chips I have seen are a simple serial number imprinted at manufacture. The device goes through a fiield gets charged up and emits that data as an rf pulse.

Re:RFIDS are not invincible

[Rick.C]

There are greater dangers than old ladies not getting their recommended daily intake of fibre.

My mother-in-law lives with us.

Sorry, but you are totally-wrong, squared, dude-guy.

Re:RFIDS are not invincible

[Anonymous Coward]

Any man with motivation can buy a RFIDs reprogrammer on EBay

Stop there. The aren't planning to make them programmable. These people aren't total idiots. They do plan it possible to deactivate them, so you can still do some vandelism.

--
me

Re:RFIDS are not invincible

[Anonymous Coward]

Tampering like that requires the RFID tag to be rewritable, and for your reprogrammer to know how to rewrite it, as well as having the password to do it. You think the combination of those two is likely?

Re:RFIDS are not invincible

[James McTavish]

Yes RFIDs are passive devices, but the problem is that RFIDs are going to be one time programmable. They are programmed at the factory and sent out to be attached to products. I severly doubt that they can be recycled/reprogrammed. Add to this the fact that there is no off switch and you have an effective tracker.

The one part of the RFID protocol that I don't know is weither all tags attached to boxes of whole wheat cheerios will respond with the same number. If they do, they can not provide a unique number to track a person. They can only tell that the signal coming back is from an RFID tag from a box of cheerios.

However if each RFID tag is unique, that would severly scare me.

Re:RFIDS are not invincible

[Azureash]

I now inform you that you and your interpretation of RFID are too far from reality.

Re:RFIDS are not invincible

[Anonymous Coward]

Parent post is extremely misinformed. Most RFIDS are not reprogramable. They are just like a bar code, defined only at creation time. Also, alhough most are passive and transmit nothing, they can also be active. When active they can be read from much farther away but have to have a battery of some sort so wouldn't be used in most cases. It just costs too much.

Re:RFIDS are not invincible

[MImeKillEr]

(This time in the right thread!)

Any man with motivation can buy a RFIDs reprogrammer on EBay

At least until the RFID manufacturers take a page from DirecTV's book and sue anyone who buys an RFID reprogrammer.

Re:RFIDS are not invincible

[Kaa]

Any man with motivation can buy a RFIDs reprogrammer on EBay, walk into Walmart, and effectively make all boxes of whole wheat cheerios identify as gold-pressed latinum.

(a) I would assume the great majority of RFIDs (and certainly the ones on the cereal boxes) will be read-only. No point at all in making them rw.

(b) How much are you willing to bet we won't get a law saying reprogramming a RFID is to be considered a terrorist act..?

(c) It should be trivial to detect a RFID reprogrammer in operation -- it's an emitting device, after all. Any store with reprogrammable RFIDs will *have* to have reprogrammer detectors installed (no, cashier, I have no idea why this TV scans at $5.99...)

The interesting part is that it should be possible to burn out RFIDs quickly and easily. And from the system's point of view an item without a RFID does not exist....

Re:RFIDS are not invincible

[MImeKillEr]

They can only tell that the signal coming back is from an RFID tag from a box of cheerios

If this is the case, and it becomes known where in the packaging the RFID is located then the point of using RFID can be defeated.

Whats to stop a terrorist from buying a bunch of boxes of cereal, removing the RFIDS and then putting these in their "WMDs"?

Now, I believe I read somewhere that the RFIDs could be as small as a grain of rice. Even if this is the case, its still big enough to be discovered and replaced.

Re:RFIDS are not invincible

[Anonymous Coward]

If that's how RFID tags worked, then you'd be right. However, RFID tags are what are called "cooperative targets", i.e. they manipulate an incoming radio signal in such a way that their presence is revealed by the manipulation. There's no intelligence in them. It's just signal1->signal2. You'd have to reprogram Wal-Mart's database that links an RFID identifier to a product identity to do what you describe.

Re:RFIDS are not invincible

[ad0gg]

Wow Modded +5 for completely wrong info. Umm RFID are encoded with a unique number. Thats not changeable. RFID doesn't say whether not the product is cereal or jewerly. The database tells the store what that unique ID is. RFID just sends out a Unique ID. No two RFID should have the same ID.

Re:RFIDS are not invincible

[windchill2001]

The one part of the RFID protocol that I don't know is weither all tags attached to boxes of whole wheat cheerios will respond with the same number. If they do, they can not provide a unique number to track a person. They can only tell that the signal coming back is from an RFID tag from a box of cheerios.

Sorry to tell you this, but even if they are as general as just identifing a Box of Ceral, or a Blue Hat, White Gap Shirt, Old Navy Carpentar Jeans, and Hanes briefs. The Combination of these seemingly generic ID come together to create a very unique Indentifier.

What are the chances that a whole lot of people are goign to be wearign the same combination of RFIDs.

Re:RFIDS are not invincible

[Rorschach1]

Not too practical with read-only tags. But you can always stick MORE tags on something!

Reminds me of the days when I used to work in a retail software outlet in the mall... we'd scatter the adhesive anti-theft tags sticky-side-up around the common area of the mall, where they'd get sat on, or stepped on, or otherwise stuck to unsuspecting shoppers. Loads of fun.

Re:RFIDS are not invincible

[gweihir]

All that tampering can be done without drawing attention to the culprit: you can hear a person cut or rip a box apart, but you can't hear binary code being reprogrammed through a contactless RFIDs programmer.

Exactly! And before anybody says that cryptography can help here, these are and need to be very cheap devices! No advanced security measure can be implemented under this border conditions.

Re:RFIDS are not invincible

[Jeff DeMaagd]

That would be funny. Am I correct in the impression that these tags can be accessed and modified simply by walking in close proximity with such a device?

I doubt that such sabotage would really help though. The person that does it would be regarded as a criminal and nobody gets the message that the possibilities are dangerous, just that there was a criminal tampering with the system. I have doubts the system would be fixed, they'll try to just prosecute the problem away.

Re:RFIDS are not invincible

[Catbeller]

"However if each RFID tag is unique, that would severly scare me. "

Take it from an old inventory system coder. To be of any use, the tag would have to have a unique identity. Otherwise, it's almost useless as an indentifier during inventory tracking.

It's not enough to know that there are boxes of Cheerios on the shelf. You need to know how many boxes.

Another RFID article

[Anonymous Coward]

Just waiting for someone to post the link to the Benneton thong again. Wo0t!

What if...

[in7ane]

What if the RFID's have some effect on the nation's food supply themselves? OK, ok, hear me out on this - it's hypothetical, not a tin foil hat thing (although, will tin foil have RFID's in it?).

Say the RFID's are manufactured with a fault which releases something into the food, a far shot I know. What if the RFID readers/etc cause some effect with the radio waves...

Far off theories maybe, but having immunity from something like this...

Re:What if...

[MImeKillEr]

Any man with motivation can buy a RFIDs reprogrammer on EBay

At least until the RFID manufacturer's take a page from DirecTV's book and sue anyone who buys an RFID reprogrammer.

Re:What if...

[MImeKillEr]

Damn it! Wrong thread!

Is anyone getting tired...

[Dark Lord Seth]

... of the "It's to protect against terrorism" line? I mean, in some cases I CAN imagine, like the recent security enhancements at the port of Rotterdam, even though I find it EXTREMELY unlikely that Mr Terrorist would stow away a nuke on a containership, in the middle of Europe. But seriously, how is this going to protect people? "an essential tool for keeping the nation's food supply safe from terrorists."??? What ARE they thinking? That Bin Laden would go to WalMart and take a piss in a bottle of coke!?

Re:Is anyone getting tired...

[Anonymous Coward]

I know I am.

With the exception of :

"Cancel the H1Bs. Ship the towelheads home. It's to protect against terrorism."

Honestly, if we ship 'em all back and keep them out it'd make it easier to spot 'em when they try another terrorist act.

Re:Is anyone getting tired...

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm also sick of the "anti-terrorism" line. It's as bad as the evil that was done in the name of "anti-communist" during the 80s.

I can tell you how tracking food would make it safer. If you want to hurt a lot of people, you'd have to contaminate the food during distribution. By tracking food, you can figure out where any related food might be very fast. Think how slow some recalls are. With RFID you could have a very fast recall.

I find it way too likely that a terrorist will put a nuke in a containership. It's way too easy and puts the bomb in a perfect place to cause major hardship for America. I don't think RFIDs will help prevent it. There's nothing to keep them from puting the chips on the bomb itself.

--
me

Re:Is anyone getting tired...

[Anonymous Coward]

I find it way too likely that a terrorist will put a nuke in a containership. It's way too easy and puts the bomb in a perfect place to cause major hardship for America. I don't think RFIDs will help prevent it.

So, with RFID, you can have sensors that detect the type of materials in a container without human intervention or inspection. You don't think that sort of inspection efficiency for valid cargo would, oh, free up human resources for other intevention? If all the normal inspection in automated, wouldn't that make it easier for inspectors to spend more time on things related to security? Consider also that rfids might act as a deterrent to terrorists wary of the rfid capabilities.

Still not convinced? You'll at least have to acknowledge that they would help police track down how/where homemade explosives were made after an attack, thereby leading to a quick, efficient capture of car bombers before they can strike again. (E.g., fragments left after an attack might be traced through rfid to distribution in cities, or perhaps even to inventory in warehouses that had not yet been sold, suggesting theft or inside help.)

Still not convined? Please describe how you think the RFID will not help. (Hint: No fair relying on your lack of knowledge or creativity! We demand and require valid points in this discussion!)

RFID tags

[ihummel]

Any electronic marking device that isn't removed when I buy the item is an outrageous violation of the privacy of my home. I can understand tags being used to prevent shoplifted, or to somehow safeguard against tampering, but they really need to be removed by the store at purchase, easily removeable by the end consumer, or at least able to be turned off in such a way that they cannot be turned on again remotely.

ship one with every set of linux cds

[Anonymous Coward]

...and tell SCO you are immune from their lawsuits, Tom Ridge sez so.

Re:ship one with every set of linux cds

[toddestan]

Well I know how to get rid of them, throw the CDs in the microwave!!! ...10 seconds later.... D'Oh!!!

Safety Through Reality

[swordofstars]

Although I'm certain these devices are 'tiny,' as the article says, that certainly doesn't mean 'embedded in product and impossible to remove.' Personally I remove all the tags from clothing I buy long before I wear it, and don't expect that these radio transmitters will be any harder to take off the product once it's out of the store. Even if the transmitters are attached to the product, like those dye tags used to prevent shoplifting, the company using them probably won't want to GIVE you a radio transmitter with every purchase. If nothing else, you can always trust corperate desire for $$ to keep you safe from this particular threat. So long as we have ashcroft, there are bigger things to worry about.

Re:Safety Through Reality

[eaddict]

Wait till they get imbedded within the threading of your clothing. Nano technology will do wonders for us BUT I fear it was also allow [insert favorit BIG evil entity here] to monitor/influence/etc... us, the consumer.

Re:Safety Through Reality

[Anonymous Coward]

Although I'm certain these devices are 'tiny,' as the article says, that certainly doesn't mean 'embedded in product and impossible to remove.'

Hate to tell ya this, but um, yes it does. Currently the tags themselves are available in sizes that are the same dimentions and textures as T-shirt lables (the size and washing instruction kind sewn on the neck collar) and postage stamps (with self addhesive on the back, or can be woven between two pieces of cardboard or cotton material).

They require no power source and as I said, are as small as a stamp and as thin as a piece of paper.

Soon they will be in the waistband of every pair of jeans sold, the sole of every shoe, the hem of every dress, shirt and jacket made. They'll be inside the cardboard and packaging of every box, case and housing made for every kind of retail item. Even embedded in our paper money.

All it takes to read them and gather their information is a reader that can output a strong enough radio signal and at the same time read the reflected resutls. Shortly, I'm sure, you'll see these high powered readers/recievers attached to street signs and light posts on most interesections.

This way, database machines for private or government use can tell that John Smith is standing at 5th and Main wearing the pants he bought last year with his Visa card, which is now overdue. He has on the shoes he bought yesterday for cash at the Payless store, 47.6 miles away, at 3:15 p.m., but he's wearing Paul Smith's hat which was purchased three months ago by Paul with his MasterCard in Ohio. John has $20,000 cash in his pocket. Accroding to his last known address in his Equifax report he's 117.6 miles from his residence. He has a Nokia cell phone on his person, it was purchased from a mall outlet store 4 months ago on an American Express card and the phones number is 555-555-5555, would the operator like to place a call and ask him about that overdue balance, the borrowed hat and the 20k in cash?

THIS is our future.

Gotta love it...

[bersl2]

Check the "Code of Conduct" on the first link (empasis mine):

We, as manufacturers and suppliers of RFID technology, agree that we have a responsibility to our industry...

As usual, loyalty is first to the industry, and not the consumer. I mean, it is an industry web site, but still...

how to counteract?

[koekepeer]

insert obligatory RFID comment here...

but seriously, how are we ever going to avoid big-brother scenarios from happening? it seems that implementation of the many ways to track people/materials and their movement is becoming one of these things that are happening anyway, no matter how much we oppose the idea.

but how to stop it?

i have no clue... anyone?

PS. i could write a *huge* rant here about your gorgeous president gWb, but that wouldn't add anything to the discussion...

Re:how to counteract?

[geomon]

I could give a shit whether the FBI, CIA, or the neighborhood criminal knows the contents of my pantry. If they know that I have 4 boxes of crackers and 3 boxes of shells and cheese, I am not going to lose any sleep.

If they want interrogate my house to look for consumer electronic, guns, books, etc., then I am putting a Faraday cage around my house.

Re:how to counteract?

[ai2097]

Well, they are just radio waves after all ;)

1. Carry a short range jammer (FCC would LOVE that e.e)
2. Destroy the tags in the device (DMCA/ protection curcumvention? Who know with the asinine rulings that are going on...)
3. Line your house with lead/concrete/other RF-impenitrable material (Yeah, right..)

But I do think that radio jammers and/or seeking out and destroying tags (after you buy the item, of course) are probably the best options for handling these things.

But hey, no matter what, thier batteries have to run out sometime, right? ;p

Re:how to counteract?

[koekepeer]

the thing is, it won't be restricted to your private areas...

clothes, items you lend from the library (books, cds etc), the list continues. weherever you walk, drive, sit... maybe i should take my tinfoil hat off?

and actually, i'd be quite annoyed if the FB of I would know what kind of crackers are in my pantry!

wtf are they doing in the netherlands anyway ;)

Re:how to counteract?

[bersl2]

---WARNING! TROLL ALERT!---
It's not the government we should be worried about. They're all too concerned about being re-elected to do the big-brother act themselves. It's the corporate scumbags in the search for more money who have me wary of this. They just use the government as a tool.

Re:how to counteract?

[koekepeer]

*grin*

can you hand me out a few more cliches?

Re:how to counteract?

[bersl2]

I'm sorry, but I appear to have run dry. I must have dissipated my anger at all the stupidity for this topic.

In a related story, I seem to have completely forgotten what the hell I was ranting about...

Re:how to counteract?

[koekepeer]

hehe
you have just made my friends list

*even bigger grin*

Re:how to counteract?

[Alien Being]

"I could give a shit whether the FBI, CIA, or the neighborhood criminal knows the contents of my pantry."

Ok, but what if your health insurance provider decides to check up on your eating habbits? Or maybe the local supermarkets will start snooping around to help direct their spam attacks. Or maybe your neighbor has some perverted interest in which OTC medications or birth control devices you buy. Maybe a potential employer will include an RFID scan of your house as part of their background check.

The potential for abuse will depend on the creativity of the abuser. If they're gonna put these things on the stuff I buy, then I want the right to know they're there and to disable them.

Re:how to counteract?

[MikeVx]

But hey, no matter what, thier batteries have to run out sometime, right? ;p

I'm not sure if you're serious or not, but here goes: These device are passive. They absorb energy from a radio field and when they get enough power they transmit a radio pulse with the ID number.

Re:how to counteract?

[Anonymous Coward]

If they want interrogate my house to look for consumer electronic, guns, books, etc., then I am putting a Faraday cage around my house.

Then you'd better keep a sharp eye on your purchases of Baggies. Some store a couple of years back "cooperated" with the cops and gave them acces to some customers' purchase history. And that's how they found the neighborhood crack dealer.

Re:how to counteract?

[Anonymous Coward]

If they want interrogate my house to look for consumer electronic, guns, books, etc., then I am putting a Faraday cage around my house.

And one of the first places they'll descend upon with guns drawn is the place that seems to be employing countermeasures. "So if you have nothing to hide,...." goes the drill.

I want RFID because...

[vrmlguy]

I want a robot that can pick up my dirty clothes, look up their washing instructions based on their RFID tag, sort them based on said instructions, and load them into my washing maching along with the proper amount of soap and/or bleach.

I'm still working on how to get them dried and folded.

Re:I want RFID because...

[The Ape With No Name]

I can hear you getting fatter from here.

Re:I want RFID because...

[Hayzeus]

While I, too am all for robot slaves, there is a hell of a lot more involved here than simple RFID tags in your clothing. It's a good first step, however.

I, for one, am perfectly willing to sacrifice a measure of privacy for robot slaves. WHO'S WITH ME??

Re:I want RFID because...

[Theaetetus]

I, for one, am perfectly willing to sacrifice a measure of privacy for robot slaves. WHO'S WITH ME??

Well I, for one, welcome our Skynet Overlords!

-T

Re:I want RFID because...

[3terrabyte]

As long as the robots all have RFID tags on them so I can tell where they're at , at all times.

Re:I want RFID because...

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm still working on how to get them dried and folded.

I have already patented this. I will indemnify you for only $699 per robot CPU should you ever violate my patent.

Re:I want RFID because...

[Mundrid]

I'm still working on how to get them dried and folded.

Isn't that what your mom is for?

"Having numbers burned into your forehead ...

[burgburgburg]

has been determined to be an effective tool to prevent terroristic identity theft" says Department of Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge. "Remember, not allowing us to burn numbers into your forehead and the foreheads of your loved ones means the terrorists have won."

Re:"Having numbers burned into your forehead ...

[MImeKillEr]

Nah, I say we go to tattooing barcode tags either on the backs of our necks or our wrists.

I've actually considered getting the latter.

Re:"Having numbers burned into your forehead ...

[dspfreak]

I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but the first time somebody gives me an ID number with 666 in it, I'm heading for the hills.

Oh, crap...

Re:"Having numbers burned into your forehead ...

[SmackCrackandPot]

Oddly enough, there is conspiracy theory that believes that the Universal Product Codes have the number 666 encoded in them.

AHA!!!

[corebreech]

See???

Now how did you *know* I was wearing a tinfoil hat????

I rest my case.

Re:AHA!!!

[g_attrill]

All tinfoil hats will have an RFID soon - the government will KNOW you have bought one!!

Re:AHA!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

But then we'll all just get tinfoil hats for our tinfoil hats! A-Hah! .... crap.

Re:AHA!!!

[magsymp]

SCO told us you applied to a tinfoil hat license which was valid between 3h30 and 5h30pm EST. Figured you'd be wearing it..

But will it stop evil megalomaniacs?

[SmackCrackandPot]

Evil Megalomaniac "Yes Mr Bond, Once I have control of the world's supply of Bagel Bits I will be rich beyond measure". Mr Bond: "Ah, yes, but there is one thing you forget. Every Bagel Bit has a RFID tag on it. You can't make a billion bagel bits disappear into thin air without people noticing. The discard wrappers will give you away". Evil Megalomaniac: "Darn!"

There is this really cool thing called a garden

[The Ape With No Name]

Grow, eat, preserve and enjoy your own food. Buy stuff at a local food co-op if you can't have a garden. If you are worried about RFID on foodstuffs, give this a try. Knowing where your food really comes from changes your perspective on everyday life. Anyhoo, any company who wants to use such a nefarious technology is most likely the producer of food you don't want to eat for any number of reason.

Re:There is this really cool thing called a garden

[Anonymous Coward]

Living in LA I'm fortunate enough to have access to farmers markets and a Chinatown. Most of my produce is organic and I've become friends with some of the growers. My chickens I pick out in Chinatown. At about $1 per pound, I get healthy, mature, chickens that are fresh read "slaughtered and cleaned while I wait"), whole (read "includes the chicken's own giblets, head and legs") that are corn-fed.

Most people, on the other hand, are offended at the sight of fruit or vegetables with "dirt," and believe chicken comes from nature in cellophaned styrofoam containers. If there's a nice package, I doubt anyone would care if the contents included an "RFID Inside" logo. But it has to be a nice package. And shiny. Shiny is good.

Damn it! I'm next then!

[mhore]

If they put RFID on food products, then they'll be able to detect whether or not I've bought the ingredients for falafel and hummus and if I eat those, I must obviously be a terrorist!

Those ignorant clods!

DOH!

[not_a_george]

I can see it now..
Wow, this guy has a lot of great shi...[check RFID scanner] wait a sec, I can't rob this guy! He has pop tarts in his house! ANYONE that eats pop tarts is too respectable for me to steal from.

Re:RFID, Terrorists, and other slashdot.com stuff

[pfleming]

Actually by "work day" I mean basically going back and forth from my couch to the fridge to get more mountain dew
Oh man. When I first read that I thought he said "from my crotch to my fridge"

Let's think this through

[WheelDweller]

Everyone's up in arms about identifying things we buy, and I'm sensative to that. I have no 'good ole boy' network that I fence diamonds through from Rio, no drug involvement, and nothing that I couldn't account for, standing in front of my Mom...so as long as the information is correct, I have nothing to worry about tracking.

But the uncertainty comes in them getting it wrong; one byte's difference might be all it takes to identify me as someone else, and that, for me, causes the stress.

There's one thing we have to remember here, though: we're on a mission. It has a defined ending, but we're too far away to make sense of the roadmap. Orwell. Revelation. Pick one.

Let's say that all the money from the lobbyists falls down a rathole and mutes every advocate on the side of RFID. Do you really think that a capitalist system is going to deny a technology that could, and probably will, save them millions of dollars?

No, I don't have an answer to this worrysome decision. But If I did, it would probably include a lot of 'getting along' with the RFIDs, and an equal amount of "they should have a warrant to CHECK my id's.

Just some food for thought.

Re:Let's think this through

[3terrabyte]

But thanks to the "Sneak and Peak" clause opened up in the Patriot Act, they don't really need to get a warrant.

You said you had nothing to hide from your mom. Well, maybe. But let me ask you this. Do you have ANY mp3's the RIAA could get you on? A copy of Photohop that isn't quite yours? Do you have a copy of ...say... Mein Kampf, back from your college days? Do you post dissenting views on slashdot?

Re:Let's think this through

[WheelDweller]

You said you had nothing to hide from your mom. Well, maybe. But let me ask you this. Do you have ANY mp3's the RIAA could get you on? A copy of Photohop that isn't quite yours? Do you have a copy of ...say... Mein Kampf, back from your college days? Do you post dissenting views on slashdot?

My mp3 collection is dwindling fast; I've ripped all the CDs I have into oggs, and the mp3 stuff is quickly going away. (But point-taken!)

Nah, I never got 'brainy' in college, thinking there could ever be anything of value in Communisim (unless it's Linux!) or Socialism or Totalitarianism. I could tell at an early age that those ideas were just slick ways of getting people to do what one man wants...and that's always a bad idea.

I don't have any illegal software; I'm Linux all the way, and when I give away one of my old Lokisoft titles, I erase the local copies. With all the challenges to Linux for-pay software creation, I don't want to get in the way. And I've adopted a zero-tolerance for such stuff; if it's considered illegal, I just don't want to do it. Heck, I barely surf porn anymore...

But there's one thing to consider here, too: after the first big batch have been hassled, people are going to realize that nearly everyone has *seen* porn (for example) but that doesn't mean he's trafficing in it. And after a bunch of reports of people being 'held for questioning', everyone, including the police, will realize that this is not unusual...and the stigma will go away, too.

I'm not saying this'll be painless...but if we, as the population are powerless to stop it, what other discussions are needed? :

Re:Let's think this through

[3terrabyte]

My mp3 collection is dwindling fast; I've ripped all the CDs I have into oggs, and the mp3 stuff is quickly going away. (But point-taken!)

LOL. I wasn't even thinking about the angle of mp3's royalty problem. My bad. I was thinking you must have had at least 1 song on your computer that wasn't yours.

However, if a 100% of your digital music collection comes from CD's you purchased... then you're a better man than me.

No problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Just install a huge electromagnet powered by a Tesla coil in the doorframe to your house. Step on the doormat, and it triggers the EMP. Fries every RFID tag in the vicinity... (course your PDA/notebook/wristwatch) probably won't take too kindly to it...

I design RFID stuff

[lcsjk]

I am presently designing to use RFID to help keep foods safe. RFID for foods, especially meats,will include time, temperature and bacteria sensors. As for the tracking issue, there has already been enough outcry about Bennetons attempt to put hidden RFID in clothing that they had to resend the idea. (RFID JOURNAL) We are aware that there are privacy problems and no-one wants to have things that allow tracking in the home or other areas. Right now, the trend/plan is to kill tags at the cash register when the item is purchased. You may have noticed that that is already being done to enable you to leave the store without setting off an alarm.

Re:I design RFID stuff

[MImeKillEr]

...and all it takes is a decent magnet to kill the RFID tag anyway, right?

Re:I design RFID stuff

[WildBeast]

Thanks but my food has always been safe so far.

Re:I design RFID stuff

[ewhac]

Right now, the trend/plan is to kill tags at the cash register when the item is purchased. You may have noticed that that is already being done to enable you to leave the store without setting off an alarm.

Uh huh, right.

Assuming the RFID has a globally unique serial number in addition to a UPC code, then all that has to happen at the register is for that serial number to be marked as, "purchased." Then when you walk out the door, the computer sees the serial number, looks it up in the database and sees that it's been purchased, and doesn't sound the alarm. A software-only solution that's much more "cost-effective" than designing the extra circuitry for a killable RFID.

It also has the added "benefit" of allowing the retailer to scan the cloud of RFID numbers coming off you as you enter the store (or even as you stroll past the entrance), thereby triggering special discounts or incentives ("We're having a special on shirts that match those pants you're wearing.").

In effect, what you're working on will afford unprecedented snooping powers to government agencies as well as corporate entities (who, unlike government agencies, don't even have to pretend to be accountable). And, of course, it will do absolutely nothing to improve public safety.

Schwab

Hello, we are at war

[Anonymous Coward]

The geek attention span is about 3 weeks.

Do you want to help terrorist?

Wake up

I don't follow your logic

[corebreech]

So because the government isn't competent, we should allow them access to our whereabouts in real-time?

Isn't their being incompetent actually an argument for their not having access to this information?

Re:I don't follow your logic

[Toasty981]

If they're so incompetent, how do they effectively set up such a fantastically complex system?

Re:I don't follow your logic

[Anonymous Coward]

Um, it isn't a fantastically complex system.

What are you, some kind of script kiddie?

Go away.

Re:I don't follow your logic

[Toasty981]

I meant the systems of TIA and all that that people were obviously referring in the parents.

Stop being an AC and at least post with your name if you're going to troll.

That's Nothing!

[Hellraisr]

In Soviet Russia, RFID Tag wears you!

No big deal

[Anonymous Coward]

The computers at the grocery stores already know everything I buy anyway. That's what those barcodes on the keychain that you swipe before checking out are all about, aren't they? Bi-Lo, Food Lion, and Harris Teeter already know more about what foods I eat than I do. How is adding RFID going make that any different?

Re:No big deal

[3terrabyte]

My wife always laughs at me when I half heartedly tell her that the 50 cents we saved is letting our future employers and health care insurance know that we are alcoholics, thus unfit to insure or hire.

Re:No big deal

[Anonymous Coward]

you saved 50 cent? rap sucks, dumbass!

Nuke the suckers!

[jgabby]

How much power would it take to fry the RFID tags? I doubt they could survive a couple of seconds in a microwave oven. Simply nuke your clothes right after you buy them, and you'll be free.

Paranoia

[t0qer]

A few months back /. had an article on sewer traversing robots. Does anyone know why they made these? I mean the REAL reason why these were made?

The goverment is out to get us man, they want to know every fart let in your house. THE MAN is trying to KEEP UP DOWN. Sure they may say that these sewer traversing robots are for laying down CAT5 in the sewer, but I know the real reason.

Each of these robots is SECRETLY equipped with a miniature spectrometer, which takes your sewer water, and breaks it down to determine its chemical makeup. All this information is then passed back to the DEA to assist so they can profile which houses do, and which houses do not have drug users living in them.

Now they are preparing phase 2 of the program for use by the USDA to profile the eating habits of Americans. By secretly implanting RDIF tags into your food you poop becomes a "stool pigeon" on your eating habits. The USDA will use this information to adjust prices on certain key products to help promote growth in our sluggish economy.

Just say no to RDIF. It's worse than you can imagine.

But this just make's the terrorist's job easier.

[ReciprocityProject]

If I wanted to contaminate the food supply, all I would have to do is put an RFID tag on myself identifying me as ground beef. Then I could sneak into the warehouse and none would be the wiser.

All I have to do then is contaminate all the food. Since, of course, RFID tags in contaminated food would detect the contamination and send a warning signal to the Dept. of Homeland Security, I would need to carefully replace all the RFID tags as I distributed the biological agent. I would just zap the food with ionizing radiation, killing the RFID tag, and slip in my own tags. Since RFID tags are so cheap, this would all cost a lot less than, say, a plane ticket.

I can only see one problem: the ionizing radiation would kill all of my bacterial agents . . . Oh that's how they're preventing terrorism. Brilliant!!!! So sneaky. I would have done all that work for nothing.

No blanket immunity

[SeanTobin]

This will give them blanket immunity from all law suits related to the product.

No, it won't. It will give them blanket immunity assuming thier anti-terrorist watermellons or terror-proof mach-4 razors fail during a terrorist attack. They are still free to be sued for any non-terrorist applications failure. This is of course still America.

Re:of course...

[Anonymous Coward]

As radio waves bother your brain,
step away from the computer...

Since terrorists don't tend to buy lots of ...

[burgburgburg]

typical consumer items (storing up their money for explosives, plane tickets, guns, etc.), sending government vans to scan peoples residences for items like consumer electronics, sneakers, new furniture and the like would be an effective way of pinpointing the terrorists among us.

And even if they are technically not terrorists, they are an impediment to the recovery that the administration keeps declaring is happening any day now. Which is practically as bad as being a terrorist. Maybe worse. Either way, Hello Guantanamo Bay!

Re:Since terrorists don't tend to buy lots of ...

[kgarcia]

Yes! Furthermore, your tax-cut should help you get a job... because... if... your'e NOT working... you will benefit from paying less tax on your... INCOME.

oh wait... wrong thread

*shrugs*

What's Wrong with this picture?

[4of12]

Quick!

There goes Osama bin Laden out the door of Walmart with a whole case of Gillette razors!

Ron Paul R-Texas: seeing the light

[paiute]

The Wired article links to Texas Rep. Ron Paul, who is opposed to the RFID idea. Republican opposed to the wishes of big business? Who is this guy? I looked at his web site and read his latest speech:
http://www.house.gov/paul/congrec/congrec 2003/cr07 1003.htm

(sorry about the URL - seems a space gets put in between the 7 and the 1 in cr071003)

Anyway, who does this guy think he is, calling the Bush gang empire-building big-gummit perpetuatin' neoconservatives?

He better watch his back out of his rear-view mirror around the two shotguns and three rifles in his pickup truck rack, the terrorist-loving pinko.

Re:Ron Paul R-Texas: seeing the light

[Anonymous Coward]

Ron Paul make elections in Texas fun. I can't believe people vote for him, but I really don't understand Texans. They hate and distrust goverment, but want massive law enforcement and death penalties. You can always count on Ron Paul saying something even more strange than he said last election. Big fun. I'm glad he's in a different district.

Re:Ron Paul R-Texas: seeing the light

[bartlog]

Ron Paul was elected to the House as a Republican, but is really a libertarian. In fact he ran for the presidency on the Libertarian ticket in 1988 (I think). So it's no surprise that he's often at odds with the mainstream of the GOP.

Re: Ron Paul R-Texas: seeing the light

[Black Parrot]

> Anyway, who does this guy think he is, calling the Bush gang empire-building big-gummit perpetuatin' neoconservatives?

He's evidence that even kooks get something right now and then.

In other news...

[natet]

Wal-mart claims that RFID tags will stop ballistic missiles from striking targets in the US, and seeks dept. of homeland security sanction to deploy them in defense of the nation....

Re:In other news...

[Anonymous Coward]

*BEEP* *Music CD - 16.00*

*BEEP* *XBOX-Halo - 50.00*

*BEEP* *ICBM - 500,000,000.00*

Thank you for choosing Wal-Mart!

Re:RFID, Terrorists, and other slashdot.com stuff

[The Bungi]

Oh man. When I first read that I thought he said "from my crotch to my fridge"

I read "from my crotch to my finger".

But that's just me.

No its not local

[tacokill]

I echo this same frustration on a daily basis. I must admit that, over the years, the lack of interest and total apathy towards understanding this stuff has quelled my enthusiasm for sharing what I know with others.

At some point, after talking to yourself for so long, you just throw in the towel and do what YOU need to do . Let everyone else fend for themselves.

Remember, you are an "armed" techo-geek. The very fact that you know and understand this stuff puts you MILES ahead of everyone else. That's just fact.

Ah, yes...

[Theaetetus]

Say the RFID's are manufactured with a fault which releases something into the food, a far shot I know. What if the RFID readers/etc cause some effect with the radio waves...

That would be the "Fear" part of FUD, right?

Seriously, read what you wrote and go think about it. I recommend doing so while making popcorn in your microwave. Or enjoy some food while talking on your cell phone.

Sheesh.

-T

Re:Ah, yes...

[in7ane]

First 'read the article'.

Now 'read what you wrote'...

What next?

Two Issues

[saintjab]

I only have two major issues with this proposal. One, is that in no uncertain terms, this is a direct violation of human privacy rights, and is an open invitation for the powers that be to 'spy' on every facet of our lives. Second, because of the way they are going about getting this legislated (under the guise of Homeland security) is absolutely criminal. This is exactly how they got roving phone taps, and illegal searches, pushed right back under our noses. For the sake of our own "safety". Yeah right. I would rather worry about the terrorist trying to attack us, than the terrorist government trying to *cough* protect us! This is just plain wrong. -just my opinion.

Unsupported Claim of Blanket Immunity Hurts Anti-R

[Anonymous Coward]

This will give them blanket immunity from all law suits related to the product.

You know, I expect that slashdot readers will not have carefully thought about a topic before shooting off their mouths. But the story writer at least has a chance to stop and think.

Blanet immunity? For all liabilities related to a product? Merely because of a connection to security? So if I market a cracker that sometimes has too much rat poison in it, I get blanket immunity because of an rfid tag?

What planet is the story submitter living on? No matter how crazy congress may seem, do you really think that blanket immunity is every going to see the light of day? C'mon. You weaken your cause and come across as less credible by making these types of outlandish statements. Those of us who are working against the dangers of rfids don't need that kind of "help".

Do this: the next time you feel the need to "help" us in the battle against rfid tags, just play the race card. Then people will know you just pitching heat.

This is a surprise to you?

[John Jorsett]

Post your results here please, I am seriously interested if this is just a localized phenominon here where I live (my gf, her co-workers, my friends, and my co-workers are 100% clueless when it comes to anything privacy related), I would like to know what the rest of the non-geek world sees.

You sound like this is some sort of surprise. Well, it isn't to me; people are clueless in general. Huge swaths of humanity don't know how their car works, which century the Civil War was fought in, that the sun is a star, what the hell the politician for whom they're voting stands for, who the Secretary of State is, or any of a myriad of other things that don't impact their day-to-day lives. They think John Edwards can actually talk to the dead, "government money" is unlimited, and that space aliens are making those crop circles. Why should they be any better on the subject of Patriot I and II?

Re:This is a surprise to you?

[cmburns69]

But space aliens are visiting! The brother of my roomate's ex-girlfriend's cousin was abducted and probed three times!

And you know the Sun can't be a star.. its too damn big!

Its a global problem

[nurb432]

Clueless people are a global problem. They are part of why we loose our rights and freedoms at a blindingly fast pace these days.. ( due the power-grab taking place by the governments, ' for our own safety' )

Its also how a fascist/totalitarian/police/etc states come into power... By the time the little guy notices.. its too lat....

Re:Its a global problem

[gweihir]

Clueless people are a global problem. They are part of why we loose our rights and freedoms at a blindingly fast pace these days..

Not a new phenomenon and democracy does only help so far. After all Hitler was voted into office. All it took was a stalemate between the other powers, a talent for making speeches and the right promises.

Make no mistake, people: Any democratic government can be replaced by a totalitarian one if the voters are blind for a decade or two. Signs aof this happening: Constitutional and civil rights are suspended for some people (the jews and other "undesirables"), a drive for war together with a hugely inflated national self image ("tausendjaehriges Reich", "am deutschen Wesen soll die Welt genesen"), surveilance of individuals is intensified ("Blockwart", the GeStaPo),...

Look for these signs in your society today and if you find them, act against it democratically as long as that is still possible. Alternatively be sorry tomorrow.

Re:Its a global problem

[Abcd1234]

What I find hilarious is that you assume that what's happening in the US (ie, "the power-grab taking place by the government") is happening in other countries. "Global problem" my ass... it's an American problem, and it's not a new one either (ever heard of the Red Scare?).

Re:Its a global problem

[sqlrob]

What is RIP then?

Re:Its a global problem

[Anonymous Coward]

err, the original poster was asking "is this problem local to the non-geeks with whom I associated, or have you other geeks noticed it too?"

Please, do try to understand what other people are posting in the first place.

RFID technology

[Anonymous Coward]

Just because an RFID tag was within your house doesn't necessarily mean anyone else could read it. The tag and the reader must be properly oriented and the tag signal strength is dependent on the tag size and the readers' power. Getting the right orientation from outside someone's house seems tricky.

Huh?

[Vampyre_Dark]

Again with this bullshit excuse to step in on privacy/freedom? Anything can be done now in the name of Stopping Terrorism? "Oh look, that guy bought an RFIDed Turban, he must be a terrorist Also our records show that he has seen the movie Con-Air 3 times, further proving our suspisions."

"War on Terror" is the new "War on Drugs"

[Infonaut]

The "War on Terror" is to the 2000s as the "War on Drugs" was to the 1990s. It can be used to justify almost anything, from depriving people of their civil liberties, to propping up corrupt regimes, to supporting big business.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Drugs can be a threat to society. Terrorists can be a threat to society. But is our only response always bound to be a blunt-instrument, simpleminded "war"? Non-Americans often perceive us as politically naiive and unrealistic, for good reason.

Re:"War on Terror" is the new "War on Drugs"

[revscat]

Dead on accurate. What kills me is that in both cases it is Republican administrations who are vigorously pursuing this, and yet the Democrats get are the ones with the bad rep. I just don't get it. Sorry to turn this into political fodder, but it really drives me crazy. The only "freedom" lobby that the Republicans seem interested in is the NRA; beyond that anything goes so long as you're fighting drugs/terrorism/abortion.

Mmmmm...smells like a panacea

[demo9orgon]

Wow...RFID with new "TERRORISM STOPPING POWERS".
Next thing you know, RFID will stop kidnapping, child abuse, Spousal abuse...why, with the amazing RFID we'll be able to find out why some guy just bought 10 bottles of amonia; heck that's bomb-worthy product! Or track all those KY jelly and condom sales...that stuff can be used for...uh, sex. And damn, if the Pope doesn't find condom use evil, you can bet your lubricated ass new ways of tracking deviants and listing frequent buyers will be established. And combine the mighty RFID with the ever-increasing, global reaching Anti-Terrorist (anti-citizenry) laws and POW! Sheeple rejoice, your complete and total safety is at hand! Your submissive dream of a risk-free world can be realized! Shopping is your salvation...halleluja, praise the RFID! Revel in the mastrubatory shopping fantasy that is is anything but an information orgy with your complete and total dominion in mind. Just keep going until you reach that sweet, sweet release...of all your privacy.

buyRFID.com...get your own RFID stuff!

[ealbers]

Check out www.buyrfid.com, you can buy your own rfid kits!

Let's see...

[siskbc]

Now how did you *know* I was wearing a tinfoil hat????

No offense, but I don't think that deduction requires an RFID. ;)

Shimmer brand RFID:

[Anonymous Coward]

Its a floor wax, desert topping, and panaceac terror prevention.

Recorded in Tom Ridge's office:

[Anonymous Coward]

The following was recorded in the office of Tom Ridge, head of the department of homeland security:

Tom Ridge: Whats this RFID thing?

Tech: It's a new techno-

Tom Ridge: Will it help stop terrorists?

Tech: (Uncomfortable shift) Well, it-

Tom Ridge: Good enough! Lets try and get it installed everywhere. (looks at newspaper) Whats an SCO?

Tech: SCO is a Lindon Utah base-

Tom Ridge: They can help us fight terrorism as well! Get Mr. McBride on the phone now!

-- Snip! --

The rest of the conversation is not really interesting... But thanks for reading!

Oh how wrong you are

[zapp]

RFID tags cannot be reporgrammed. and they do send out signals (on request from scanner).

RFID tags have a very small amount of READ ONLY memory on board, which is used to store their unique ID. Furthermore, the devices to not have the functionality to write to the memory, even if it was writable. So you can be sure no one will ever buy a RFID reporgrammer on Ebay, well... maybe they will, but you can be sure it's a hoax and they got ripped off.

Secondly, they DO send out the signal. barcodes need a clear direct line of site to a scanner to be recognized. RFID tags work in a much different manner. A scanner could be put in every light post in a city to monitor the RFID tags planted in tires, and track individual cars (or general traffic patterns). Worse, due to the nature of the technology a directional antanne could be used to read an RFID tag from large distances.

In conclusion, your comment is crap.

Re:Oh how wrong you are

[Anonymous Coward]

I normally don't post comments, but I have to in this situation, as this is so entirely, totally wrong.

There are a number of RFID devices that have re-writable memory, some that can hold upwards of 256k.

Now, on the other hand, RFID is not the evil people make it out to be. They have a *very* limited range.

The only tags that can be read from 30-feet away are self-powered and have a battery. They're big.

The tiny ones you can't see have a range of about 18 inches *at most*.

one more reason....

[hornrimsylvia]

...to grow your own. food, clothes, and computer chips.

Hello John Anderton

[A55M0NKEY]

Walking through the mall, soundwaves from different sources designed to sound like whitenoise individually converge on John Anderton's eardrums producing understandable speech.

Hello John Anderton, I see from the RFID devices in your stomach, that you ate a Super Combo Taco Deluxe combo meal with extra guacamole for breakfast. Come into CVS and buy some Pepto Bismol - CVS the only price you need.

Hello John Anderton, you've had those sneakers for a year. They're getting kinda ratty I bet. Come into SportShoe and get a new pair before someone faints.

Hello John Anderton, The RFID in your Hemmorhoid pad tells us that you are in pain. In 56% of all hemmorhoid cases the major irritant is toilet paper that is not soft enough. Let us interest you in Charmin Lotion Soft toilet paper. The soothing lotion makes wiping a joy. And it is much stronger than that no-name brand stuff that left it's RFID sticking to your ass hair..

Parent is right.

[thePancreas]

This won't prevent me from suing these buggers when I choke on a RFID tagged grapefruit.

I don't know why America's food producers would want to use these, once these foods are on the market then it realy isn't any of the producers concern what happens to the product except selling, and these little tags aren't going to help with that at all.

Well of course

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course they would do this, because all the politicos are scared to death to not appear white tight and upright patoritic americans. While we're at it, we need to implante the things in our dogs and cats and kids (oh, wait...)

News just in...

[agby]

The Department for Homeland Security has just announced that putting 'locks' on your 'doors' will stop thieves burgling your house.

Latest research also indicates that umbrellas keep you dry in the rain, women like chocolate, oranges are not the only fruit and it's dark at night.

Re:News just in...

[gunix]

Do they say if the locks should be locked or unlocked? I think that's a big decision that I can't make myself.

Re:News just in...

[agby]

DARPA have been commissioned to investigate all possibilities. They have developed a 'futures' model, betting on how many terrorist acts are avoided if you do or don't lock your doors.

Re:Unsupported Claim of Blanket Immunity Hurts Ant

[Jack Schitt]

Blanet immunity? For all liabilities related to a product? Merely because of a connection to security? So if I market a cracker that sometimes has too much rat poison in it, I get blanket immunity because of an rfid tag?

[From the article]They also may get legal protection under the Safety Act of 2002 -- a tort-reform law that offers blanket lawsuit protections to makers of antiterrorism devices, should those devices fail during a terrorist attack.

No, the rat poison will still get them in trouble...

sorry i should be more clear perhaps

[koekepeer]

i actually mean: does it matter who big brother is: the government or some (bunch of) big corporation(s)?

the fact remains you're being watched without wanting this to happen

but, as i can already judge from the moderations, even the majority of /. readers thinks my question is highly uninsteresting...

break it.

[whittrash]

Duhhhh...rock...smash tag?

Calm down, the sky isn't falling?

[WildBeast]

So what if they can track you? So what if the government knows everything about you? They're just trying to protect us from terrorists. If you're not a criminal you have nothing to fear. Can't you see that the Pentagon's new tracking system went from Total Information Awareness to Terrorist Information Awareness? See you have nothing to worry about if you're not a terrosit :)

No pork = terrorist

[Anonymous Coward]

Now the police will just drive around with a scanner and call the swat team in any time they find a home that does not contain RFID'ed cans of spam.

Becuase only an islamic terrorist would have a hourse free of pork products...

Blanket protection?

[Blue Lozenge]

So... does this "blanket lawsuit" protection apply across the board? Or does it only apply to lawsuits having to do with "failure during a terrorist attack"?

DANGER, HAYZEUS, DANGER!

[Tumbleweed]

> I, for one, am perfectly willing to sacrifice a measure of privacy for robot slaves.

Hey, coppertop, didn't you ever watch "The Matrix"? What about "The Terminator"? It's people like you who'll cause the greatest catastrophe mankind has ever seen!

I say, if you want slaves, buy some Republicans or clergy; that's all they're really good for.

I'd suggest you go with "helper monkeys", but anyone who's seen the Planet of the Apes movies knows where _that_ leads.

Re:DANGER, HAYZEUS, DANGER!

[Hayzeus]

Don't be such a foolish luddite. Why, with the appropriate safety mechanisms -- perhaps a device fashioned from sturdy pig-iron, levers, pistons and a clever arrangement of mirrors, the robot slaves will be harmless as mothers milk.

Nothing can possible go wrong.

When my dealer...

[B1ackDragon]

starts putting rfid tags in each bag, then I'll be pissed. Otherwise, I don't care if the feds know how many pounds of coffee I have in my house.

Wait...

Crossing Over

[Jaeger]

Just for the record, John Edward is the guy who talks to the dead, while John Edwards is running for president.

Re:Crossing Over

[John Jorsett]

Thanks for the correction. I'm a little out of practice with his name, since I usually refer to him as 'douche'. /South Park

Wary public my eye.

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the problem is that on a regular basis people are being confronted with these sorts of things left and right, and just like selective hearing they tune out the possibility that it could effect them in any way if it doesn't impact their life immediately.

Your example of SSN's works well, while at the same time those same people would look at you suspiciously if you had asked for their credit card number -- probably because more people have had their credit cards used illegally than have had their identity used to obtain credit cards in their name.

People react to real stimuli more than they do theoretical stimuli. As usual, the impact will be felt when it's already too late to do much about it and we'll shrug because it was obviously done in our best interests.

Once it's on the cover of the Weekly World News, well.. maybe then someone will pay attention to it.

"There's a dead bishop on the landing"

[burgburgburg]

"What's his diocese?"
"How should I know?"
"It's tattooed on the back of the neck."

WMDs...

[Niles_Stonne]

"Now all illegal products are required to be manufactured with RFIDs installed"

Explain to me how this will help them to catch terrorists before the act. If it's after the act of terrorism, it doesn't matter that much anymore, does it? "hey, this piece has an RFID of a timex watch"

*sigh*

RFID will.....

[infiniphonic]

not even stop shoplifting.

Good concept, totally flawed & stupid audience

[jd]

I like the idea of being able to track my own personal belongings with a radio-frequency system. It would make finding anything I have a cinch, as all I'd have to do is a broadcast ping.

I do not like the idea of someone else being able to track me, or what I have, by the same mechanism. Sorry, but that is not acceptable. That goes beyond "privacy" concerns and enters the realm of warding off delusional idiots with earthed-tin-foil ten foot poles.

Hey, if I could buy a 100-pack of low-power, short-range tabs I could put on reports, books, CDs, or anything else I have a habit of losing, and then find it with absolute accuracy in mere moments, then I'd consider this the greatest new tech gadget around.

But if it's for someone else to do the tracking of my stuff... if it's for someone else to see what I eat, what I read, where I am, etc, then no thanks.

As for it stopping terrorists - how, precicely is it going to do that, when the major cause of terrorism is a dictatorial, authoritarian, power-mad governmnent?

If the USA had a decent welfare system that didn't create a poverty/ill-health trap, and if the USA didn't have a corrupt religious fanatic hell-bent on a 21st Century version of the Crusades as a President, then there wouldn't be a problem.

Think about it. There are a lot of dangerous, fanatical, stupid people in the world. Adding to their number by creating intolerable conditions is hardly going to improve matters. Nor is it going to give those dangerous, fanatical, stupid people the opportunity to see alternative ways of living that not only work, but work with them.

You'll never stop the nutcases, no matter what you do, but you can reduce their number by being civilized.

Any skepticism? Anywhere? Bueller?

[HarveyBirdman]

I'm not trying to be flamebait here, but is there ANY evidence these things have enough range to really cause concern? Aren't these passive devices that have a range of about 4 feet after they have been activated by a scanner? Wouldn't the police have to be in the house anyway (and thus need a warrant) or the thief (thus he's already broken in and can SEE what I have)?

Is this another blown out of proportion nothing? Don't we have enough REAL issues to face that we don't need to make up new ones? One poster below talks about how only the geek community knows about this stuff. Fine. But shouldn't the geek community also be able to filter out the real threats from the piffle? If someone has any reliable information that a privacy threat from RFID exists, I'd happily review it, but all I have found is stuff on websites devoted to the black helicopter set that requires these devices to do things that are quite basically impossible.

It all sounds like the scare a few years back about the metal wires in the new dollar bills that were supposed to magically transmit their values from hundreds of feet away, through walls, to any G-man with a Dick Tracy scanner-watch. I think those people moved on to believing airplane contrails are full of poison chemicals or something.

So far all I see is a way to get out of a store without having to wait while Grandma writes a check for a pair of socks.

Re:Any skepticism? Anywhere? Bueller?

[SKPhoton]

4 feet? I'm sure someone will come up with a pringles can (hopefully w/o an RFID chip) and bring a new meaning to wardriving. If not, we'll be in much better shape.

Re:Any skepticism? Anywhere? Bueller?

[gr0nd]

If there range is long enough to be activated in a warehouse, then the range is at least 30 feet (floor to ceiling). Even at a range of 10 feet, that will be enough to cover the entrances of most public places (airports, train stations, etc). I easily see these becoming as ubiquitous as video surveillance is today.

Re:Any skepticism? Anywhere? Bueller?

[BandwidthHog]

If they can't be used in the way we fear, then why are retailers so hot to put them in the *product* rather than the packaging?

RFIDs in packaging would provide all the inventory benefits of which they speak, and RFIDs in the products themselves would provide the privacy fears of which we speak. So the harder they push to get the tags in the products themselves, the less credence your can't-be-scanned-from-a-distance argument has.

Re:Any skepticism? Anywhere? Bueller?

[HarveyBirdman]

the less credence your can't-be-scanned-from-a-distance argument has.

I didn't make the argument. I *asked* if there was any real evidence to the contrary. I can find plenty of generic and theoretical hand waving, and futuristic confabulations that involve either [1] a black box of dubious possibility or [2] a pseudo-fascist government whose behavior defies 4000 years of empirical history, but not enough hard data to lead to the sort of near hysteria that I am seeing in some of the posts.

The General Rule...

[lynx_user_abroad]

Whomever builds the computer controls the computer.

We do not know what functionality these "remotely controllable mini computer devices" offer today; we do not know what functionality they will offer in the future. But we do know that the functionality will evolve toward the functionality desired by the people who create them. And we know it likely won't be you or I building them.

Do you want to live in an environment swarming with millions of little computers all working to fulfill the desires of someone-who-is-not-you?

Re:The General Rule...

[HarveyBirdman]

Whomever builds the computer controls the computer.

Until you install Windows.

The real reason is...

[oktokie]

I believe that RFID has positive side but also has very negative side to its technology.

I works like a double edged sword. It's use and reult will vary depending on who's using the technology and for what purpoes it's being used.

It's great that if thechnlogy were used to help inventorize and automate warehouse. But at the same time it could be used to track people's where about and habits, etc.

If I recall correctly, US government had forbid satellite phone companies in US to add encryption on the device. I was having a talk with my friend how moment's notice, all terrorists were going to run out and swap their encrypted satellite phones with unencrypted one.

The thing is that RFID isn't a rocket scientists. Soon, criminals and terrorists will use it against us(Noraml People). Like...um...muggers will use it to find out who's got most cash in their handbag(if cash was tagged with RFID), or go after a person wearing 12K gucci wrist watch rather than kid wearing $10 CONY wrist watch(Um...I've actually seen brand name PANASONY...true master piece).

Same thing goes for gun. When was last time going out clubbing with your Saturday night special 8mm handgun in your pocket? Even muggers and thieves bring gun with them all the times, but they do bring gun with them 100% of time when they are on the job!

Um...enough said. I have vast collection of personal private datas on my computer. Like my credit card, bank statement, mp3, cartoons sitting on my hard drive. I have hard time organizing my already digitized belongings! Do you think RFID will actually make you more organized?

I think some things are better left alone. Like...I still read paper book vs. pdf books. They are not the same. Let alone, I am not going to have organized closet because my clothes were rigged with RFID tags! You'd still have to pick them up and hang them in orderly fashion. If I am going to do them, then I might as well have them remembered. And if you have more shoes & blouses that you need RFID to help you remember what you have, then you have some problem.

If I were assasin then I'd probably program my pda with RFID reader so I can follow my target and avoid cops.

Enough said!

I don't think we are ready for RFID yet, until we find a better solutions, such as MELTING RFID tag.
Where we need to develop bioRFID tag where enzime in laundry soap will destroy RFID tag. Or, having come with fresh air will self destruct...or self destruct upon scanned by a cash register!

Because RFID is only useful in storage facility to help them identify and measure how much they have in shelf. It makes perfect sense to be destroyed upon walking out the store.

Ugh...it's 4:55 and I want to go home. Datacenter is so so so cold. Ugh...enough said.

RFID Spoofing...

[karlandtanya]

Ooh, I see fun times ahead!

RFID readers are already available.
What's to prevent some industrious hardware hacker from developing a programmable device that responds to a RFID reader pulse?

Grab your portable reader. Go around scanning all sorts of products. Just walk down the street and see what you pick up. Post the ID strings to a web page or newsgroup.

Now, the fun begins...Anyone can download the RFID response strings for a multitude of products and retransmit them when a scan pulse is detected. Maybe you could even run an antenna wire to your annoying neighbor's house!

"Hey, you better radio the station!". "Why?" "Well, according to my property scanner, there's at least a hundred cases of steel-core 7.62 and fifty Norinco AK knockoffs over at the Flanders' house...And about a pallet of dildos (dildoes?)."

Fourth Amendment

[missing000]

Finally, isn't it legal to observe people in public places? That is the very definition of public, a place where you cannot control being observed by others. The government might as well be looking at you if ten or twenty people you don't know personally are. I'm not saying that if you have done nothing wrong, you have nothing to hide, or some other silly thing. I just think expecting privacy in public is unrealistic.

Time for a law lesson!

The Fourth Amendment:
"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

i.e. The government is expressly forbidden from domestic spying on citizens without probable cause citing specific persons locations and evidence.

Re:Fourth Amendment

[Knife_Edge]

Time for a you're a dick lesson. There are exceptions to this, and one of them is if evidence of a crime is in plain view of a police officer. What, did you think it was illegal for cops to look at you while you are in a public place, that they have to get a warrant with your name on it first? That would make enforcing any laws at all nearly impossible!

How is a system that tracks your movements through a public place any different than a police officer looking at you? I think if you are in public, you are in public, period.

Listen, I also think the technology to make this a reality does not exist, so don't worry about it.

Re:Fourth Amendment

[missing000]

According to FindLaw:
The plain view doctrine is limited, however, by the probable cause requirement: officers must have probable cause to believe that items in plain view are contraband before they may search or seize them.

Also, it is well established that police are prevented from domestic spying without probable cause and a warrant. Whether or not I am a dick, this standard still applies.

Re:Fourth Amendment

[Knife_Edge]

Do you really believe that the act of observing people who are outside their homes, and perhaps on public property, or at least in a public place, is spying? I think of spying as a more of looking in the windows of your house kind of thing, and yes, that should be covered by probable cause and warrants.

It would be objectionable if they were using a system that specifically tracked YOU as you moved through public places, for no specific reason. But if the system tracked everyone, it is pretty much the same as police looking at crowds of people, videotaping them, etc.

Individuals expecting to be able to hide in public is unreasonable. Police expecting to be able to track individuals specifically for no reason is unreasonable. A compromise might be that records were kept but it was illegal to access them except in the event of a crime. So the police would have to get warrants to search the records. Happy now? Nobody is able to watch you to see if you jaywalk, litter, or whatever, but if somebody gets beaten to death with a bat, they can check who was on their street that night.

Re:Fourth Amendment

[jericho4.0]

In several of your posts you've mentioned that you don't think the tech exists to do these nasty things. Of course it does, or will soon. There is absolutly no reason why one couldn't build a scanner that could read a RFID tag from, say, 50 meters away. See the AIM site. The recive distance only depends on the sensitivity of the reciver.

Dealing with filtering and sorting the data recived by these devices would be trivial, databases are being designed and built all the time that handles this level of data.

I'm not saying that we should all being making tin foil hats, but the technological limits arn't going to be what stops this be a potential invasion of privacy.

Re:Fourth Amendment

[Si]

Do you really believe that the act of observing people who are outside their homes, and perhaps on public property, or at least in a public place, is spying? What does it matter what some schmoe on Slashdot believes? Reality is defined somewhat differently. I think of spying as a more of looking in the windows of your house kind of thing, and yes, that should be covered by probable cause and warrants. Oh well, then, that's ok, because Knife_Edge (582068) thinks that spying is defined as X. Well, I hate to disappoint ya, edgey-ma-pal, but who gives a rat's colon what spying is defined as? the point is WHO is doing the "spying", and WHAT are they doing with the information so gleaned, and HOW do they turn it to their advantage? the police would have to get warrants to search the records Haven't experienced much what of what most people call reality, have you?

Re:Fourth Amendment

[lucifuge31337]

There is absolutly no reason why one couldn't build a scanner that could read a RFID tag from, say, 50 meters away.

While I'm not going to even get into whether that's true or not, does it matter? If we're talking about tracking RFID tags in shoes, why couldn't a panel on the sidewalk read the tags? How about in the floor of an elevator? The deck of the thing that takes you from the terminal to the plane?

While my opinion is that the plain view doctrine certianly does NOT apply to querying electronic items in a person's posession, I'm just bringing up a technological point here.

Re:Good concept, totally flawed & stupid audie

[HarveyBirdman]

Hey, if I could buy a 100-pack of low-power, short-range tabs I could put on reports, books, CDs, or anything else I have a habit of losing...

The era of lost car keys may be at an end. :-)

And I think the RFID are NO power and all are short range. They are charged up somehow by the scanner. I think that's how the Mobil Speedpass works. There an emitter bnehind the Pegasus logo, and if you look up, there what looks like a slotline antenna about 8 feet above the ground that receives the signal. The chip in the Speedpass is literally powered by the RF field. I think that's why you have to wave it, so you get EM flux.

The Department of PreCrime will ...

[burgburgburg]

prevent the terroristic threat.

Everybody runs.

Question...

[windchill2001]

So Are all RFID's Unique? Or is the ID more generic to the product.

Is the number unique to my new pair of shoes, or is the number the same for all size 12 brown hush puppies.

Consumer group against RFID (CASPIAN)...

[wherley]

This group, CASPIAN - Consumers Against Supermarket Privacy Invasion and Numbering has information on RFIDs including Auto-ID: Tracking everything, everywhere. The group is also against loyalty shopping cards for similar reasons.

Re:Consumer group against RFID (CASPIAN)...

[Nexus Seven]

Can anyone say "retrofitted acronym"?

RFID used to track pets...

[jeepliberty]

RFID tags have been used to track pets.

I wonder if you can use the RF scanner in the kitchen of Duc Vu's Vietnamese Restauant to find the lost dog that strayed too close to the back door.

Re:RFID used to track pets...

[Catbeller]

RFID is also being marketed to parents to track their kids.

Prediction: first pedophiles, then common criminals, then anyone wanting to get a job with a company... finally, everyone.

If you're agin it, you're a terrorist enabler. Maybe even a terrorist yourself.

Maybe we'd better chip you, just in case.

I'm also

[gunix]

very bored with the "to protect against terrorism".
How much freedom do we want to give up, to get a false sense of security?
Now I don't say that RFID's in the food has anything to do with freedom, but where will they put the RFID next? (I've got a suggestion, but it will probably be considered obscene).
As someone said once upon a time, "we gather this information about our customers, we don't know why, but it might be good in the future".
That idea, and the believe that technology will save us (from all the bad in the world), that's just so utterly wrong!

The only way to feel secure, is to be selfconfident and show more love, help those who suffer. Then you don't have to vorry about fanatic idiots and other problems (since these seems to muster from problems).

By the way, the taste of coke is acctually very much like... oh, never mind.

Warburning

[Anonymous Coward]

RFID tags + concealed HERF gun + WalMart = Warburning

Walk down the WalMart aisles, triggering your trusty HERF at random (should people wielding these be called "HERF nerders"? Who you calling scruffy?). Then the fun REALLY begins near that funny looking Gillette shelf...

Just don't carry your PDA or digital watch on you when you walk in the store! ;) Oh, and make sure there are no elderly folks around who may have pacemakers. It's not their fault that the AutoID guys and Ridge are greedy, voyeuristic poodu.

"They" keep saying that technology is the key to 21st Century "homeland security." "They" just don't get it that the same technologies will inevitably be turned against their oppresive corporate-police state. If "They" want to move their attack against freedom into the technology realm, "They" will find success for a while as they embrace it, but will "fall on their own swords" in the end as it becomes a crutch-like addiction for them, and they have trouble dealing with the shortcomings of those technologies.

"They" have been quite successful in enslaving us via consumerism, TV, cars/suburban sprawl, photo IDs, SSNs (the thinly veiled National Identifier, thanks to gross mission creep), etc. Addict, then control. We need to take a lesson from their playbook and employ the same tactics in our eventual rally as a People to rise up and take back our freedom. Addict, then control. See, I managed to learn something from the Dune series! ;)

"Overthrowing the government through violence" isn't currently necessary when We The People can do it through peaceful means right now. Hopefully it won't get to the point in the future where violent revolution is once again necessary before We The People wake up, like what our Founding Fathers had to go through. Gandhi and MLK Jr. were no idiots. Peaceful, civil disobedience of unjust laws and regimes may be harder, but it does work and it takes the clearest moral high ground. Violent protest is "easier, more seductive", etc. but only warranted in fairly extreme oppression, once the regime has lost every shred of mandate from We The People as a whole.

Who is "They", you ask? The Pentavirate, of course! "I hate the Colonel, with his wee beady eyes..."

Missing socks

[Gandalf1957]

Judging from the ever increasing number of odd socks I have after each trip to the laundry someone's going to get very baffled when they start tracking my whereabouts using RFID !!

Many of my clothes were passed down to my brother as we grew so according to RFID info my parents have human cloning cracked !

Although I completely agree with the general privacy concerns I think that this particular aspect of it is so impractical as to be of no concern.

german article: RFID Will Stop Terrorists?

[Anonymous Coward]

Funkchips sollen Terror-Abwehr dienen
http://futurezone.orf.at/futurezone.orf?re ad=detai l&id=177109

Just what we need, better profiling!

[Anonymous Coward]

Just imagine...the police just scan each house in the neighborhood as they drive through...

"Let's see here: we've got some falafel in this house...no razor blades...very suspect...and a GORE IN 2004 BUMPER STICKER! WE HAVE PROBABLE CAUSE! CALL IN THE SWAT TEAM!"

I feel safer already.

Oh please....

[MoeMoe]

Yes, we wouldn't want them stealing our bananas now would we? That would be a true act of war... Seriously though, this idea doesn't add up right. There is no reason to use RFID tags for food unless Saddam gets hungry enough to eat one.

Bush & pals

[Petronius]

can go fuck themselves. That's why the terrorists have won: because we have less and less freedom without getting any safer. Airport security is a joke, there are thousands of miles of border that are un-protected but instead the FBI can spy on you all day long, Tom Ridge & Ashcroft can arrest you without right to counsel, etc. What a pity.
Bush keeps saying that he'll never forget the lesson he learnt on 9/11. Hardly so. The lesson of 9/11 is that the FBI & the CIA suck and couldn't connect the dots with information THEY ALREADY HAD. Why do would they need more power?

WAR ON TERROR = NEW House Un-American Activities Committee

Mod me down, I don't give a shit.

Re:Bush & pals

[Anonymous Coward]

Look.....another liberal pussy on slashdot...

fag!!!

You misunderstand: The money you make ...

[burgburgburg]

from dividends will tide you over between jobs. And since it won't be taxed, you'll have more to invest.

What do you mean you don't receive any money from dividends? What sort of financial planning services do you frequent?

You know, if people making over $300,000 a year aren't freed from burdensome taxes and allowed to take their "hard earned" monies and reinvest them, then the terrorists have truly won.

Just a thought...?

[fasaxc]

RFID (among other things) should allow stores to see if something has been stolen (scanner in the doorway reads tag) - but couldn't a thief easily disable the tag in the same way the store would? The properties of the tags are well known so could a small handheld device be made to disable them?

Or maybe rfids on box cutters

[xyote]

I can see it now. "Sir, you bought those box cutters in Maine. This is Massachusetts and you haven't paid Massachusetts Use Tax on those." Busted!

Opening new markets.....

[reality-bytes]

I can see a new essential device market opening up!

Lead lined wallets for your DVD purchases along with designer lead-lined satchels for larger items (comes complete with a free weight-lifting course at a local gymnasium)

And for all your non-rf/em sensitive purchases; the one and only Portable BIG-ASS ElectroMagnet (just don't wear a watch)

It suprises me that products like these haven't yet reached the market.....


Or how about something far-more sinister: An RFID scanner which can take any existing chip and clone it. - Now all potential terrorists can walk around emmiting the RFIDs of a peaceful citizen. - I'd like to see someone prove wrongful arrest for this in the States!

*GLOBAL*

[nurb432]

Look around and don't put your head in the sand, its global problem that clueless people facilitate the advance of the government into restricting peoples rights and freedoms..

Perhaps don't notice it in your neck of the woods, but wake up.. its happening. on a global yes, GLOBAL scale.

And i agree totaly its not NEW, however the pace has increased ...

Re:*GLOBAL*

[Abcd1234]

*snicker* Do your immerse yourself in the politics of every nation on the planet? Because, unless you do, you have no clue what other governments in other countries are doing, and thus have no right to claim one way or another if this issue is a "global" problem (counter-example, where I live, while there has been some attempt to pass "anti-terrorism" legislation, nothing has come of it). Yes, it's definitely an American problem (just look at all the anti-terrorism legislation being passed), but I'd love for you to demonstrate, with hard evidence, how this encroachment on personal freedoms is happening on a global scale .

Frankly, the fact that you assume that "clueless people facilitate the advance of the government into restricting peoples rights and freedoms" just points out that you're a paranoid libertarian. Now, that's your perogative, but I certainly don't subscribe to that view. I, personally, don't feel compelled to assume that the government is evil and out to get me.

RFID Penis implant

[DigiShaman]

And if you scan it will read "Hung like a horse". Maybe then I will have better prospects of geek chicks finding me.

The Terrorists Win

[Eric Destiny]

Now if i don't buy Oreos, the terrorists win.

Please, show some respect

[Anonymous Coward]

First post you fucking niggers.

We prefer to be called "Nigger Americans".

You must be new here...

[Anonymous Coward]

The common opionion on slashdot is that privacy rights are infinitly more important than terrorism. Who cares if a few thousand people die each year because we can't control the terrorists, I don't want I don't want Micro$oft knowing that i have 3 PCs in my house all running Slackware Linux.

RFID Labels

[suwain_2]

I think RFID would be far less opposed if there were legislation passed required all devices with RFID devices to bear a prominent "This object contains an RFID transmitter," along with a brief description of what this means.

Rather like how places using video cameras put "CCTV Monitoring Is In Use for Your Protection" signs up -- now you know it has RFID, and can make the decision on your own.

2 edged sword

[whittrash]

This is a powerful technology. It could save your luggage from ending up in Boston instead of Baltimore. It could be attached to a toxic waste barrel to mark its location in a storage. It could be used to automate rail car coordination. It could be used in the ground to mark telecom lines, or as survey markers. The industry link is www.aimglobal.org. But by design it must have a limited range, otherwise the detector would pick up all tags at the same time. In a million square foot warehouse stocked floor to ceiling it would cause a data overload as all the signals converged! How would you know where your package was, is it in shipping or receiving? You need to be able to point it at a pallet, and record the contents as it goes by on a forklift, both in and out. This could revolutionize shipping and trucking, vastly reducing costs and improving efficiency. It could vastly improve inventory techniques, leading to cheaper prices and improved service. I doubt it would be good for tracking criminals/terrorists unless it was covertly placed. OK, assume the nuke has a tag...that says 'Nuclear Weapon', just swap it with one that says, 'cheese'. Now some poor cheese shop will get raided by Delta Force? And since the tags are passive, the only thing you will be able to know about a terrorist is that he ate some cheese. It seems to me that the real reason they want homeland security approval is that the farmers co-op selling ammonium nitrate doesn't want to be held responsible when his tank gets linked to a terrorist bomb or the Wal-Mart Sudafed gets linked to a meth lab. For the paranoid, just get a signal detector, find and 'disable' the signal. A hammer will probably do the trick. But be aware, automated tracking by video, bank transactions, phone calls, voice print, et cetera is already available. If someone with vast resources really wants to track you they will. If you want to be free you have to fight to keep it, otherwise you can live comfortably with mandatory 24 hr obeservation of all aspects of your life, the choice is yours. If people weren't so lazy about getting involved there would be no problem here.

Just Cook 'Em

[The Angry Mick]

Shove everything in the microwave, and voila, instant privacy.

Of course, once you eat and RFID, you're screwed . . .

PATRIOT ACT again

[asscroft]

The PATRIOT act is what allows this type of thinking. Some people want to repeal it. One of them is Kucinich.

Go to his website and look at his 10 major issues. Up towards the very top is repealing the PATRIOT ACT.

You may not think he's a viable candidate, but at least he's got the right take on this issue.

I'm tired of being spyed on.

NO, I haven't yet read the article. But despite the fact that my post is matching my sig today, this is still on topic. Take away the PATRIOT Act, and the RFID crew don't expect benefit from tying RFID to the anti-terror campaign.

General Scanner Availability

[Balthisar]

Hey, I'm a capitalist, and I'd support RFID tags whole-heartedly, with the caveat given that:

(1) I can get a cheap RFID scanner for use in my home, and it's guaranteed to work with all RFID tags.

(2) There's a requirement that RFID tags be assembled into the packaging or article in such a manner that they can be removed by the consumer without destroying, defacing, or voiding the warranty of the item.

No big deal. It'd be simpler than scraping off the price tags for birthday gifts, or those damn labels on the glass of picture frames. Flush 'em down the toilet and they're gone. If you see DPW rerouting your plumbing for "individualized collection" then you'll have to figure out where else to dispose of the tags.

The tags worry me for the government a little, but worse for commercial abuse. Remember "Minority Report"? Yeah, I'll kill the little suckers, but I'm not against them in principal if I have ultimate control.

Answers

[zurab]

Most of what you describe is quite possible and feasible as well. Here are the answers:

So, you are saying that it would work like this. I go to the store, and buy a pair of shoes with a credit card. The RFID in the shoes is scanned in order to bring up a price to charge my card. So conceivably there could be a database somewhere that matches my financial info, including my name and address, etc, to an RFID tag in my shoes. Presuming the government could get access to a database like this, they could track people with some kind of device that could read the RFID tags from a distance. Thereby tracking my movements with my shoes.

They already have you beat on this one. Gov't can already access commercial databases without your consent when you purchase an airline ticket and get to the airport. This is a new color-coding system that they assign a color code to each passenger and to their "threat level".

With each step in this process I have detailed, things become more and more implausible. Retail store having database records of purchases, likely, I am willing to believe. Government getting access to database, not too likely but possible with warrants or something.

See above. If they do it to the airline industry, they can extend it to other industries as well. E.g. they can get your threat level before you enter a railroad station, public parade area, football game, concert, etc.

Government having device that can read the tags from a distance great enough to use it to effectively track your movements, probably next to impossible. I doubt these things are detectable at a range that would make tracking people practical. If you are willing to believe the government has the resources to put the trackers everywhere, on every streetcorner, without anyone knowing or getting upset, for budgetary if not privacy reasons, well...

They could equip FBI, local police, and maybe even security guards with such devices - I don't see a problem here. As far as privacy concerns - yes there are and will/would be a lot, but the attitude that you express doesn't help that. Even with the airline passengers color-coding system, where did these privacy concerns get? Almost nowhere with only one major admission that the gov't will not store your color-coded data for more than certain period of time.

Another obvious problem is what happens if I resell my shoes, or donate them to charity, or any number of other things that could cause inaccurate information in the database.

Charities that are accreditted as charitable organizations by the federal gov't could be required to report all RFID tags that they have received or transferred.

Will these types of devices draw us closer to licensing products to you and not selling them? Could it be illegal to sell an object equipped with RFID because it contains someone's IP, plus you'd probably be supporting terrorists? That's a far-fetched, yet interesting thought.

Finally, isn't it legal to observe people in public places? That is the very definition of public, a place where you cannot control being observed by others. The government might as well be looking at you if ten or twenty people you don't know personally are. I'm not saying that if you have done nothing wrong, you have nothing to hide, or some other silly thing. I just think expecting privacy in public is unrealistic.

This has already been answered by others. Gov't cannot invade your privacy by tracking your every move and recording it without a probable cause, at least according to the U.S. Constitution anyway. But who's paying attention to that silly thing nowadays?

Re:Answers

[Knife_Edge]

Nice post. I still do not think it is technically feasible to track people from any distance using RFIDs. I think range would be a problem. That is what I meant when I said it was implausible that the gov't could have such a device, not that it wouldn't want one, or wouldn't deploy it if it had one. I think you missed that, as your response seems only to cover what could happen if it did exist, glossing over the very good chance that it doesn't and can't.

Gov't cannot invade your privacy by tracking your every move and recording it without a probable cause, at least according to the U.S. Constitution anyway.

I want you to know that this is a very shaky argument. The problem is that the U.S. Constitution means whatever the courts say it means. It says so in the Constitution! While you may be right about the current rulings, legal precedent can be changed. I feel like I have made some convincing arguments as to how it could be changed to allow a system like this while allowing as little abuse as possible. See some of the other threads responding to the great-grandparent initial post of mine.

Re:Answers

[zurab]

I still do not think it is technically feasible to track people from any distance using RFIDs. I think range would be a problem. That is what I meant when I said it was implausible that the gov't could have such a device, not that it wouldn't want one, or wouldn't deploy it if it had one. I think you missed that, as your response seems only to cover what could happen if it did exist, glossing over the very good chance that it doesn't and can't.

There seem to be differing opinions on what could the range of these transmitters be, or what methods could best be used to activate the transmission. Even if we assume that the range is very short, one can still do sufficient tracking in the entrances to public places such as sporting events, concerts, gov't and other important buildings, airports, shopping malls, etc. Could you be refused entry, service, or be subject to a full search if the resulting information determines your threat level to be yellow, or red? That's what is happening in the airports right now. If you get pulled over by a police officer when you are driving is that a probable cause for him to have access to all information obtained through scanning your RFID transmitters? Even if you had an option to voluntarily consent to such "search" would you be treated with more suspicion if you didn't? In other words, even assuming the transmitters do not have long range, it is still possible and very feasible to abuse the system.

Re:Answers

[Anonymous Coward]

This has already been answered by others. Gov't cannot invade your privacy by tracking your every move and recording it without a probable cause, at least according to the U.S. Constitution anyway. But who's paying attention to that silly thing nowadays?

The fundamental thing you must remember is that the Constitution and Bill of Rights only limit what the government can do to you, not private entities like airlines, department stores, etc.

I'm goin' into buisness!

[Anonymous Coward]

Protect your privacy!
Disrupt your compeditors buisness!
Shoplift with impunity!

Yes, Sir, these RFID-frequency jammers do it all. Their compact size and two AA batteries make them portable and discreet, while still providing enough power to drown out an RFID hundreds of yards away.

2 AA batteries $19.95
120V Home Unit $49.95

Call Now!

Re:I'm goin' into buisness!

[promethean_spark]

That'll be fine until best buy sues everyone who ever purchased one of those for theft.

Answer:

[Anonymous Coward]

No, it won't.

It's not hard now...

[Anonymous Coward]

...They're all named Muhammed for Chrissakes!

Close proximity clause

[Anonymous Coward]

I think we're safe for now considering that the
reader must be very close to the RFID tag in
order to get any information off of it. The
transponder (meters range) type RFID are just too big for the
time being for them to be practical on every day
products. Scanning our homes is a while away.
I've tried working with these tags and they can
be difficult to use if you don't have the right
setup.

Blanket immunity ?!

[TheRealStyro]

I really can't care if these devices are used on (not in) food packaging and/or consumer goods as long as they can be identified and removed after purchase and do not contaminate the food.

The problem I would have is with the 'blanket immunity' clause. You cannot just remove the consumers right to sue (for whatever cause) without asking first. If such a law were to be created it would have to stand the test of a general vote. A representative vote would be invalid, as representatives generally don't have a clue about the concerns of the citizenry. I highly doubt that a general vote would be able to be used as a certain percentage of the voting population would have to vote either way on the issue to get a useful result (if 10% of the voting population actually voted on the issue it would still be non-binding due to such a low ratio).

This brings to mind the law that was to be passed in California (I think) concerning customer database break-ins. If a customer database is hacked/stolen/copied/whatever then who needs to be notified...the obvious answer is everyone that is listed in that database. Then law enforcement. The people in the database need to be contacted so they can change account information. This bill was not presented to the people and was killed by special interest groups (industry lobbyists). If I lived in that state and my account information was stolen from a database and I was not contacted immediately I would sue the state government for millions on the dollar of any credit fraud committed with my stolen account information. They failed to ask and they are the one responsible for the id/credit fraud.
\end rant...\

Tremble before the mighty microwave

[Angst Badger]

I'm as paranoid as the next guy about RFID tags, but folks, remember this -- there isn't an RFID tag on the planet that can survive fifteen seconds, probably much less, in your househould microwave oven. Most of the goods to which they are attached, on the other hand, would be largely unaffected.

Now mind you, it's theoretically possible that microwaving your shoes would then violate the DMCA, but prosecution is practically unlikely unless Hilary Rosen is sitting inside your microwave right now.

In which case, set it to maximum intensity for an hour.

Guillotines and NWO - Police State

[Anonymous Coward]

Bush knows he will lose the election if not get kicked out before that.

He will declare martial law. (Easily done by making the Terror Alert:RED.)

This means that there will be no election and the current administration can be in place indefinitely.

The government owns 100,000 new guillotines.

I wonder how many people will die.

Then sir, You are a fool.

[nurb432]

I have a better handle on other countries governmental maneuvering then you realize.

Example? the Britain banning all weaponry, incrementally, until the peoples rights to defend themselves are almost totally gone now. Or cameras on most every street corner, monitored by the police..

I could go on, but since you choose to live in a fantasy world where the government is benign ( which is by definition contrary to reality ), I wont. That's why I chose couple rather simple examples.

Perhaps after you have no rights or freedoms left, you might wake up and see what is happening.. But again, that will be a day late. Remember its incremental, and all designed to have the populace ( sheep ) gladly accepting each small step towards total control... as apparently you have.

Though I do agree that many nations in the world don't have as many rights and freedoms we have here in my country, so you are already 1/2 way gone.. so you don't notice it as much when what is left is slowly taken away.

That said, even ONE single right or freedom that is encroached in even the slightest amount, is wrong, and should be fought. Regardless of what country it is. Never grow complacent and accepting..

you've confused RFIDS and EPROMS

[alizard]

RFIDs are generally READ-ONLY devices, mask programmed at the factory. You won't be getting programmers at eBay or anyplace else for these.

Tape?

[taped2thedesk]

I thought they said putting duct tape on your doors would stop theives... Oh, wait... wrong commercial.

Other News: Cell Phone sales Up.

[Anonymous Coward]

Hun, I guess there is no longer a reason not to get a cell phone anymore.

Where is the USA I so idolized in my youth, ignorance is bliss.

Coming up fast. . .

[alernon]

Just to give everyone some insight into how fast RFID tags are coming to fruition, the town I live in just got named as a site for a new Alien Technologies factory. Everyone is touting it as a great thing for the area without realizing how harmful these things could become. The scary quote from the newspapers is how they're expecting to grow from a hundred or two hundred person factory to an 1100 person factory over the course of just a few years! I wouldn't think they'd be spouting off those numbers unless they had a lot of retailers/manufacturers already lining up for the little suckers.

Those cards are easy to outwit...

[Akardam]

It's as easy as one person volunteering to be the "blind". Then all you need to do is to know that person's phone number, and type it in. You'll notice that they never complain if you don't have your card - sure, go right ahead and type in your number.

I am one of a group of about two dozen people who use one phone number on one of our number's card. That ought to be enough to make their data practically useless :)

Gov't Security Breach

[Anonymous Coward]

What if said terrorists breach the US DoD systems that maintain this information? The terrorists would have a phenomenal amount of information then. Just a thought...

Good for Canada

[Anonymous Coward]

So we can put an RFID chip in every pharmaceutical product and/or tablet, and then sell it back to Americans at one quarter of the price.

Arguments about supply chain being unsafe would be false if this happened. Also a medic could scan you, and instanty pronounced - he/she just took ....

Or maybe arrest the poor and American Retiree's who hop across the border to buy what they need (more likely), who go for blood pressure and arthritis tablets.

What won't happen is chips on liqour,beer and cigarettes, so a policeman can arrest a minor for posession of same, because his school pass/credit card/DMV card also transmitted 'minor'.

As for 2nd hand/charity cases, these folk are good. The terrorists flew first class in Armani suits, just like certain former energy executives up to no good. Despite this, the cattle class airline passangers are screened, and the premium flyers - get less security.

Sprinkling chips on the ground or road with special glue outside Mosqueque places would work though - but I would hate to buy the car 2nd hand.

you one of them thar "software engineers"?

[alizard]

If you knew anything about basic RF, you wouldn't have posted the above.

So you think it's impossible to play with a nominal 4' transponder range a bit?

Try:

• boosting the power a bit... your limit here is that you don't want to fry the RFID chips. Best experiment with a signal generator or a variable gain power amplifier and be prepared to burn out a few in experimenting.
• directional antennas with gain

• If someone has any reliable information that a privacy threat from RFID exists, I'd happily review it

  That's very nice of you. If you showed evidence of basic competence of any area relevant to possible security / privacy or threats from RFIDs, I might be interested in your opinion.

  Being a "geek", even a "pencilneck" (1 geek point for the reference), whatever the hell you mean by this, does not automatically make you competent at threat analysis or evaluating the sociological or political impacts of a given technology.

Wow

[No Such Agency]

Who a) brought Philip K. Dick back from the dead, b) gave him a Slashdot account, and c) severely damaged his writing ability? Where does the giant alien spaceship orbiting the earth and sending you signals fit into this scheme, Phil?

:-) Seriously, PKD was right. If the government could pull this sh*t off (pun intended) and get away with it, they would.

No, I design ASICs for space communication links.

[HarveyBirdman]

If you knew anything about basic RF, you wouldn't have posted the above.

Oh dear! Was my post abusive or something? What brought this on?

Actually, I know quite a bit about basic RF, having worked in the field quite a bit before going into ASIC design. I've built operational ham radio equipment. It's the RFIDs themselves I have found little detailed information about. I was wondering if there was any real direct evidence that RFIDs can be abused in the way people are fearing given all the handwringing and histrionics.

Tossing out boosting power and antenna gain doesn't really say anything. There are myriad other details. I was hoping someone could link to actual experiments with actual RFID tags.

That's very nice of you. If you showed evidence of basic competence of any area relevant to possible security / privacy or threats from RFIDs, I might be interested in your opinion.

LOL! Oh no! You wound me, sir! What's with the front of irritated faux sophistication? Wait- are you Stewie from the Family Guy?

Being a "geek", even a "pencilneck" (1 geek point for the reference), whatever the hell you mean by this

I *said* I was referring to a comment by another poster. Anyway, I'll let you go. It's probably nappie time for you. tell Brian the dog I said "Hi."

Hey! I tease! Laugh, blast you! Lighten up! Hug a kitten or a puppy or something. Have a Mike's Hard Lemonade.

I do that with manners!

[MarcQuadra]

Good job! Seriously! Our rights only get trampled on because of apathy. Human decency/manners/rules of safety are regularly broken for convenience in this world and it'll only get worse as long as people don't stand up to it.

A few nights ago while shopping some lady in front of me brought at least 50 items to the express lane, I was behind her. I followed her out to the parking lot and told her that if I ever caught her doing that again she'd pay for my time with her blood. That's one less asshole in the express lane FOR THE REST OF HER LIFE because I stood up to her and put fear into her.

A few days ago someone was double-parked at the mall. It was quite apparent that she decided that since a shopping cart was taking half the space she wanted she could take two spaces. I parked my car right where I should have, between the lines, but it was under two inces from her door, she was totally blocked in. I watched her climb though the passenger side from the mall,, and approaced my car just as she was pulling out. She asked why I blocked her in and I gave her a nice explanation about RULES and how to use the 'P' on her transmission to leave the car and move a blocking cart. There's another asshole of the world who will probably NEVER double park again because it's not worth the trouble I made it.

Fry it!

[retro128]

Mr. RFID tag, meet Mr. Taser.

not to mention microwaves ...

[Anonymous Coward]

to bad this RFID will not work to track and nab
time-travellers, since travelling thru time-maschines
uses short, very powerfull bursts of microwaves
which will grill any RFID and most of the time
the top layer of skin of the time-traveller.
this is why one has to travel thru time naked! :-)

Deal With It

[Anonymous Coward]

In the future, RFID tags will be implanted in the body. Also, a sample of DNA will be taken from every new-born baby and stored, encrypted, in a worldwide database. There will be no danger of hackers accesssing this database because regular home computers won't be allowed to run non-approved software. {Think of the Pentium III with its embedded serial number and move up a notch or two. Every processor will effectively have a different instruction set. The software you are allowed to run will be compiled for your processor and your processor alone. You might be allowed to run a simple script interpreter, but it will be heavily crippled so as not to give access to system devices. You will be able to create files, and you might even be allowed to use API calls to access existing files.}

If anyone commits a crime anywhere in the world, any DNA they leave behind can be compared against the database and the culprit located. If the crime is simply a misdemeanour, then the perpetrator's bank account can be docked automatically to pay the fine. This would save a fortune on police and courts. Alternately, if there is not enough money to pay the fine, or the crime merits a jail sentence, then the city's public buildings would be placed on lockdown alert. As soon as the perpetrator entered such a building, a silent call to the police would be triggered. Once the criminal is out of range of all exits {to prevent making a run for it}, they would be sealed.

Public urinals would be fitted with mass spectrometry apparatus in their waste pipes. This would allow every citizen to be drug-tested on a continuous basis. Similar technology would eventually be fitted to the public sewers, to ensure that no-one might escape the system. {Relieving oneself anywhere other than an Appropriate Facility would, of course, be Probable Cause for arrest. CCTV cameras would be deployed to ensure that no-one could take a crafty, system-subverting leak in a doorway.} Non-essential bushes and trees would be removed.

Every piece of property, every banknote and every coin will be RFID equipped and every transaction will be monitored. Theft will become simply impossible since there will be an international database of exactly who owns exactly what. Future stores will have no traditional tills or cashiers. As a person enters, their ID will be logged. They may then select items. As they try to leave, their bank account will be checked. If they have sufficient funds to pay for the goods in their cart, the exit will be released. Otherwise, the exit will remain locked and the only way to leave the store will be by returning some unwanted goods to the shelves.

RFID "Poppers"?

[rdmiller3]

Looks like there will soon be a market for gizmos which can burn out RFID tags. It shouldn't be too hard to drive enough energy into them to make them go "pop" somwhere inside.

Small ones could become a problem for store owners who try to rely on RFID to catch shoplifters though.

Re:RFID "Poppers"?

[spike it]

Should be interesting to see how it plays out once the market for those gizmos is established, if at all.

He is right.. but for the wrong reasons

[Hyperfrog]

To think I actually researched RFIDs in 2000.. anyway.. You can get devices that will destroy/nullify RFIDs. When this does happen (I have already posted a note to ThinkGeek asking them to stock them), I will be buying a couple and I will spend the rest of my life reducing small electronic RFIDs to useless pieces of paper and metal. End of story. Simply carry an RFID killer with you. Turn it on and swipe anything that takes your fancy. muhahahahah.

Common misconception about radio transmitter range

[just fiddling around]

I understand your confusion. It is said that these radio devices have a limited range, so you think "if I stay out of the range of scanners, I'm ok".

This is a common misconception among the public. Radio waves have unlimited range, whatever the transmitting power. "What!" you say, "this is not what happens with my favorite Clear-Channel(TM) FM station! I can't listen to it from [some distance] out of town! And they got a whole lot of watts of transmitting power, situated in prime locations!"
Well, you can listen to your music from almost any distance, if you have line-of-sight to the tower.(Note to amateur radio buffs: I know FM bounces on the stratosphere) The reason you cannot with your car radio is that the signal to noise ratio gets worse as you go away. If you had the right black box, you could theoretically clean the noise around the signal and resume your listening. As an allegory, think of it as the electromagnetic equivalent of shouting in a croud: the ambient noise drowns your message as the listener goes away. But, if your listener gets a nice boom microphone(sorry for the stupid link, could not find better; see model ASV-5), he could greatly augment the distance he could hear you.

Following this, you can see that staying out of the range of scanners is quite difficult. In fact, if one perfect RFID scanner(TM) (one that has an unlimited capability to filter noise) could be installed on each street in a city, the whole city would be covered, and everybody could be traced. Of course this perfect scanner(TM) does not exist, so let's say you have a realistic max range of 1000 meters(3000 feet). See how inconspicuous it could be? A little black box in a while, camouflaged as, say, a street lighting control box?

Quick! where is my thinfoil hat!! Got to microwave my stuff right now! ;-)

I'm right too

[thePancreas]

I heard a guy from Walmart on the radio yesterday talking about how impossible it would be to start using RFID's on their products. He said:

1) It would take every semi-conductor company in the world 5-10 years just to cover Walmart's inventory.

2) They have no need to do this as there doesn't seem to be any incentive to the customers while adding a substantial cost to Walmart itself.

3) The substancial cost he stated was something like $0.30 - $0.60 per RFID tag. He said that in order to be cost effective they would have to be able to get the tags at a $0.05 per tag range.

All this means to me is that Walmart has done lots of research into this kind of "product enhancement. What I still can't figure out is WHY?

Whistle Me Up Keyrings

[redwolfoz]

Think how cool it would be for the individual though. You could instantaneously inventory your belongings. Lost your keys... just whistle up the RFID embedded in your keychain.

Nice useful example, but I'm reminded of those old keyrings that supposedly beeped their location when you whistled. My friend's mother could only get it to work when calling her daughter's name. Amusing for the outsider, but annoying for the daughter. I can see much the same bugs multiplied by the RFID in your keyring and your socks and your beer...

Rolls of tin foil

[Anonymous Coward]

I'll bet you can't find out where to buy tin foil. Tin foil was not used after WWII, iirc. It's all aluminum, and aluminum is not tin.

Enby in Waltham