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NYT on RFID
The New York Times has a piece on RFID tags. It's basic, but worth reading as a milestone - the technology is starting to enter the public eye. These RFID tags will have unique serial numbers - every RFID-tagged item you purchase will be uniquely different from every other nearly-identical item, enabling it to be identified and associated with you long after the purchase. And no, microwaving will generally not destroy the tags, and no, most items won't be microwaveable anyway. Try to microwave your couch.
Ha! I laughed at my buddy a few years back when he said that the U.N. could fly over your house and scan it to see how much money is in it. Now that is a reality. The RFID tags would be useful for inventory purposes, but the privacy thing is hard to shake. Who says that "advanced" criminals in the future won't develop a "super RFID scanner" and scan all of the houses in a neighborhood and "see" what goodies are in each house to try to figure out which house to rob. OR the government can use it to see which house is guilty of thought crime! :)
"Jeremy, you need to get to an internet cafe and cut and paste some appropriate sentiments about me from the world wide
Would microwaving (whatsoever) the tag in a bank note render the note unusable? Will shops also have machines for automatically alerting the local police if I try paying with one of the forged ones?
What if I, without knowing it, carry such a note?
Guantanamo calls.
Either:
How many will choose to leave it on.
And if you have something to hide, then that is just the excuse that the police/... need to come sniffing.
Either way, the pressures will be such that most people won't bother/want to have them removed.
But what is worrying is when information about you is used in ways to control your behaviour. For instance, if you are thinking about quitting smoking and purchase the patches to help with the cravings. Those interested will track your movements along with the movements of other "quitters" to place smoking triggers along your path to make it that much hard for you to shake the habit.
Perhaps you're a person who has bought a lottery ticket or two. Suddenly you're flooded with all kinds of gambling offers. Sure, you can say no to their offers, but what will others think when they see you getting that barage of junk mail to visit all those cassinos? What will your boss think when they start sending those offers to your office?
Most of us live lives of moderation. We like to take in occasional vices, but we mostly try to keep things pretty mundane. But this isn't allowed in the corperate world. They have to seek out potentially new exploits to justify getting an MBA. Any information that they can get will allow them to find a wedge between you and your better judgement.
I know, I know... You're too smart for their tactics. You're in control of your own destiny. It doesn't bother you when they mercilessly pick away at you. You're just content to sit back in your recliner watching "Matlock" re-runs on cable.
The sad part is, people don't see any value in privacy, because they don't realize the benefits it allows. Being anonymous allows you to have your turn next in line, and receive the same amount of respect as a person who is twice as affluent as your are. Once your personal worth is on the table with everyone else's, your value in society has just been broadcasted, and you will wait until those more worthy have been served no matter how long you've been waiting. You may never be served at that rate...
Oh, but you'll just head on to their competitors, right? Think again. They bought the same list. They also know that you'll be more desperate than before since they knew where you were coming from... Now they can really ream your wallet *IF* they decide you're worth having as a customer.
Privacy also allows you to be forgiven for your past mistakes more easily. Who hasn't made a mistake or exercised poor judgement when they were more youthful? It's the foundation of experience, but if your subordinates know every detail, they aren't as likely to be as subordinate. How can you credibly jump on them for making the same mistakes you used to?
Privacy has a very real value for people in society. It's not just about dirty magazines or illicite affairs. It's about not having to worry what the score is every moment of your life. It about not having to be publicly humiliated at unexpected moments. It's about maintaining person dignity and self-respect.
If you don't have any respect for yourself to keep private things private, how can you expect anyone else to respect you as well?
You know, RFID tags are a lot like cookies. When they were designed, the intent was to help a web site maintain state. A security mechanism was built in to prevent a web site from getting someone else cookie. Courtesy of doubleclick.net and others, now they are used to track marketing and web site visits and clearly violate my privacy. Yet, I cannot browse the web without them because of how sites are designed to use them. This means that I have to periodically clean out cookies that are unwanted and violate my privacy. It seems that RFID tags are going to be the real world equivalent.