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RFID Tags For The Rich
Greedo writes "While reading this piece about designing 'experiences' in the Globe and Mail, I came across this interesting tidbit: If you're a frequent Prada shopper (and who on /. isn't?), the loyalty card in your wallet or purse contains a RFID tag that announces your arrival in the store. When you encounter a saleswoman, her handheld computer brings up your tastes, buying history, vital statistics and personalized suggestions from in-stock and coming inventory; the handhelds also place orders and book change rooms. Every item for sale bears an RFID tag. The RFID tags are courtesy of IDEO, and their website has a nice write-up of all the RFID-powered stuff at Prada, including the changeroom! I'm guessing this isn't coming to Wal*Mart's changerooms when they implement RFID. (Another write-up can be found here.)"
They don't care how they look in that Prada or D&G or whatever it is they're wearing as long as it's the latest designs. In fact, I doubt most of them would want to see a picture of their behinds because they'll suddenly start feeling fat or something. What they want is for the salesgirl to say "Oh, yes, you look fabulous in that! And so slim! And that color really brings out your eyes! Yes, it's really you!"
People say I'm crazy, I got diamonds on the soles of my shoes...
Problem with that idea is antennas are specific to the type of RFID technology used. So you'd probably need a collection of dozens of scanner and antenna combinations to pull that off.
Nice idea though.
I have a second sig, I call it sig#2.
I've worked with several RFID implementations, and all of the (silicon-based) solutions have decent encryption to prevent "capture" of IDs or other data. Usually a shared-key system -- not unbreakable, of course, but pretty difficult to intercept on the sly.
S
> which makes W the first Pres since Herbert Hoover to have a
> net loss of jobs during his term
Liberal myth. Any job loss would be run-on from Clinton's bungling. Witness the recent massive job creation due to Bush house policies.
Your not fooling anyone.
Mwaha.
For those of you that aren't Canadian, or have never heard of Radio Free Vestibule (I think they're just called 'Vestibule' now), this comes from one of their sketches. Zalgon-26 McGee's fine clothing!
There seems to be many people wondering if they can make an antenna that transmit rfid signals. Look up rfid blockers on google. They have been developed.
The system is composed of a few elements. The Readers which have large mats attached to them. The mats have a series of loops in them. One loop 'charges' the chip the other 'recieves' the chip.
The mats constantly send out a 'charge' signal to the chips which then send back their ID for the reader. This is happening at a very high frequently, for champion chip the time is rated to the .01 of a second.
The other major component is the Ear. The purpose of the Ear is to syncronize all the mats. This makes sure that all the 'charge' and 'recieve' cycles and in sync. Otherwise you would have chip reads happening out of sync.
As for the 'photo-finish' aspect of a race you still need to rely upon a photo for high speed events since it is possible that both athletes could register the same time to the .01 of a second.
For high density races we place a system (System Photo) right at the finish line. This system is usually 8M wide by 4M deep. Then a back-up a few meters beyond. The systems can be linked to form larger read areas. If you have ever been to a marathon you will know what I am talking about.
If the system is working correctly we can dedect a chip as high has 60CM off the ground. If we have strong EMI then the reads are a bit lower.
To avoid multiple reads we set a time to ignore for the system. Usually 10 seconds. So once we read a chip we won't read it again for 10 seconds. This can be an issue with a mass start since people may be walking over the mats and end up on the same mat for a few seconds.
Although I love good shoes (I'm a recent leather sole convert) I find Prada to be too contemporary for my tastes, but their web site is a joke. I scanned about with my mouse for the magic pixel to let me in, but I don't see it. Maybe it just isn't friendly to safari on the Mac.
-- Solaris Central - http://w
Bullshit.
Proximity cards based on ISO14443 have encryption, but very limited reading range due to the larger power consumption of the chip. Popular types of vicinity (up to about 1 m reading range) cards such as I*Code, Tag-it, ISO 15693 use no encryption at all. I designed low-level firmware for a reader to read these, so I should know...
Try ISO 15693, part 2 and 3 (part 1 is not that interesting). You can order it with your national standards organization. Much cheaper: you can find the final drafts of the standards on the Internet, e.g. at http://perso.wanadoo.fr/dgil/14443/
In response to many of the posts above, this anonymous coward who has worked extensively with supply chain rfid solutions would like to submit the following:
4 /1/2/ for more info and a link to a major newspaper story
_ WalMart was testing RFID retail solutions on individual products BEFORE they pulled back from the gillette tag project. See http://www.rfidjournal.com/article/articleview/65
_ Data collected by RFID in the retail environment is pretty inocuous compared to what is already collected. Wheter you use a 'club card' or not, if you've ever payed for a purchase with a credit card there is a name & address associated to your detailed purchases.
_ RFID tags can't be read by potential theives or evil conmen. The technology as-is is pretty crappy right now, and the range required to read tags small enough to fit on an individual product is within a couple inches. Portals/readers have to be specifically tuned to certin tag formats as well. Suffice to say, unless the 'evil doers' have the ability to hold the actual item -- and the right hardware to read the specific tag, they dont have a shot in hell at reading it. If that doesn't address your concerns, then how about this: newer tags implement self-destructing features, that allow a 'die now' command to be sent when scanning to render them useless -- just to be safe.
_ RFID tags function poorly around metals and machinery from interference. They're pretty bad around water and paper/wood too.
_ Everyone touts the Prada store's accomplishments for the past two years. Its old news -- and no one ever mentions that the stuff never works. Go by the store, ask for a demonstration. Watch the employees cross their fingers or laugh. Go on... The Prada store is only functional as a PR piece.
All of the outcry and reservations about RFID is just plain stupid -- the technology only makes current supply chain tasks easier. The only negative effect on consumer privacy they exert, is detracting attention from the invasive climate THAT ALREADY EXISTS.