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World's Smallest RFID Reader Touted
An anonymous reader writes "Innovision Research & Technology, a UK company, has developed a radio frequency identification (RFID) reader that supports Near Field Communication (NFC), a new standard that will allow electronic devices to interact when "touched" together.
The NFC standard is being backed by Nokia, Philips and Sony. It's meant to let users access content and services by simply touching 'smart objects' and connecting devices just by holding them next to each other. Some services include swapping music and buying movie tickets. Once a connection has been established between two NFC-enabled devices, another wireless technology such as Wi-Fi or Bluetooth will be used to actually transfer the data. By adding support for NFC, Innovision says it's getting ready for when mobile users will be able to download music tracks by just tapping their device against a poster."
... I'm having mine built right in to my tinfoil hat. That'll stop the CIA/NSA/MI6/CI5/Walmart from spying on me as I carry out my top level, high security, deeply private but basically non-existent personal life.
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
By adding support for NFC, Innovision says it's getting ready for when mobile users will be able to download music tracks by just tapping their device against a poster."
Amazing - that would be a great transfer rate if we're talking about full songs. Or when they say "tap" do they perhaps mean "holding their devices against a poster for a few minutes."??
A little planning goes a long way...
Innovision says it's getting ready for when mobile users will be able to download music tracks by just tapping their device against a poster
Imagine also walking into a high street music shop with your MP3 player in hand where all of their CDs are embedded with rfid tags. Tap your MP3 player against a CD case to get the rfid tag, then your MP3 player connects to the store's wifi network and requests a sample of the album using the rfid tag.
Limit it to a couple of samples per person per unit time to avoid abuse, and you've got yourself a very powerful means of marketing CDs.
Once the tap against the poster has been registered, the transfer takes place via Bluetooth or Wi-Fi. So it could take seconds or minutes, it doesn't matter if you stay close enough to the transmitter. It may even appear to the user that the tap transfered the song instantaneously.
Why is the buying movie tickets example always touted with this kind of technology? Does anyone actually spend that much time buying them to make it worthwhile for boffins to spend millions researching ways to make it a few seconds faster?
Confused! (easily)
Once a connection has been established between two NFC-enabled devices, another wireless technology such as Wi-Fi or Bluetooth will be used to actually transfer the data. :-/ ): exchange symmetric keys over NFC, then do encrypted 802.11 or Bluetooth. This gets rid of passwords (which are either difficult to remember, easy to guess, or both), is as secure as wire (requires physical access to the 802.11 hub to build a connection) and provides a nice security metaphor to non tech-savvy people: by touching the two devices together, one creates a "virtual wire" between them that can be "stretched" up to the maximal range of the wireless link.
This idea could solve the wireless security problems in a really secure and convenient way (if only the standards folks can get the crypto right this time