RFID for Laptop Inventory Tracking?

An anonymous reader asks: "We are in the process of getting new laptops and I was wondering if anyone has used RFID for inventory control of them? Like many places laptops have had a way of going MIA. In an ideal world I would like to be able to get a 'real time' update of where the tags are located. I also would like to know when a RFID tag goes by a fixed location such as a door. What are people's experience both good and bad with RFID? Is this realistic? Where do I start? Had this been done with open-source?"

Comments

Re:Active RFID Tracking

[Anonymous Coward]

ELPAS (Visonic NA) is a company that makes that type of tag. Shameless plug, I install those systems.
Basically, the tag transmits constantly and the readers are spaced throughout the facility (not just at portals), and give a message if the tag leaves an approved area, is tampered with, or is not seen by the system. The system can even lock down doors when a tag approaches the exit, and integrate to CCTV to capture a picture of the thief. Also does wonders when you have twenty people in a conference room with the same Targus leather case.

They approached Michael Dell about installing at the factory. He doesn't want them as 1000's of laptops are stolen every year, requiring replacements..... Hmm, Profit Motive?

Random points

[Anonymous Coward]

1. RFID can be readily defeated (e.g. with tinfoil, or by placing laptop in metallic container), it should not be viewed as a security mechanism.

2. The current model of IBM thinkpads have an integral RFID option (enabled via BIOS).

Re:Random points

[billcopc]

RFID is easily foiled (*rimshot*) by any sufficiently massive _OR_ properly positioned hunk of metal. I played with the RF stickers at a video store that was once blessed with my dutiful presence, and soon discovered that they were rendered silent by merely holding an Xacto knife against the little bump in the center of the sticker. The knife would absorb the energy from the RF towers and thus the poor passive tag couldn't sing.

Now it is safe to assume that most of my customers were too retarded to even try the obvious, but I'm equally sure that a select few elite weirdos had perfected this art, or maybe even just lined their travel bag with a few layers of foil/sheetmetal, cuz we sure lost tons of tapes.

Re:Active RFID Tracking

[foidulus]

They approached Michael Dell about installing at the factory. He doesn't want them as 1000's of laptops are stolen every year, requiring replacements..... Hmm, Profit Motive?
As I imagine the theifs aren't using them to give venture capital proposals, it also means thousands of stolen laptops that get sold at very low prices, taking away some potential Dell sales.

Active Systems

[MarkedMan]

If you are willing to spend a few dollars for each tag, and install a tracking system, then what you are talking about should work. There is a good AIM reference summarizing this: What Is RFID? The advantage of an active system is distance, it can be meters away from a receiver. I remember talking to a friend working on this technology (14 years ago, sorry, I've lost touch and can't refer you). They were installing a system in a naval hospital to track the doctors by adding active tags to their base ID's, because the doctors were "too busy" to sign in and out at the guard desk. Sounds like what you want to do, substituting "laptops" for "doctors" . If you go to this site, select "Radio Frequency Identification" then "Systems" you will get a list of manufacturers: RFID Resources

Re:Active RFID Tracking

[billcopc]

Dude, I hardly ever hear "I'd love to get a laptop" without being followed by "My buddy gets them for cheap". They're quite content in receiving X-random-laptop with X-lacking-features. Meanwhile, I blew a nice chunk on an Inspiron 8500 and even after a year I still love the damned thing and use it daily.

Now don't get me wrong, I was once in the dark, having purchased (and quickly resold) a few questionably-obtained mobile computing apparati. I didn't resell for monetary gain, which didn't happen anyways. I resold because I wanted those things out of my life forever, they sucked monkey balls. Sure, for the typical suit who just wants to "read email" and look as rich as the guy sitting next to him, yeah fine, but for a power hacker you want the fastest, most connectable, graphically-superior machine out there. It just so happens that when you blow 2500$ on a toy, you will see no wrong in spending another 100$ or so on security devices to protect your beloved electronic companion. Me, I like how my Bios is modded to phone home during POST. And how everything is passworded to infinity and beyond. And how I never leave it in plain sight unless I'm standing near with a weapon of mass bludgeoning.

Long story short: stolen laptops suck, because good laptops have watchful caring owners.

Re:Active RFID Tracking

[foidulus]

That may help for laptops for personal use, but you can often read in the newspaper about a social engineeri just walking into some business, and getting the receptionists to help him steal 20 laptops. And considering even though PHBs only use their laptops to check email, as a status symbol the PHB usually orders the most expensive laptop possible.
My laptop anti-theft devices are
a) I'm a poor college student and I dress like one
b) I carry it around in a beaten up(on the outside) backpack, but one with a lot of padding.
c) my final line of defense is the laptop itself, an all white little clamshell with a glowing white apple on the other side of the screen :) Not too many thieves target the iBook(or at least that is my wishful thinking!)

What happens when the laptop leaves the building

[raider_red]

Unless you're using a strong active RFID, you're only going to be able to track a laptop to the door of your place of business. If someone takes it home and "loses" it, there's no good way to keep tabs on it. It could be possible to scan it on the way out the door and take a picture of the person carrying it though, kind of like that store system which takes a picture of someone when they remove an item from the shelf.

Size Matters!

[SuperChuck69]

I was looking at the similar problem of inventory tracking at my company. Every so often, the admin (conveniently my girlfriend) has to run around, tracking down who has what. We just just plain old inventory tags to keep track of things, but you have to get people to locate their items, locate the tags, transcribe them properly and not miss anything (dude, I didn't know THAT had a tag on it!).

My solution was RFID. Then she could walk into an office, "hear" the items in the room, and go about her day. It sure beat any other system I could think of for tracking items (especially when techs, engineers, and managers trade items around the office without letting her know).

The problem?
Primarily size. RFID tags are not available in the "paper-thin" size you hear about on /. They are big and bulky and have a rather limited range (meaning inches, not feet). There was also a question of cost and how efficient it would be place a $1 RFID tag on everything from a server to a mouse.

Re:Size Matters!

[Skater]

My workplace is doing inventory right now. The have bar codes on every monitor and CPU, but not keyboards, mice, or speakers. Laptops have a single barcode on the laptop itself, but none of the accessories.

It seems to work pretty well. They come in with a handheld bar code scanner, scan the bar codes, key in the branch we're in, and move on to the next cube/office. If the range of those RFIDs is as short as you say, they offer no advantage over old-fashioned bar codes - you still have to get near the equipment to check it.

--RJ

Off the network != left the building

[oneiros27]

It's a thought, but whenever someone reboots, has their system go to sleep, or shuts it down, it's going to look like it's disappeared.

You'd want to use a seperate tracking system than something that runs only when the system is operating.

Oh, and I'd have personally recommended Bluetooth as opposed to some 802.11 implementation -- as you can get distance estimates between two nodes (I have no idea how accurate they are, though). And of course, it has the same problem with not being on when the computer's not on.