Slashdot Mirror
RFID Not Just for Kids
dritan writes "News.com is reporting that a theme park in Florida is tagging all members of your group when you enter. The park has kiosks throughout the park that let you find the other members of your group in "real time." The park's web site makes it seem that you will only be able to find members of your group, instead of seeing everyone in the park. Slashdot has previously reported about tagging kids with RFID in order to keep track of them."
Great, there goes my plan to leave my crazy no-good kids behind.
----- You know you have ego issues when you register a domain in your name.
... slashdotters will spot the magic phrase "RFID", and remember that this is something the hivemind has told them they're against. They will proceed to explain why a private entity using RFID tags -- entirely on its own property -- to track and locate lost children is an appalling infringement of their civil liberties.
This should be good.
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
To me, this sounds more like a boon in marketing research than a breach in privacy. After all, theme parks have guards & cameras everywhere these days.
link you to any vandalism or trouble making.
:)
They can pin point your location so lets say a little boy and a "older man" magicly end up in the same toilet cubicle..... well then
Could be very useful for this kinda thing
I like muppets.
Am I the only one who is gets a bit freaked out by theme parks?
Sure, there is this nice image of happiness and friendliness.. but it's also obviously fake and false. (Even as a 7-year old at disneyland, I felt it)
At the same time, there are guards and surveillance cameras everywhere, not to mention the rigorous safety measures.
It's like being inside a Soviet propaganda movie or something.
And that was before they started tagging people. I can't say I'm surprized.
For a theme park, I don't think this is necessarily a bad thing. One of my least favorite things about theme parks is the potential to lose the rest of your party - resulting in much tedious wandering around. sure, you can call or SMS, but this seems like a genuinely good feature.
Can the park individually track where you are? probably, but it's their right to do so - you've voluntarily entered their private property after all, and paid for the privilege. Can they track your preferences within the park? probably.
will they store any personal identifiers? there's the rub. if their database links your RFID tag to the visa card number you paid with, THEN we're talking problems, and of course the article doesn't make it clear if this can happen or not...
Screw you all! I'm off to the pub
move on, nothing to see here
Not bad of an idea. Maybe they'll have some pad you swipe your tag near and it'll show your party on the screen. Can you use it to buy stuff too? How about stealing someone else's tag and getting crap w/ it?
Nope... I didn't read the article.
It's going to be a huge problem when these people wander near the sharks with frickin' RFID-tracking laser beams attached to their heads.
paintball
OK, I not a die-hard libertarian, but this seems like a good idea. This is not the same as tracking someone's movements all the time, as a theme park is ostensibly not the real world. It should stop kids from being getting lost; and it would save school and youth organisation groups from having to hammer around in those big chain gangs with flags, etc.
You've probably noticed that people's noses get bigger as they get older. That's because old people are huge liars.
Dude! Where's my Ki...
Woah. Gnarly.
Thanks Mouseman.
How am I supposed to have any fun if I can't accidentally get separated from the wife?
paintball
well, the monitors are throughout the park. you just check monitors as you get closer. if your friends are doing the same then you inevitably get closer.
;-)
of course if they hate you and they're deliberately trying to ditch you, then the knife cuts both ways
Screw you all! I'm off to the pub
Wow! Now you can find your other family members via a tracking system. Next thing you know the government will be using it to "track" you in airports, grocery stores, masterbating in the bathroom, etc. In Mexico they are implanting RFID tags into goverment officical to track them in case of kidnapping. "Experts" say that there is nothing to fear. Yeah, right. My paranoid buddy said a few years ago that the dreaded U.N. black helicopters could fly over your house and scan it to see how much money you had in it. Now that's possible; The EU is putting RFID tags in it's money. Also, within 5 years, EVERYTHING you can buy will have the damn tags on it.
I hate to sound like an apocalypse nut, but within 15 years it will be capable of one individual (i.e. antichrist) to control/track just about everyone on the planet, including money and food.
"Jeremy, you need to get to an internet cafe and cut and paste some appropriate sentiments about me from the world wide
Slashdot says the park is tagging everybody, but the article says it's issuing tags to everyone. So is the park really 'tagging' everyone as they enter? Like what happens to cows?
Anyway, unless it's mandatory, it should be okay. It's pretty close to being watched by CC cameras when you wonder around a department store.
Uselessful technology (Air-Charged
RFID is IMO not inherently "evil". It is a tool, like a screwdriver. Now, a screwdriver can be used to turn screws, or it can be plunged into someone's head. RFID is fine with me, as long as:
1. I know it's being used
2. I'm not required to use it
3. I can turn it off
"BSD: Free as in speech. Linux: Free as in beer. Windows 10: Free as in herpes." --Man On Pink Corner in #52607549.
Admission: $50
Lunch: $20
Knowing your party landed in Alabama: priceless.
Quid festinatio swallonis est aetherfuga inonusti?
Africus aut Europaeus?
Hopefully they have enough monitors around...nothing like waiting in a 20min line to find out that your party is in the same line, 50 people behind you.
"If it sucks without butter, it still sucks with butter, only creamier." - AC
I wonder when workplaces will start using rfid in security badges to monitor start and finish times, lunch breaks, toilet breaks etc..
generic
If they're any relation to wanadoo.[fr|nl], they probably have the least secure theme park in the world, with the rowdiest guests on the planet. They probably need RFID to keep track of what their customers are doing.
:)
Just sayin'..
"BSD: Free as in speech. Linux: Free as in beer. Windows 10: Free as in herpes." --Man On Pink Corner in #52607549.
Simple solution for you, then. Don't go into this theme-park. It's their park, they can set whatever rules they want. If I don't like them, I won't go there.
No "rights" issue here, move along...
I'd like to see posters in this discussion indicate if they have kids or not. I'm going to guess that those who post "not over my dead body/evil CIA tracking device/civil liberties being eroded by govt." are the single adults who've never lost a small child they are responsible for in a large, crowded public place.
Get everyone to take off their tag and attach it to the roller coaster cars ... then sit back and watch as park officials panic when they realise that there are 578 people riding around and around.
... as you take a journey through a ride, take off you tag and through it as far as you can into the diaroma ... and watch as park officials try and hunt down the lost kid
... flush a tag down the toilet and then say your kid is lost ... and watch then chase the 'kid' as it 'travels' around the park
Or
Or
Most of these have RFI tags in them. Seems like a good idea to me, for fairly ovious reasons.
Regards,
treefrog
..if you don't like the idea of being tagged and tracked - well, don't go to that park that tag and track you. Problem solved.
Off course, if the US goverment (or any other evil organisation/entity of your choice) started doing this, allowing you to be "found in real time", you might have a reason to scream up about "civil liberties" and whatnot.. but as long as it's private company doing it on their own property you have nothing to say in the matter - except to vote with your dollars and feet. Besides, I like the idea to find the kids when it's time to leave - spendt way to much time tracking down a kid that didn't want to be found because he didn't want to leave one time.
Everything in the world is controlled by a small, evil group to which, unfortunately, no one you know belongs.
No big deal. Seems to me, one can just remove it, unless it is required for the attractions. (Still can break the tags, I guess.)
Theme parks are all about control anyway. The better ones have good control which results in a good experience. (That is what you pay for.) The poor ones have not thought everything out resulting in problems. (Which is what you don't pay for.)
It's a good feature. Pay cash if you don't want your prefs tracked to your identity.
Blogging because I can...
How many times have you gotten separated from your buddies at a trade show? If you don't have their cell numbers, it's going to be a bitch to find them in the crowd. But if everyone can go to a kiosk and wave one's badge into a "group finder" app to register into a group, then you have only to go to the nearest kiosk to find everyone in your group.
What are they using? GPS? Antenna Triangulation?
...
Probably the last one.
I took a look at their website, but couldn't find any hints
This could lead to a cool modern day version of hide and seek. One person is the fugitive, gets hmmm 10 minutes to 'escape' then the others have to use the rfid to track the fugitive down.
Given that both the hunter and the hunted can see each others locations - but only when visiting the booths - then some interesting strategies could come out.
What would be really cool would be if you could tell the park you're doing this and they limit access to the location data to something like 1 minute access every 5 minutes to prevent 'booth squatting'!
Now I'd visit that park.
Seeing the number of Anonymous Cowards on /. I'dd say they've been using your teeth to clone you...
as long as the technology can't be used by pervs to find kids that are alone... the technology is more of a threat than an aide for groups if it isn't implemented properly...
finding loopholes in this type of system isn't something that you can afford to do after it's been widely put into use.
All the torrents you could want.
Well, at least they aren't implanting it.
Huh? How exactly does this technology turn the visitors of the park in to "serfs"? How does it make them property of the park?
if you hate the idea so much, the solution is simple: Don't go to the frigging park!
Lesbian Nazi Hookers Abducted by UFOs and Forced Into Weight Loss Programs - -all next week on Town Talk.
... welcome our new Theme Park Overlords.
http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/july2004/1907 04mythofrfid.htm.
Search the web for it too. There's lots written about it. It's from a month and a half ago or so, so a lot of it has already fallen out of Google News, but it's still mentioned.
Note it's not just an ID card -- it's an implant. If your job required one, would you take it?
As for peace of mind, I suggest that leaving your children unattended (and being encouraged to by the supposed benefits of the system) just because you can track them from afar is bullshit. Yes it might prevent some kids from being (momentarily) lost, but unattended kids are more likely to crack their heads open, or shoplift, or be beat up / be beaten up by other kids, or in the worst case even be molested or abducted.
With the right controls, I'd welcome this. Whenever my family and friends head to Cedar Point, we always take 2-way radios to keep in touch (emergencies, when its time to eat, etc). They really help out though when you can't find someone at 4 PM where we're all supposed to be meeting for dinner. Well, with these little kiosks, we can leave the radios at home and have one less thing to worry about losing on a ride. Just pop onto a kiosk and see where they're at. Most likly they're STILL in line for (insert newest ride here) and that they're not going anywhere any time soon.
"On a scale from 1 to 10, people are stupid"
Since the tags they'll use probably wont contain all the information on you they can possibly gather, this probably isn't that big a deal. They're probably just matched to a group set up in the park database when you enter so you can find each other. Sure they can track you too and provide you with ads and garbage for when they get a new rollercoaster if thats where you spend all your time, but one would like to think that's not the use.
People spend too much time being paranoid of what RFID can be used for in all the wrong ways. If they don't go overboard this isn't a bad idea, because we all hear about the person who had their kid wander off. Imagine if you could just go to a park booth and say hi I'm so and so and my kid just wandered off, they could tell you where the kid was instantly.
Presently here, but not there.
Where in that article does it say the park advocates leaving your children unattended? All I read was that the system will help reunite you with your children if they are separated from you. You've gone off on a tangent of your own creation. You're out to lunch.
Support the First Amendment. Read at -1
Don't just shrug and move on.
Personally, I wouldn't care if they were handing out bracelets designed for this specific purpose. I'd take them myslef I was going with a bunch of kids. But if they are being included in standard admission armbands, that is unacceptable. That's the problem with RFID,it's so small and inexpensive it can be embedded anywhere, not just devices created for tracking purposes.
Mod parent up!
Dollywood's Splash Country in Tennessee does this. For a couple of bucks, you can tag your kid with a radio transponder and one or more of the parents. The tags are paired at rental time. At any kiosk throughout the park, you can hold your transponder up to the scanner and it will show you the location of all other matching transponders on a little video map, as well as the last time it was detected.
I found it *extremely* useful since I could let my daughter ride the waterslides without worrying about how to find her when it was time for lunch or time to go home. Likewise, she could find me quickly and easily if she needed to. I certainly didn't feel that my privacy was being invaded and I wasn't able to track any other users in the park.
Is there potential for abuse? Of course there is, but it's like any other tool. It can be used for good or evil. In this case, I feel there's no evil intent and it helps prevent lost kids.
"Tell me doctor, with all of your defenses, are there any provisions for an attack by killer bees?"
During their stay, guests can use WannaFinder kiosks throughout the park to locate members of their group in real-time. "
I'm sure the park doesn't advocate leaving children unattended, but it is a bleeding obvious consequence of the system. Just because I'm able to realise that and you are not, does not make me 'out to lunch'.
Legal fight-fight-fight!
Now that's entertainment!
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
You know, I was just thinking, technology isn't doing nearly enough to relieve me of my parenting responsibilities! I wonder how long it will be before some lowlife goes there and snags an unattended kid in the "SafeTzone", cuts off the wristband and walks out with him/her? I smell a lawsuit. I just hope a lawsuit is the worst thing that happens.
666-607: 6th floor apartment of the beast
Have you ever listened to "I Think We're All Bozos on this Bus"? If not, consider it a missing piece of your cultural heritage. It's more relevant (and accurate) today than it was 25 years ago. In Firesign's world, theme park gets freaked out by YOU!
And if you have something on your property (ie killer rides or other cool things) worth being a serf for maybe i'll agree to that
Othewise I'll LEAVE. which is what you're free to do at a theme park if you dont like the RFID idea.
If you can't see the value in jet powered ants you should turn in your nerd card. - Dunbal (464142)
Back in my day, my grandmother parked her self on a bench at the front of Disney World and my two brothers and I (13, 11, and myself 8) roamed the park on our own, checking back every hour or three. I guess that era of confidence and trust is gone forever....
Stop by my site where I write about ERP systems & more
This could make for the best ever game of Rollercoaster Tycoon. All the little Sims walking about could be real people. All they need now is fsome system that measures the visitor's mood and keeps track of exactly how much the spend at any given store in the park.
A little planning goes a long way...
Now I can beat the crap out of little Jimmy anytime I want too! He can't hide from me anymore. I wonder how well that RFID tag will work after I stuff him in his locker?
Don't worry the above is satire. But it is likely to be used for that sooner or later. The problem with restricting the privacy of the lawabiding people to stop bad things from happening is that the people who want to do the bad things don't give a crap. They will either find a way around it or find a way to use it against you. Meanwhile, you, as a law abiding citizens had more rights removed from you and lost more privacy. All to stop the bad people who are still going to do it to you anyways.
Don't get me wrong here. For kids and stuff, It could be a great tool. I don't think it will stop kidnapping at all whereas the tag can simply be removed, disabled or altered. If someone wants to defeat it, they are going to be able to. It's not going to stop crime. It can however be used for a number of things to help us from day to day. We just have to be aware of those that will try to use this to curtail our freedoms in the mean time.
Remember when you used to make fun of people with cell phones? When you actually had to plan social events and be on time? When you would arrange meeting places in case of seperation?
Guess that was too difficult...
DALLAS and MESA, Ariz. (PRNewswire) - DALLAS and MESA, Ariz., Sept. 13 /PRNewswire/ -- Florida-based Wannado City(TM), the first indoor role-playing theme park for kids, is increasing children's safety throughout the 40 venues at its 140,000 square foot facility using SafeTzone's Real-Time Locating System. The technology, which combines passive and active radio frequency identification (RFID) tags and readers from Texas Instruments and RF Code, respectively, allows parents or other members of a group to identify the whereabouts of their family and friends at any time while inside the facility.
Wannado City, which held its grand opening on August 13, 2004 at the Sawgrass Mills Mall in Sunrise, Florida (near Fort Lauderdale), is a first-of- its-kind attraction in the United States. Designed to inspire children from ages 4 to 11, the indoor city allows kids to actively explore a world where they become doctors, dentists, firefighters, archaeologists, actors, television news reporters, chefs, judges, airplane pilots and a host of other professions. There is a small scale courtroom, circus, television studio, police station, bank, dance club, hospital, and even an airplane with a realistic flight simulator.
Included in the general admission fee, each visitor receives a WannaFinder(TM) plastic wristband, a hybrid wireless bracelet which combines a Texas Instruments 23mm passive, low frequency transponder and an RF Code Mantis(TM) series active RFID tag.
The WannaFinder wristband communicates information, including a person's location, via radio signals to a series of TI and RF Code readers and makes the information accessible through the many WannaFinder touch screen kiosks situated throughout the park. RF Code's TAVIS(TM) data management software collects and consolidates data from the active RFID tags, while SafeTzone's patented Real-Time Location Module draws associations among the passive and active data to identify and locate each member of a group. Groups can easily and securely access the real-time location of their members, on a map of the park, at any time of day in English or Spanish simply by scanning their WannaFinder wristbands at any kiosk. While the active tag communicates a person's location, the passive RF tag automatically identifies visitors as they approach the touch screen kiosks and scan their wristbands, linking them to onscreen icons marking the individual location of any member of their family or group within the park. The instant, real-time location of group members and amenities enables parents and guardians to know where their kids are, while at the same time empowering them to explore career roles with their young peers with unprecedented freedom and safety.
Wannado Entertainment, which plans to open new cities in the top 10 U.S. markets over the next several years, is the most recent company to incorporate the SafeTzone Location Services package into an entertainment park. Outdoor deployments of the SafeTzone solution include Paramount's Great America (Santa Clara, CA), Wild Rivers Water Park (Irvine, CA), Dollywood's Splash Country (Pigeon Forge, TN), Wet 'n Wild (Las Vegas, NV) and the soon to be opened Steamboat Springs Ski Resort (Steamboat Springs, CO).
For more information on TI's RFID technology solutions, please visit http://www.ti-rfid.com/ or call 1-888-937-6536 (North America) or 1-972-575-4364 (International). For more details regarding RF Code's data management software and active RFID solutions please visit http://www.rfcode.com/ or call 1-877-969-2828 (North America) or 1-480-325-4041 (International).
About Texas Instruments
Texas Instruments is the world's largest integrated manufacturer of radio frequency identification (RFID) transponders and reader systems. Capitalizing on its competencies in high-volume semiconductor manufacturing and microelectronics packaging, TI is a visionary leader and at the forefront
More spiels and jokes:
a nks.htm
http://www.themedattraction.com/jungle.htm
Famous Pranks
http://www.csua.berkeley.edu/~yoda/disneyland/jpr
# Dropping a rubber spider on guests' heads as they disembark and pass under the boathouse bridge (OK, I gotta take credit for this one... I Imagineered this prank in the Summer of '95. My most notable victim... Carrie Fisher of Star Wars fame)
# Fishing from the "catwalk" (center dock). The fishing line usually has a rubber fish or snake attached to it, waiting for a cast member to pull it up in a moment of glee with the entire boathouse audience watching.... one time somebody had put a broken "stroller parking" sign out on the catwalk with a stroller on it.
# Making jars of "baby piranha" to display in the dispatch office (Yep, I Imagineered this one, too. -- We'd bring in an aquarium fish net and scoop up those little minnows that live in the river, labeling the jar "baby piranha")
# Playing chess with a fellow cast member in the "luggage storage" part of the queue building.
# Playing dead on the infirmary bed upstairs in the queue building.
# re-routing the queue so the line goes in a circle, but never to the loading area (only works when there is only a few people in line)
Now if they can just get these things to read your emotions. Those park operators could just sit back and play a little game mapping the real park to a virtual world.
Just hope they don't integrate any "Black and White" technology.. I'd hate to go to Cedar Point and have the hand of god actually lift me up and drop me in the water because I can't find the bathrooms.. lol
Actually, I have to say amusement parks are one place I don't really mind being tracked. If they can do anything to make my visit smoother with less lines, by all means, do!
For larger families with older children that are old enough to reasonably be out on their own and where the parents (assuming there are two) will occasionally go different ways to indulge the differing interests of their children, I can see this as being a fairly useful 'enhancement' to the park. There were several times when my family (myself, 15-year-old brother, and parents) went off on our own and then took some time in meeting back up in spite of having arranged doing so earlier where something like this would have been useful- we could have checked and seen, "OK, Matt is still stuck in line at such-and-such ride, we can go wait for him where it lets out." Not saying it's completely good- the already mentioned possibilities of it being used by someone looking for a child to abduct do exist, but hopefully there would be other measures in place (like, decent security, and good parents) to prevent that.
I'm a season ticket holder for the local minor league baseball team. They have no RFID bracelets, yet the park swarms with unattended kids and foul balls hurtling through the air at dangerous speeds.
I go to the local mall on a Friday evening. I see swarms of unattended kids (most older than the 4-11 target age of Wannado City, but still not adults).
Stupidity and bad parenting are bleeding obvious consequences of the human condition. Given that they are unavoidable, I don't see any other problems with this system, especially as we're talking "on their property, in their theme park."
Save Maine's economy: write stuff down. All comments are exclusively my own, not my employer.
i tell you what, grandparent is damn right, and you're damn wrong...
this has nothing to do with becoming a theme park's private property...it has everything to do with you having to abide by their rules while you're on their private property...if you won't follow their rules, then you aren't allowed in!
if i want you to wear a green shirt when you come to my house, you'd better, or you won't be allowed in!
this is not making you my property, it is disallowing you entrance to my property which you have no right to enter unless GIVEN PERMISSION.
remember, theatres make you pay, and not bring cameras in; airlines require you check your knives and not bring them on board the plane...is this making you their property? NO. It's merely the rules private citizens have imposed on visitors to their private property.
Since the YRO section was originally created it has been posting stories about "technology and your rights". Every story I have read fits that qualification. Every story I have read has met the "news for nerds, stuff that matters" qualification. Every story that I have read has generated interesting discussion among readers of this site who do care about these issues.
So basically what your entire complaint boils down to is the pedantic fact that they could have chosen a better title than YRO. Give it a rest - if you're not interested don't read it. Until then, I will continue to mod down any posts complaining about "relevence" of a story. I don't care whether the poster is intentionally karma-whoring, trolling, or just being off-topic, these posts increase the signal/noise ratio for those who are interested in the story, and thus should be moderated down.
I don't have a problem with it as long as they are using capture and release.
"Grab them by the pussy" -- President of the United States of America
The lowlife scumball can molest your kid right "here and now" and walk away, without any tag to watch over him. And as the surveillors see that your kid is in the "SafeTzone," they're none the wiser as to what is happening and has happened.
People say I'm crazy, I got diamonds on the soles of my shoes...
Theoretically, parents can rent the child-tracker bracelets and use cell phones or kiosks to track and page the kids. Various companies (e.g.: http://www.blipsystems.com/) are developing this sort of thing, taking advantage of Bluetooth's limited range to quickly get a rough fix on someone's position in the covered area. I don't know if it's in practice anywhere . . .
I am not a crackpot.
That's the killer app for rfid!
I think so, Brain. But where will we get a duck and a rubber hose at this time of night? --Pinky
Did I say literally? Then read my parent post again: It's all about analogy and an allusion (as always, those who don't get it mod it as troll), and we all should know the answer if someone asked what putting an RFID on a living being rather compares to:
If they are lying, then why is it wrong to raise questions about what their real motives might be?
Because if they aren't lying, it is ok. If they are lying, then everything brought up is acceptable to me so far as well.
If your real objection is being lied to by corporations, your only recourse is to move to your own private island. I hate to be the one to break it to you, but corporations lie all the time, and it isn't illegal (and since corporations have no morals, isn't immoral or unethical either).
As for peace of mind, I suggest that leaving your children unattended (and being encouraged to by the supposed benefits of the system) just because you can track them from afar is bullshit.
Uh, I've not seen anything suggesting that is the reason for the system. I know that parents have fears of losing children. I also know that if you split with a group of adults, it is sometimes hard to meet back up. This helps with both. You don't leave your 3 yr old alone in Mickey Land becuse you can track him. You use the system if you are watching him, get distracted, lose track of him, and are upset because you've lost your child.
Learn to love Alaska
It was my car that got stolen. No RFID tag offered for that (not by the theme park anyway)
If my call is important, why am I talking to a recording?
I thought RFID tags were supposed to protect us from evil... strange evil creatures that try to eat you... Oh, no, sorry.... think I've gone mad.
How about just putting cow bells around their necks?
----
This concludes our transmission to Oceania.