Using RFID Tags to Make Teeth
Roland Piquepaille writes "If you live in France, and soon elsewhere in Europe and in the U.S., and if you need a dental prosthesis, chances are good that RFID tags are involved in the manufacturing process, according to this article from the RFID Journal. The tag is embedded by the dental lab in the cast which will be used to make the prosthesis. Then it is used to record the whole history of the crown, a process requested by a European sanitary regulation. Before delivering the bridge to your dentist, all the data is copied to a smart card that will be given to you. The company is also studying the idea to put directly the tag inside the prosthesis. Maybe one day, when your dentist installs your new bridge, you'll also be the owner of a deactivated RFID tag inside it. This summary contains more details and a picture of the RFID tag used to record the life of your next crown."
They really are trying to get inside our teeth!
:O
How long will my fillings tingle after I pull my head out of the microwave?
i was attacked by a coked up whore and a fscking crazy dentist!
wasn't this going on in 1984? or wait.. that's the book... my apologies.. not to be a conspiracy theorist, but isn't this just a little suspisious to anyone else?
President Bush Supporter
The 1 Euro coin shown in the real size image is just slightly larger then an American nickel.
.. but there's NO way I'm letting my dentist near my routers!
With great numbers come great responsibility!
The Aliens have been implanting tiny tracking devices in teeth for years. These so called "RFID" tags are just humans using Alien(tm) technology.
comment directly in my journal
If you've seen the movie, then you know this is a bad idea.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
you'll also be the owner of an activated RFID tag in your skull.
You'll need a tinfoil jawplate now to go with that helmet.
David
I think my teeth have the right to surf the internet...I demand that the dentists adopt Wi-Fi instead of RFID.
Two freaks, no foes. It takes absolutely nothing to make some people angry.
...with all the teeth in Europe that need replacing.
I would rather go toothless than have my teeth broadcast my whereabouts to snoopers, offical or otherwise.
May the Maths Be with you!
RFID is for tracking things. Prosthetics (of any type) need to be tracked closely, since they're essentially unique to their intended recipient. If you happen to be someone waiting for one, you want it as quickly as possible. Anything that makes the process more efficient is a good thing for the patients.
I know this is some slashdot "the gummit is comin to git us" FUD, as well as Roland Piqopiles contractualy daily blogvertisement, but get the hell over it.
If you're so afraid, start brushing your teeth and flossing.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
I sure hope they include data like:
... NO THANKS!
- my toothpaste preference
- whether or not I brush 'correctly'
- the tardiness of my payments to the dentist
This is like a dream come true - having data imbedded into my FUCKING HEAD which drones can access at their will
You can't expect to wield supreme executive power, just because some watery tart threw a sword at you
Old school Penny-Arcade once more proves its value. Hehe.
Before delivering the prosthesis to the dentist, the lab retrieves the data contained in the die's RFID chip and copies to a smart card also fitted with a PicoPass chip. The dentist can then pass on to the patient. "The advantage of such a card is that if a patient requires another prosthesis for other teeth at another stage in his life, he can present it to the practitioner, who will retrieve all the data related to all the prostheses of the patient," says Cachia.
Is it an RFID chip or a "smart chip"? Why would you "copy the data" from an RFID chip to a smart card? Isn't an RFID chip simply a form of serial number? If they're really just copying the data associated with that number, does that mean that RFID Journal writers aren't really familiar with what's going on?
500GB of disk, 5TB of transfer, $5.95/mo
DarkLordSeth, this is your story! Imagine, a government agency (for "sanitary purposes" yeah right) placing a RFID tag ("deactivated" yeah right) in your mouth! Now all you need to do is tie it in with 9/11 and George Bush and you are all set.
Oh yeah, and twitter can tie it all in with Microsoft and I will feel right at home!
It's time to buy stock of tinfoil producers, I guess.
Sincerely,
Pan Tarhei Hosé, PhD.
"Homo sum et cogito ergo odi profanum vulgus et libido."
John Ashcroft and the Patriot Act!!!
How long before they identify a victim by the RFID tag embedded in his or her tooth with, of course, some whiz-bang 3D interface.
Does an RFID tag contain metal?
If so, this could become a problem at the airports.
Maybe one day, when your dentist installs your new bridge, you'll also be the owner of a deactivated RFID tag inside it.
You just couldn't restrain yourself from adding that onto the article summary, eh? I'm not trying to troll but that is absolute FUD and fear-mongering.
I mean, what is it with you guys? I use RFID all the time in a system I've developed to track employees. Nothing about this can be construed as bad but yet you still spin it somehow or another.
We use them in our employee badges and have scanner points at all major doorways of the building. It helps us track when employees are in areas that are containing overly sensitive material and when employees just go goof off which a great many do.
RFID only makes life better and I don't see how any of you can say otherwise.
Now RFID in teeth? That is absolutely FUD. You know it will never happen but you just want to provoke some sort of knee-jerk reaction from the masses. These sort of comments don't belong to be with the article summary on the frontpage.
Wouldn't Bluetooth be better suited for this than RFID?
Sorry, I couldn't help myself.
Although, at least I'll have an excuse for being late to work.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
Gah! Next thing you know Bruce Willis is going to show up claming that he's from the future and and evil group called the Army of the 12 Monkeys led by Brad Pitt is going to destroy all of humanity. Wait, maybe he's right. Quick! Everyone knock your teeth out! That's where the tracking devices them future peoples use to find you!
They are just trying to hide the co-ordinates to the fractal core in your teeth.
Ok, I watched Lexx
Once.
Better post this Anonymous Coward.
"I was attacked...by a coked up whore and a F*CKING crazy dentist!!"
I would if I will throw off inventory at Wal-Mart?
These RFID tags are to help continue the tradition of identifying incomplete/decomposed bodies from dental records. They coincide with the new government issue head seeking bullets.
Yea, I think I'd take care of this asap.
"I have no idea how my history keeps getting erased evry time you see me"
Check out my sysadmin blog!
but once they start making fake teeth that can run Linux, you're all going to fight for the right to dream about having them in your mouth.
^_^
Putting my "1984" book down, I have to ask. Wouldn't this kind of technology be helpful in identifying unknown corpses? Or perhaps finding the murdered wife in the landfill?
Just stirring the pot.
Now we really will have to pull out our teeth so they can't find us. *sigh*
it just looks like that because they left Norway out.
just don't mention it to a finn or sweede...
The RFID tags are embedded in the _cast_ made of the teeth, in the manufacturing process, not in the actual fake teeth/toothwork itself! RTFA RTFS RTFAnything! Jeez.
I don't think I've seen one post that understood this. The RFID is only used during the manufacturing process. The information about that RFID tag is given in a memory card to the customer at the end of the dental work. It probably contains information like when it was made, the tooth/teeth it pretains to, type of material used, etc, etc. Goddamnitreadthearticle.
-Jesse
Nothing says "unprofessional job" like wrinkles in your duct tape.
> Maybe one day, [...], you'll also be the owner of
> a deactivated RFID tag inside it.
Maybe deactivated, maybe not. As a consumer, I don't like the idea.
I think we can do interesting things with RFID, but don't make use it, if I don't want to. Let's not give away too much tools to Big Brother!
You don't like having data in your head? Do neurons count as drones? If so, I can fix that for you.
Hold still a second, this might hurt a little.
Personally I find this a little hard to believe (and no, I haven't read the article - it's already /.'ed).
My father works for a company that makes the casting materials used for making crowns & other dental stuff. As a result, I've had to listen to him explain the casting process in great detail many times.
The process used is a lost-wax casting process - a wax model is made, then a ceramic mold is made from the wax model and the metal is poured into this mold. The problem with putting a RFID tag in (in any step of this process) is that very high temperatures are involved (both in firing the ceramic mold and in pouring the molten metal into the mold), so any RFID tag would probably be vaporized (or at least rendered inoperable).
Anyone know of a school using RFID for student identification?
Help end the use of Sigs. Tomorrow
You know, I would like to know that would RFID tagging ever going to end? With each passing second, these chips are getting smaller and cheaper. I won't be surprised if they start marking each and every item sold over the counter with these chips. Privacy?? Hum..... sorry, I don't know what that means.
ROLAND SUCKS!!!
I am sick of people who are sick of things! Also, the correct way to refer to an Orwellian reference is by using that term rather than the author's name by itself.
As far as the nature of the article itself...not every article posted on slashdot needs to have an 'earth shattering kaboom' attached to it. Some are just interesting uses for current tech, others are just joke threads waiting to happen, when I saw this article, I thought 'great, I wonder how many good jokes about listeners implanted in body parts there will be.' If you don't like the stories on slashdot, just leave, or complain in your sig, webpage or email directly to the editors, bitching about them here is lame, and a further waste of time.
oh yea the bitch about not wanting to upset the 'group think' is wrong, appentently 'we' have gave that AC 2 mod points already. Considering that many poeple are unwilling to give mod points to ACs, that speaks rather well about the comment itself.
French police continue their investigation into the bizarre serial-style murders in which the victims are decapitated and their heads are found in microwaves...
- -Jeffrey Goines
or is that just the tinfoil crowd?When they finally come for you and break down your door, and they are sweeping your house with their scanning devices and there you are hiding trembling in the cupboard, your false teeth will suddenly pipe up: "HEY! HE'S IN HERE! IN THE GODDAM CUPBOARD!"
The article summary sensationalizes and distorts the actual content of the article. The summary claims that the company is considering adding RFID chips to dental prosthetics. This little sensational item is nowhere to be found in the actual article. The only place that RFID tags are being used is in the dental lab to track the work in process. If the summary had been true to the fact that this is just a very routine use of technology in a factory to automate regulatory compliance and improve efficiency and productivity, Roland's advertising laden worthless "technology site" probably would not receive much traffic from this submission.
Why do the Slashdot editors continue to publish free ads for Roland's garbage blog? Is there financial consideration involved? Would Slashdot publish articles *submitted* by commercial sites like ZDNet or CNet etc.? The unrelenting flow of Roland's free ads is dragging down the quality and credibility and usefulness of Slashdot. It should stop.
honest we deactivated it and aren't using them for tracking people.....honest.
:-)
Great, so I'll have no choice in carrying an RFID around (de-activated or not).
pass the soup
Conspiracy theorists and dentistry go hand in hand? I mean first it was the fluoride in the drinking water; now, it's the rfid tags in the bridges. What next-flossing used to retrieve DNA to aid military recruiting efforts or something?
Can a Tesla coil be used to "disable" RFID chips? It might hurt with the tag inside your tooth and it's not a good idea for people with pace makers...
Forgetting the practicality of the 'ID in a tooth' for just a moment, your example doesn't hold water.
Tracking employees with their consent while on *company property* is NOT the same as tracking individual citizens as they enter stores or just walk down the street minding their own business...
It is not the technology that is the problem or its proper use.. its the fact it opens so many doors for improper use that is the issue.
You don't technology will be used improperly? Get your head out of the sand and look around..
And no, its not a matter of 'well I'm doing nothing wrong' it's a matter of 'its not anyone's business'....
---- Booth was a patriot ----
would seem to be a better choice than RFID
If you care to read the article, the article says that they don't plan on using the RFID part due to privacy concerns.
They also state that if they did use RFID, that would be for tracking from source to dentist, and that prior to putting it in your head they could ZAP all data off of the RFID, basically killing it.
Heck, I've been getting zapped RFID's from stores for years. How often do I remove those from my items? Do I care? No.
If they ever quit zapping them, a cheap EMP will do the job nicely. But if they quit zapping the RFID's when you leave the business, then many of their RFID processes these stored have developed would quit working. (That part could change, though.)
Who is this person, and why must all of his submissions point to his weblog? He has submitted many articles to nanodot as well, for some reason.
Lots of interesting issues here. My mother-in-law has trouble with her tooth implants; the dentist working on fixing them is having problems because the dentist who did the work initially convienently 'lost' the molds of her original teeth when facing a malpractice lawsuit.
Should consumers get full copies of their medical data as a matter of course if it's in digital form?
that the RFID could be included in the prosthesis. The first and second casts are made at relatively low temperatures. But the following step in making a porcelain bridge or crown (obviously these couldn't be embedded into metal and still work) involves a baking process for hardening the ceramic after grinding and for fixing the enamel layer. This is done at up to 1000 degrees C (again, depending on the materials), a temperature far above what most semiconductors can survive, even when inactive.
/. article that I can comment on using my experience designing porcelain furnaces.
Sadly, this is the first
You COULD just brush your frikking teeth, and avoid RFID entirely.
am I gonna de-activate this one if it's still active??? Sticking my head in the microwave won't work as you've got to close the door before the magnetron can power up...
Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
Granted, the original post got some of the facts wrong, but the knee-jerk reactions here are bothering me.
Having had more than my share of experiences within the health system lately, I'd gladly accept the risk of being bleeped by a yahoo on the street to reduce the very real risk of misdiagnosis in an emergency room. If I need to go into the emergency room, I want the team to know in less than a minute the make, model, and date of manufacture of any prosthetics I have implanted, cross-indexed with any reports of trouble with those specific prosthetics.
Seriously folks, there are occasions when being able to instantly identify an object by waving a wand within 6 inchs is a good thing.
Am I the only one who reads RFID as:
"Read the Fucking ID"
I could be wrong. I'm always wrong...
if it reduces the risk of getting the wrong set of dentures. I have some problems with RFID in passports (due to the possibility of thieves and terrorists abroad getting hold of a sensitive scanner and figuring out who's an American) but using RFID in the dental prosthetic production process makes perfect sense, as long as nothing dangerous leaks out of the prosthesis because of such.
I had two crowns fitted a few weeks ago in France, and I didn't get any RFID-card given to me... So I'm not sure how far ahead of reality this info is.
/.er)
(This post comes to you from an aging. French-resident
... you will be able to regrow a missing adult tooth?
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Remember a couple of years ago about the ability to read computer screens from a van on the street? I wouldn't put it beyond the capability of NRO birds such as LaCrosse to do this.
With a sufficient antenna, I don't see why it couldn't be read from quite some distance.
achtung nein getexten
Sweet. I've already got a titanium bolt in my jaw. I wish they'd hurry up and start using the RFID tags in the crowns themselves. I don't care if it gets burned in the kiln before it gets to me -- I'm getting one in a few months, and I'd love to have more weirdo things show up in my head in an x-ray.
:-)
I've got a wide-format x-ray of my entire skull, and display it proudly. My titanium bolt is the best part.
If we are gonna get RFID tags everywhere including
implants.. we better learn fast how to disable them.
It seems that this could become a rather thorny crown...
We could have a new branch of the armed services: Army, Navy, Dentistry... fighting the War on Cavities, and the Gum War -- a.k.a. Dessert Storm.
And think about those "crazy" guys on the street ranting about the CIA transmitters in their teeth...
RFID tags are used all over the place. Any time you want good traceability of a process you need to put tracking numbers on or with the goods.
Scanning is okay, but a bit trouble prone, RF tags are easy and less picky about the environment you're in.
I'd bet that many of the items you already own used RFID tags, you just don't konw it.
The header of this fella's article is the same as groklaw... is that a template or a blatant ripoff?
This is so much bunk that I have to just sit back and laugh. It's simply not true. Don't believe everything you read. This one is really bunk. The first tip should be that the person doesn't know the difference between a crown, a bridge or a denture.
This story completely reminded me of a song by Lard (Jello Biafta & Ministry) about how the government is tracking us by our teeth.
CAN GOD FILL TEETH?
Don't ask me why But I was walking down the streets Of Fairfax, California
And I saw this flyer hangin' On a telephone pole, and it said CAN GOD FILL TEETH?
For a $10 "donation" You could see silver fillings turn To gold and other "supernormal dental happenings."
New caps! Filled cavities! Bring a Flashlight and a mirror and observe
But wait a minute Didn't I just read
About how the cops are getting parents
To plant bugging devices In their kids' teeth
So if they disappear they can track 'em
Before they wind up on the backs of milk cartons
And all that
And didn't I read That these devices can go two-way And everything that I do or say
Is all goin' on tape somewhere right now
Planted in my cavities
And they didn't even tell me no wonder every bad thing
In and out of my mouth Keeps winding up on my employment record
All those fillings All those crowns
I'll show them Who's the boss of my big mouth
Where's the pliars
God dammit! Where's the pliars?!?
Wilma! Where'd you put my electric drill
This is all coming out now-TODAY!
CHORUS
Agh! Agh! Agh!
Agh! Agh! Agh!
Agh! Agh! Agh!
Must be some kind of conspiracy
The whole world's a God damn conspiracy
Look anywhere long enough, you're gonna find a conspiracy
Man, LIFE is a conspiracy!
CHORUS
Needlenose Up my nose
-Agh!-
Where did all these wires come from?
How far up into my skull do they go
I pull out more and more copper spagetti
How'd my Weekly World News get all wet?
God damn fishsticks melted again
What are they trying to do to me?
No secrets in the land of the free!
There no one's gonna tell me what to do
It's worth eating baby food The rest of my life
To be a free man Bastards
Probably wouldn't understand me anyway
Hello: this is big brother, and I'M IN YOUR MOUTH!
There's really not much call for that kind of dental work over this side of the pond..
*british smile*
Yep, folks, that's it in a nutshell. Mostek purchased a few million ceramic boats for their new chip that will be used in some sort of RF transponder. They are packaged in the traditional white ceramic package for flatpacks licensed from Radiation Incorporated. They have been sent to a polishing tumbler and are very bright and shiney. If anyone knows of a potential use for these, they are available at a very low cost.
People have been worried for decades about dental implants being used to track them. Sometimes they think the implants might be installed by the government, other times by aliens....Is there some reason that they can't just slap a bar coded sticker on the mold?
If they did that they couldn't find you and pull you back through time.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Great... now if terrorists want to find people with fake teeth to kill, they'll just need an RFID scanner.
Don't blame me; I'm never given mod points.
Unless some major development in dental materials just sneaked by my department, crowns and bridges are still cast at temperatures well above 1000C.
/. article might suggest to some.
So, yes, you will have a "deactivated" RFID chip in your crown/bridge/cast partial.
But since it is completely embedded in metal, nobody would notice anyway, I assume (got no idea about effective shielding of RFID equipment, I have to admit).
In dentures (made from acrylic resin) it would work. But the EU directive (as can be read in the FA) does NOT require RFID-tagging as the wording of the
The required records are generated along with the invoice by modern laboratory software, so why any lab would invest in RFID technology is beyond me.
But electronics in teeth sounds cool, anyway.
Being a geek, I of course had to go watch the machine. It starts with an oblong block of tooth material and has a couple of spinning files that grind on the tooth. However, after a minute or two of position-calibrating, it started spraying water and became impossible to see anything, so I went back to the chair and breathed nitrous until the tooth was ready to install.
In addition to being RFID-less, and single visit, it's able to make the crown in shapes that fit better to your tooth's surface, without the need for a post or the various other surface shapes that you used to need to get the crown to attach; my dentist said that the shaping the new technology uses goes against everything he learned in dental school, but he's done a few hundred of these by now and they work pretty well (as well as amortizing his machine cost.)
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
and TEETHING PAINS!
Imagine if all of newborns, instead of having only their foot and hand prints taken also have a clamp put on their gumline. Of course, as they grow up, the clamp could either cause a hell of a lot of teeting, uuumm, teething pains, or the clamp could simply embed itself into the bone under the flesh/gums. This would produce one hell of a dillemma for those trying to remove the device. They could probably, however, irradiate the thing.
But, if the purpose of the clamp is not primarily to transmit or respond radio waves but instead illuminate itself as the chomper walks past an x-ray transceiver of some sort.
OTOH, imagine intel agents with these things embedded. If they grant the agent access to many sensitive areas and documents, you could say:
"Sink your TEETH into THAT pile of data..."
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
Good for you. Bullies thrive on getting you to do self-censorship so they don't have to work so hard.
By the way, the parent's overrated post seems to leave out the main feature of RFID, remote readability. Reading IDs used to require direct physical access to the prosthetic in question. Now it can be done remotely and in secret.
It's not reasonable to walk up to a woman with breast implants and ask her to rip the implants out of her breasts so you can examine the ID code. But with a signal that can be read remotely, anyone with an RFID scanner can get this information without the subject's knowledge. She becomes trackable. As RFID scanners become cheaper, setting up a network of them becomes viable just so people can be tracked as they make their way around town (or the country, depending on the size of the scanner deployment).
It's not about the "gummint" coming to get us, it's about the private sector doing the invasive privacy-taking work for anyone who is willing to pay. This could be the government, or it could be a network of privately-run databases filled with possibly inaccurate information on which big decisions will be based (people's health care in the US, and hiring potential, to name a couple). And free market supporters think this is okay because with enough people participating in this dot-eat-dog way, somehow magically things problems work themselves out.
Digital Citizen
reception were a lot funnier when they weren't true.
SLASHDOT: news for people who can't concentrate on work or have no life at all and got tired of yelling back at the TV.
They just wish Osama had an RFIDed tooth. But when pliers are outlawed only outlaws will have pliers.
Oddly reminiscent of 12 monkeys. I just hope one day I don't end up in a sleazy hotel prying my teeth out with some pimps switch blade so the "man" can't track me any more.
There's no shame in being a pariah. -Marge Simpson
"Brush your teeth kids, or we'll know exactly where to find you!"
I, for one, welcome our new dental overlords.
Both sites are probably built from the same popular Content Management System Geeklog".
;-).
You can play with a number of them at OpenSource CMS.
You are affected by reading too much RIAA, SCO and Microsoft coverage: not everything looking similar is theft or ripoff
Insert
Sticking your head in a microwave: it's not just for getting a tan anymore. /mashed potatoes can be your friends
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?