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Following the Chips in Wynn's New Casino

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the hey-steve-comp-me-a-suite dept.

ctwxman writes "As Steve Wynn gets set to open his new Las Vegas casino, something new hits the tables: RFID encoded chips they report that "The fancy new chips look just like regular ones, only they contain radio devices that signal secret serial numbers. Special equipment linked to the casino's computer systems and placed throughout the property will identify legitimate chips and detect fakes" " " Having stayed pretty much everywhere else cool on the strip, I'm sure I'll try the Wynn out soon after it opens, but I think I'll be cashing out my chips before I leave the casino. It makes me nervous knowing I could be unwittingly scanned by others after I leave the floor. Of course, this added inconvenience may save me a fortune in blackjack losses!

2 of 264 comments (clear)

  1. Be calm, relax, things aren't that bad... by Space+cowboy · · Score: 5, Informative


    The range over which you can read RFID information in any sort of portable (ie: non-obvious) fashion is limited to a few inches. In fact, tuning the damn things so they'll read at (say: 4 or 5) inches is hard.

    The readers that are designed for doorways can do roughly 2 feet, but they're huge and very very obvious - they're designed for store entrances, where they make you walk through the "gates" to get in/out of the store. You can't miss a 4-foot (max) separated row of columns covering all the exits...

    RFID works by the reader exciting a sympathetic response in the tag (which is itself unpowered, though it rectifies the incoming RF energy to self-power), this response modifies the reader's waveform signal, overlaying an incredibly weak (roughly 1% of the incident waveform) signal on top. It is this weak modification to the reader's signal that has to be extracted and deconstructed into a bitstream.

    Speaking as one whom RFID has tried, it's not an easy task to get any significant distance between tag and reader, and IM(NS :-)HO the likelihood of being randomly snooped on wherever you go is damn small. Almost flying-pig small. Our asset management system aimed for a 6" separation between tag and reader, and we didn't care about being obvious though there were size constraints for the reader (had to fit in a 1U box). Getting repeatable results proved very difficult with the units we had.

    Aside: London Underground introduced an RFID-based system for block-purchase of tickets, promising it would read your "ticket" in your bag/pocket as you passed by. This claim was dropped on introduction, and they now advise you to swipe the reader with your tag as you go by...

    Simon.

    --
    Physicists get Hadrons!
  2. Chips ain't the only thing being tracked... by funny-jack · · Score: 5, Informative

    from the rejected submission bin:

    funny-jack says: A small school in the San Francisco area has come up with the latest "innovative" use for RFID: tracking student attendance.

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    You probably shouldn't click this.