Hardware Reference
In-Depth Information
card, an alarm is sounded. Not only does this system eliminate the need for
cashiers and the corresponding wait in line, but it also serves as an antitheft system
because hiding a product in a pocket or bag has no effect.
An interesting property of this system is that while bar codes identify the prod-
uct type, they do not identify the specific item. With 128 bits available, RFID
chips do. As a consequence, every package of, say, aspirins, on a supermarket
shelf will have a different RFID code. This means that if a drug manufacturer dis-
covers a manufacturing defect in a batch of aspirins after they have been shipped,
supermarkets all over the world can be told to sound the alarm when a customer
buys any package whose RFID number lies in the affected range, even if the pur-
chase happens in a distant country months later. Aspirins not in the defective batch
will not sound the alarm.
But labeling packages of aspirins, cookies, and dog biscuits is only the start.
Why stop at labeling the dog biscuits when you can label the dog? Pet owners are
already asking veterinarians to implant RFID chips in their animals, allowing them
to be traced if they are stolen or lost. Farmers want their livestock tagged as well.
The obvious next step is for nervous parents to ask their pediatrician to implant
RFID chips in their children in case they get stolen or lost. While we are at it, why
not have hospitals put them in all newborns to avoid mixups at the hospital? Gov-
ernments and the police can no doubt think of many good reasons for tracking all
citizens all the time. By now, the ''implications'' of RFID chips alluded to earlier
may be getting a bit clearer.
Another (slightly less controversial) application of RFID chips is vehicle track-
ing. When a string of railroad cars with embedded RFID chips passes by a reader,
the computer attached to the reader then has a list of which cars passed by. This
system makes it easy to keep track of the location of all railroad cars, which helps
suppliers, their customers, and the railroads. A similar scheme can be applied to
trucks. For cars, the idea is already being used to collect tolls electronically (e.g.,
the E-Z Pass system).
Airline baggage systems and many other package transport systems can also
use RFID chips. An experimental system tested at Heathrow airport in London al-
lowed arriving passengers to remove the lugging from their luggage. Bags carried
by passengers purchasing this service were tagged with RFID chips, routed sepa-
rately within the airport, and delivered directly to the passengers' hotels. Other
uses of RFID chips include having cars arriving at the painting station of the as-
sembly line specify what color they are supposed to be, studying animal migra-
tions, having clothes tell the washing machine what temperature to use, and many
more. Some chips may be integrated with sensors so that the low-order bits may
contain the current temperature, pressure, humidity or other environmental vari-
able.
Advanced RFID chips also contain permanent storage. This capability led the
European Central Bank to make a decision to put RFID chips in euro banknotes in
the coming years. The chips would record where they have been. Not only would
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