Alien Has Landed (RFID)

October 4, 2004

Terry Melanson wrote:

Alien Has Landed

A

growing technology strikes some as a perfect tool, while others think

it's a sign of the apocalypse

By Stett Holbrook

THE ALIEN

invasion has begun.

Still hidden behind

warehouse walls and receiving-dock doors, the technology won't

proliferate for several years. The Silicon Valley company with a sci-fi

name is at the forefront of an integrated circuit-powered revolution

that may someday rival the Internet in its reach, touching virtually

all corners of the global marketplace and beyond.

Its proponents

envision an "Internet of things" that links everything, everywhere.

They see dollar signs as well as better-stocked shelves, safer

medicine, less lost luggage, fresher produce and an ever-growing list

of business and consumer benefits. Others regard the coming revolution

as the dawn of an unprecedented era of corporate and government

surveillance—and privacy invasion.

As devices and life

forms merge, locating lost dogs and children will be a snap.

Chip-implanted Mexican government officials can now badge their way

into secure inner sanctums without even having to flash a card. Loose

tongues have already raised macabre South-of-the-border scenarios of

kidnappings and severed limbs as chips begin to be used to track,

authenticate or grant access and financial privileges.

Welcome to the brave

new world of Alien Technology and radio-frequency identification.

Tag, You're It

In the next few years,

radio-frequency identification (RFID) may be everywhere: in

supermarkets, in your clothes, in your home, even in you. It is

imagined that RFID will one day replace the omnipresent bar code. But

RFID isn't a new technology. It's only moving into the mainstream now

because the price of the technology is dropping and several major

corporations are adopting it, creating a

get-on-the-bandwagon-or-be-left-behind mentality.

"People are getting

extremely excited," says Kathleen Schaub, vice president for Sybase

Inc.'s information technology solutions group. The Dublin, Calif.-based

company is a leading provider of database software and plans to get

into the get into the RFID industry itself. "It just absolutely

explodes the amount of data coming into a company ... the physical

world can now be part of the Internet."

For all its potential,

RFID is a relatively simple technology. RFID uses radio waves to

automatically identify people or objects. In its most common

applications, RFID stores a serial number that identifies a person or

thing on a microchip. The grain-of-sand-size chip is attached to a tiny

antenna. Together, the chip and antenna are called a tag. Most tags are

about the size of a small Band-Aid. The antenna allows the chip to

transmit information to a reader. The reader then converts the radio

waves from the tag into digital information that's read by computers.

RFID was first used by

the United States in World War II to distinguish friendly and enemy

aircraft. The first commercial application dates back to the 1970s,

when Los Gatos electronics inventor Charles Walton sold a lock-opening

key-card system to Schlage. While he saw widespread uses for the

technology, he was too early. Back then, the bar code was the ascendant

form of product identification. Now that RFID's time has come, Walton,

82, watches as others run with the technology he was advocating 30

years ago. While he continues working on RFID in his lab, his patent

expired in 1997.

While consumer

applications of RFID are limited now, the technology is widely used.

FasTrak toll passes, remote-entry key fobs and ID chip implants in pets

are all RFID-based technology. In many ways RFID tags are like bar

codes in that they transmit data about a product, but unlike barcodes,

which must be held up to a scanner to be read, RFID tags are readable

from up to 20 feet away. And where bar codes must be read one at a

time, an entire pallet full of products can be read simultaneously,

dramatically reducing the time—and workers—required to inventory

products.

As it's being applied

now, RFID is used to strengthen the weak links in commercial and

government "supply chains." As merchandise moves from manufacturer to

distributor to wholesaler and finally to retailer, things often get

lost. Inventory is misidentified. Quantities are improperly calculated.

This can mean retailers order too much product or not enough. Products

fall out of date or spoil. Customers get mad and shop elsewhere. Prices

rise.

With RFID, proponents

say, these errors will become a thing of the past. Queried with a

reader, a pallet of RFID-enabled toothpaste will speak up and say, in

essence, "Fifty cases of Crest toothpaste, right here." Perishable

items like milk could be programmed to respond, "There are only two

cases of us left, and we'll be sour in three days. Better order more."

Supply-chain RFID

applications are going to be the first roll-out of the technology, but

other uses will follow right behind.

"Retail supply chain

is going," says Tom Pounds, Alien Technology's vice president for

corporate affairs and product development. "2005 is the year of

implementation. It's deploying."

Other uses, while they

may sound far-fetched, are only a few years off. In the home, it's

imagined that clothes will tell a smart washing machine that they

should be washed in cold water or an RFID-wired turkey will tell the

oven how long it needs to be cooked. In the supermarket, an entire

shopping cart of groceries could be scanned at once without unloading

your cart. If you've got an RFID-enabled credit card or

customer-loyalty card, the RFID reader will scan your purse and debit

your account.

But it's talk of RFID

tags appearing on individual products like cosmetics, automobile tires

and clothes, and potentially linking them to the people who purchased

them, that gets privacy advocates nervous.

RFID critics fear the

technology will offer corporations and the government irresistible

access to not only our shopping habits, but a peephole on our movements

outside the supermarket. RFID tags could potentially be read through

your car or your clothes or as you move about, identifying not only

what you buy, but who you are, critics say. It's expected that the

distance at which the tags can be read will increase over time, but in

the near future critics fear the placement of readers at strategic

points such as store and parking lot entrances, freeway on/offramps,

public buildings, etc.

"You could put these

things anywhere," says Katherine Albrecht, a privacy advocate and

leading critic of RFID.

The Patriot Act

already allows federal agents to seize personal and business records if

the records can be shown to relate to terrorism or spying. Government

agents can also conduct "sneak and peak" searches, entering a home or

business secretly without immediately notifying the target. In the

post-Sept. 11 world, will Constitution-stretching officials like

Attorney General John Ashcroft be able to resist using RFID to

accomplish their goals?

Organizations like the

American Civil Liberties Union and the Electronic Privacy Center as

well as elected officials are also concerned about the privacy

implications of RFID technology.

Prime Mover Directive

While the public is

generally unaware of the potential perils and promise of RFID, Alien

Technology has been at the center of the coming revolution. Alien

Technology occupies a sprawling modern building in Morgan Hill's

growing high-tech area off Cochrane Road. A company that calls itself

Alien offers plenty of fodder for opponents who fear the technology's

intrusion into private life, but Alien seems to have a bit of fun with

its name.

More: http://www.metroactive.com/papers/metro/09.29.04/rfid-0440.html

Alien Has Landed

A growing technology strikes some as a perfect tool, while others think it's a sign of the apocalypse

By Stett Holbrook

THE ALIEN invasion has begun.

Still hidden behind warehouse walls and receiving-dock doors, the technology won't proliferate for several years. The Silicon Valley company with a sci-fi name is at the forefront of an integrated circuit-powered revolution that may someday rival the Internet in its reach, touching virtually all corners of the global marketplace and beyond.

Its proponents envision an "Internet of things" that links everything, everywhere. They see dollar signs as well as better-stocked shelves, safer medicine, less lost luggage, fresher produce and an ever-growing list of business and consumer benefits. Others regard the coming revolution as the dawn of an unprecedented era of corporate and government surveillance—and privacy invasion.

As devices and life forms merge, locating lost dogs and children will be a snap. Chip-implanted Mexican government officials can now badge their way into secure inner sanctums without even having to flash a card. Loose tongues have already raised macabre South-of-the-border scenarios of kidnappings and severed limbs as chips begin to be used to track, authenticate or grant access and financial privileges.

Welcome to the brave new world of Alien Technology and radio-frequency identification.

Tag, You're It

In the next few years, radio-frequency identification (RFID) may be everywhere: in supermarkets, in your clothes, in your home, even in you. It is imagined that RFID will one day replace the omnipresent bar code. But RFID isn't a new technology. It's only moving into the mainstream now because the price of the technology is dropping and several major corporations are adopting it, creating a get-on-the-bandwagon-or-be-left-behind mentality.

"People are getting extremely excited," says Kathleen Schaub, vice president for Sybase Inc.'s information technology solutions group. The Dublin, Calif.-based company is a leading provider of database software and plans to get into the get into the RFID industry itself. "It just absolutely explodes the amount of data coming into a company ... the physical world can now be part of the Internet."

For all its potential, RFID is a relatively simple technology. RFID uses radio waves to automatically identify people or objects. In its most common applications, RFID stores a serial number that identifies a person or thing on a microchip. The grain-of-sand-size chip is attached to a tiny antenna. Together, the chip and antenna are called a tag. Most tags are about the size of a small Band-Aid. The antenna allows the chip to transmit information to a reader. The reader then converts the radio waves from the tag into digital information that's read by computers.

RFID was first used by the United States in World War II to distinguish friendly and enemy aircraft. The first commercial application dates back to the 1970s, when Los Gatos electronics inventor Charles Walton sold a lock-opening key-card system to Schlage. While he saw widespread uses for the technology, he was too early. Back then, the bar code was the ascendant form of product identification. Now that RFID's time has come, Walton, 82, watches as others run with the technology he was advocating 30 years ago. While he continues working on RFID in his lab, his patent expired in 1997.

While consumer applications of RFID are limited now, the technology is widely used. FasTrak toll passes, remote-entry key fobs and ID chip implants in pets are all RFID-based technology. In many ways RFID tags are like bar codes in that they transmit data about a product, but unlike barcodes, which must be held up to a scanner to be read, RFID tags are readable from up to 20 feet away. And where bar codes must be read one at a time, an entire pallet full of products can be read simultaneously, dramatically reducing the time—and workers—required to inventory products.

As it's being applied now, RFID is used to strengthen the weak links in commercial and government "supply chains." As merchandise moves from manufacturer to distributor to wholesaler and finally to retailer, things often get lost. Inventory is misidentified. Quantities are improperly calculated. This can mean retailers order too much product or not enough. Products fall out of date or spoil. Customers get mad and shop elsewhere. Prices rise.

With RFID, proponents say, these errors will become a thing of the past. Queried with a reader, a pallet of RFID-enabled toothpaste will speak up and say, in essence, "Fifty cases of Crest toothpaste, right here." Perishable items like milk could be programmed to respond, "There are only two cases of us left, and we'll be sour in three days. Better order more."

Supply-chain RFID applications are going to be the first roll-out of the technology, but other uses will follow right behind.

"Retail supply chain is going," says Tom Pounds, Alien Technology's vice president for corporate affairs and product development. "2005 is the year of implementation. It's deploying."

Other uses, while they may sound far-fetched, are only a few years off. In the home, it's imagined that clothes will tell a smart washing machine that they should be washed in cold water or an RFID-wired turkey will tell the oven how long it needs to be cooked. In the supermarket, an entire shopping cart of groceries could be scanned at once without unloading your cart. If you've got an RFID-enabled credit card or customer-loyalty card, the RFID reader will scan your purse and debit your account.

But it's talk of RFID tags appearing on individual products like cosmetics, automobile tires and clothes, and potentially linking them to the people who purchased them, that gets privacy advocates nervous.

RFID critics fear the technology will offer corporations and the government irresistible access to not only our shopping habits, but a peephole on our movements outside the supermarket. RFID tags could potentially be read through your car or your clothes or as you move about, identifying not only what you buy, but who you are, critics say. It's expected that the distance at which the tags can be read will increase over time, but in the near future critics fear the placement of readers at strategic points such as store and parking lot entrances, freeway on/offramps, public buildings, etc.

"You could put these things anywhere," says Katherine Albrecht, a privacy advocate and leading critic of RFID.

The Patriot Act already allows federal agents to seize personal and business records if the records can be shown to relate to terrorism or spying. Government agents can also conduct "sneak and peak" searches, entering a home or business secretly without immediately notifying the target. In the post-Sept. 11 world, will Constitution-stretching officials like Attorney General John Ashcroft be able to resist using RFID to accomplish their goals?

Organizations like the American Civil Liberties Union and the Electronic Privacy Center as well as elected officials are also concerned about the privacy implications of RFID technology.

Prime Mover Directive

While the public is generally unaware of the potential perils and promise of RFID, Alien Technology has been at the center of the coming revolution. Alien Technology occupies a sprawling modern building in Morgan Hill's growing high-tech area off Cochrane Road. A company that calls itself Alien offers plenty of fodder for opponents who fear the technology's intrusion into private life, but Alien seems to have a bit of fun with its name.

More: http://www.metroactive.com/papers/metro/09.29.04/rfid-0440.html

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