Corporations Plan to Track Us Using RFID?

[Guest]

Just heard a program about this on the radio and looked up the site. It's alarming to see how easily our privacy could be intruded upon in the near future.

I think I'll buy this book.

http://www.spychips.com/

RFID, which stands for Radio Frequency IDentification, is a technology that uses computer chips smaller than a grain of sand to track items from a distance. And as this mind-blowing book explains, plans and efforts are being made now by global corporations and the U.S government to turn this advanced technology, these spychips, into a way to track our daily activities-and keep us all on Big Brother's short leash. Compiling massive amounts of research with firsthand knowledge, Spychips explains RFID technology and reveals the history and future of the master planners' strategies to imbed these trackers on everything-from postage stamps to shoes to people themselves-and spy on Americans without our knowledge or consent. It also urgently encourages consumers to take action now-to protect their privacy and civil liberties before it's too late.

[Guest]

From the site http://www.spychips.com

RFID stands for Radio Frequency IDentification, a technology that uses tiny computer chips smaller than a grain of sand to track items at a distance. RFID "spy chips" have been hidden in the packaging of Gillette razor products and in other products you might buy at a local Wal-Mart, Target, or Tesco - and they are already being used to spy on people.

Above: Magnified image of actual tag found in Gillette Mach3 razor blades. Each tiny chip is hooked up to an antenna that picks up electromagnetic energy beamed at it from a reader device. When it picks up the energy, the chip sends back its unique identification number to the reader device, allowing the item to be remotely identified. Spy chips can beam back information anywhere from a couple of inches to up to 20 or 30 feet away.

Some of the world's largest product manufacturers have been plotting behind closed doors since 1999 to develop and commercialize this technology. If they are not opposed, their plan is to use these remote-readable spy chips to replace the bar code.

RFID tags are NOT an "improved bar code" as the proponents of the technology would like you to believe. RFID technology differs from bar codes in three important ways:

1. With today's bar code technology, every can of Coke has the same UPC or bar code number as every other can (a can of Coke in Toronto has the same number as a can of Coke in Topeka). With RFID, each individual can of Coke would have a unique ID number which could be linked to the person buying it when they scan a credit card or a frequent shopper card (i.e., an "item registration system").

2. Unlike a bar code, these chips can be read from a distance, right through your clothes, wallet, backpack or purse -- without your knowledge or consent -- by anybody with the right reader device. In a way, it gives strangers x-ray vision powers to spy on you, to identify both you and the things you're wearing and carrying.

3. Unlike the bar code, RFID could be bad for your health. RFID supporters envision a world where RFID reader devices are everywhere - in stores, in floors, in doorways, on airplanes -- even in the refrigerators and medicine cabinets of our own homes. In such a world, we and our children would be continually bombarded with electromagnetic energy. Researchers do not know the long-term health effects of chronic exposure to the energy emitted by these reader devices.

Many huge corporations, including Philip Morris, Procter and Gamble, and Wal-Mart, have begun experimenting with RFID spy chip technology. Gillette is leading the pack, and recently placed an order for up to 500 million RFID tags from a company called "Alien Technology" (we kid you not). These big companies envision a day when every single product on the face of the planet is tracked with RFID spy chips!

As consumers we have no way of knowing which packages contain these chips. While some chips are visible inside a package (see our pictures of Gillette spy chips), RFID chips can be well hidden. For example they can be sewn into the seams of clothes, sandwiched between layers of cardboard, molded into plastic or rubber, and integrated into consumer package design.

This technology is rapidly evolving and becoming more sophisticated. Now RFID spy chips can even be printed, meaning the dot on a printed letter "i" could be used to track you. In addition, the tell-tale copper antennas commonly seen attached to RFID chips can now be printed with conductive ink, making them nearly imperceptible. Companies are even experimenting with making the product packages themselves serve as antennas.

As you can see, it could soon be virtually impossible for a consumer to know whether a product or package contains an RFID spy chip. For this reason, CASPIAN (the creator of this web site) is proposing federal labeling legislation, the RFID Right to Know Act, which would require complete disclosures on any consumer products containing RFID devices.

We believe the public has an absolute right to know when they are interacting with technology that could affect their health and privacy.

Don't you?

Join us. Let's fight this battle before big corporations track our every move.

[Guest]

One more site: http://www.boycottgillette.com/

This is serious stuff.

[Guest]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RFID

[Bravus]

I agree about the concern, Larry, but do you have a cell phone? And know the government can track your location using it? I don't use one, partly for that reason.

Personally, I think the level of resistance needs to be at the political - keeping corporations and governments from having the power to use the information in certain ways - rather than the technological level. (And those enthusiastically embracing the PATRIOT act and its ilk are part of the problem in this case.)

Having said that 'the street finds its own uses for things', and I'm sure there'll be scanners and jammers and other ways of protecting oneself from RFID that will evolve at the street level.

[Guest]

You're right about the political response Bravus. Here is another one from somebody promoting tracking http://cryptome.org/rfid/fmi_2002.pdf

[cricket]

Quote:

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I agree about the concern, Larry, but do you have a cell phone? And know the government can track your location using it? I don't use one, partly for that reason.

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Here's a curious thing:

My brother-in-law, now deceased, was using a cell-phone. It was found in the hotel room where he tragically committed suicide.

My sister-in-law (a joint owner of the phone) requested that his cell phone be located through this system so that his life might have been spared. Turns out, if the government has the ability to track these cell phones they refuse to use it to help everyday, ordinary citizens.

[tic]This news about the implanted RFID devices in our razors is fantastic news! Now, if I ever have the misfortune of having my razor stolen from me, I can request that the government track it and arrest the bloke who took it![/tic]

[Barbara]

IN some ways it would be a good thing. Think about how much easier abducted children could be found.

[bevin]

Quote:

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Researchers do not know the long-term health effects of chronic exposure to the energy emitted by these reader devices.

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We do know the long term effects of living near power lines, near airport radars, near TV and radio transmitters, near cordless phone, near AC household current, near TV's, near radios, and near cars.

RFID is similar to the above. The quote is typical luddite FUD.

/Bevin