RFID – What it is and Why is it Showing Up Everywhere?

So by now you’ve probably heard of RFID. If not this technology is Radio Frequency Identification. At a technological level it’s actually a pretty cool technology that could enable slick things like taking a semi-full of goods and driving it to a dock and sensors could automatically update inventory by reading the tags while the semi was pulling up to the warehouse (no clerks, no data entry errors, not time spent filling out paperwork). This is the same technology used in things like the EZ Pass for bridge tolls in certain parts of the US. Without going into a technical description of RFID, it’s easies to think of RFID as a broadcasting technology. So, when the tag is not “shielded” (think of this a quite literally putting a tinfoil hat on the device) then it is broadcasting information. Where this gets into interesting privacy issues is when this technology is integrated into things that are more personally associated. Think driver’s licenses, bus passes, clothing, pets, passports, charge cards, cell phones and even people. Since this data is remotely collectable this give people with inexpensive readers the ability to track movements as the data is aggregated. Technology like the Enhanced Drivers License also has all the data that is on your driver’s license so that data can be collected (say, like when you take it out as ID at a store).

Some organizations are pretty much against this RFID in all forms (like the folks at CASPIAN) while other folks see it as applicable for industrial use but not consumer products (as Tesco tried so that it could track consumer’s actions in their stores). Still others think this technology is fine as long as it isn’t used in humans. Finally there are those who are volunteering it be tagged. It is probably biasing but worthy of note that RFID “non-removable” bracelets are used at Guantanamo to track prisoners in much the same way that the Nazis used tattooed numbers to track prisoners in their death camps (IBM is one of the leading patenters of RFID technology as well as the folks who made the computer systems for the Nazis).

As it turns out some of this info isn’t even well secured as a German hacker proved with the e-passports. As with any technology, it can be used for good or for evil. In this case, RFID has the ability to be used for significant privacy invasion; the funny part is that there is not that much to gain for individuals when their materials are tagged. This begs the question, why adopt it?

If you want to read about how scary some of the folks patenting this technology are getting (at least in their patents) the book Spychips is a bit alarmist but quite eye opening.

You sound familiar… Writing Style Matching in a Blogged World

So the National Science Foundation created a program called Dark Web. For those not familiar it’s a project that tries to collect all the extremist and terrorist sites on the net. For monitoring, this is probably something that seems perfectly practical. Some of the technology has interesting applications. One in particular is a writing style matching technology Writeprinting. Writeprinting looks at things like your writing style, structure and semantics to identify who you are (or more appropriately identify writings by the same individual. The benefit to be able to identify “anonymous” extremists from other writings they have done online (or other sources) is of obvious benefit which few people would deny we should be looking into in an effort to keep all people safe. Indeed, the Unibomber was caught after his manifesto was published and his brother recognized the thoughts and writing style.

Of course, like most technologies, it can be used for good or evil as machines and algorithms are apathetic to purpose by definition. This means that the same technology we rely on to keep us safe from terrorists may also be the same technology that keeps us from expressing our thoughts and feelings about what is happening in our communities, country or world. Anonymous speech was important to our founding fathers (as much of what they were doing was treasonous under English rule) and this technology could easily be used for other “well meaning” though totally unintended purposes such as catching students who write other’s papers or unmasking anonymous whistle blowing bloggers.

Of course, not making any public writings available would thwart such a technology but it also has a down side. Right now public shows of dissent are the ways that people form movements against programs, policies, organizations and governments that they don’t agree with. This form of association allows a safety valve for people to express their concerns and help make change if their views are shared by enough individuals. If such speech is tracked and the authors found and punished (like those that have protested President Bush in the United States or were thrown out of the US Capital for shirts relating to the Iraq occupation). In individual cases this leads to motivating those who believe in the cause being suppressed. In extreme cases it leads people to go directly to much more drastic means such as subversion and terrorism.

The point here is that freedom of speech is as much about having a voice as it is about maintaining a civil society. The creation of technologies that remove that anonymity may have the ironic result of actually making things less safe in the long run as those who feel that they are being oppressed and don’t feel free to express their grievances (free from reprisal) move to more extreme tactics.

Will technology meant to make us safer actually have the opposite affect? I certainly hope not. But as we develop such technologies we should bear such possible outcomes in mind.

Of course, people also may just start to come up with obfuscation programs (such as used in computer code) to mask their identities; only time will tell.

RFID: Tag Your Kids For More Efficient Busses… Hu?

The Associated Press is reporting that a Rhode Island town is going to implement a “test” program where they will RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) children’s backpacks to see where they get on and off the bus. They will also use a GPS system to track the busses location. The ACLU of RI is fighting this action as unnecessary. I’ll avoid the obvious question of why they need this at all since they could just GPS the bus and then have the driver record the number of kids that get on the bus without needing to identify each individual student. The school dismisses concerns that others could use this information to track children since they say it is “just a number”. If this sounds familiar, it might be the ghosts of the debates over the Social Security Number program (and we see how that number has remained just a number and not a personal identifier, right?). The push for RFID stalled some time ago over the debacle with Tesco and its hidden tracking of UK shoppers (and Gillette razors at Wal-Mart here in the US). It appears this is back in the news. There is no question that RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) has many uses, but tracking people is one that many folks are rightfully skeptical of (see www.spychips.com). I’ve not covered RFID yet in this blog (I will some time in the future) but there is good reason to be skeptical about technology that makes its carrier remotely traceable if we believe that people should have personal privacy). At least in the US, privacy is a balance; even in the case of the 4^th amendment, there are weighing factors that have been used to determine the limits of privacy protections v govt. intrusions. In this case, all I can wonder is who thinks this is an appropriate trade off?