So much for the security of RFID tags: development is already underway for the Tag Zapper, a device which purports to be able to “erase” RFID tags and render them blank. The device is “proposed” (which I’m guessing means “still in development”) but an interesting scenario is put forth on their website:
Proposed scenario:
A consumer purchases a six-pack of beer at a convenience store.
After exiting the store the consumer uses her TagZapper™ to disable the RFID tags.
At this point the consumer is able to transport and consume her purchase without being monitored by any commercial or government agency.
Right. Or, you could really piss off Wal-Mart by erasing the tag BEFORE you leave the store. Not that the developers of this device (or myself, for that matter) would advocate such a thing. 🙂
While still vaporware, the product doesn’t seem to be too far-fetched. A competing product, the RFIDWasher, is supposed to be out by the end of the year.
Good luck to both these companies – they have potentially the largest product market on earth to sell to..i.e. every consumer…but will need the largest legal team in the planet to fight of WalMart and co.
Karl Lingford
I managed to send an email to Tagzapper about 3 months back – but never got a reply – you are correct all their emails are now bouncing…its does look like a hoax site….also not really sure about RFIDWasher….these folks have a website that is only marginally better than Tagzapper…however they respond to all their form requestes (I’ve registered twice) – and their news item gets updated daily – so someone is upodating the siteand replying to emails….perhaps some 12 year old kid !! – but something inside me tells me someone will crack this and have a useful consumer product – so I also send me warmest wishes to however gets there.
I work with a large retail chain of stores in Europe and I am convinced there is nothing we can do to stop this.
I would agree that Wal-Mart has a significantly large legal team to fight anyone that gets in their way, but then, what would they fight against? The “end user” (read: the customer) isn’t bound by any license that prohibits reverse engineering of such products. And you can’t exactly lobby for legislation that prevents the “tampering” of such ID devices, considering that it would probably undermine the current and very profitable mail-in rebate discount system (that requires that one basically “tamper with” or “disable” the identifying UPC code on a product to confirm it was purchased).