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UsingRFID.com was recently sent an update by a UK-based company that is developing a product called 'RFIDWasher', aimed at giving consumers more control over the RFID tags they may end up taking home in their shopping bags.
Using RFID asked RFIDWasher's marketing chief, Joyce Freeman, how and why the product's concept came about. According to Freeman, the current and predicted growth in RFID use is creating a global issue of distrust where RFID tags are concerned, with many privacy groups already being worried that tags will remain active after they have left the stores. These concerns include the idea that consumers could somehow be monitored through the tags that remain in their cardigan. The RFID industry, however, points out that the tags work only at very close range (usually a matter of a few inches), so this kind of "big brother" people-monitoring would be difficult if not impossible.
However, Freeman explained that "there is a growing need for consumers to have control over RFID tags in products that they have purchased. We want to allow consumers to make the choice for themselves and not have to trust third parties to deactivate tags. It simply is not enough for consumers to have to take it on trust that a tag has been deactivated."
RFIDWasher's management say they have identified a requirement in the global market place for a product that gives consumers control over their privacy, and to be free of worries about RFID technology.
The company expects to launch its low-cost, mass-market product (called RFIDwasher) toward the end of 2005. The product is being designed to detect and optionally "electronically wash" any RFID tags it finds. "We have already seen much interest in the product from over 20,000 visitors to our website," noted Freeman.
However, when finally launched, if the product does successfully what its developers claim it will do, it will be interesting to see how long it takes those with less-than-pure intentions (such as professional shoplifters, for example) to begin using these devices to disable in-store RFID anti-theft tags. Will it prove true, after all, that for every solution there is a problem?
Source: RFIDWasher
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