Radio Frequency Identification (RFID)
Torin Monahan
Radio frequency identification (RFID) systems signal a shift toward non-visual (or post-optic) forms of surveillance. Essentially, RFID systems work as unique electronic identifiers placed on items (in the form of stickers embedded with RFID chips or “tags”) or on people or non-human animals (in the form of bracelets, badges, or implants embedded with RFID chips). Once “tagged,” human or non-human objects can be identified, tracked, and managed through electronic databases. There are two main types of RFIDs: active and passive. Active RFIDs contain a miniature battery and actively emit radio frequencies to any proximate system readers; passive RFIDs contain no battery source but instead draw the necessary power to emit a frequency through secondary “reader” devices such as mounted detectors or hand-held wands, which are often called “interrogators” by industry vendors. Both types of RFIDs are “transponders” with built-in antennas for communicating with tag readers, which are “transceivers.” To date, these systems have been deployed by factory, shipping, retail, and entertainment industries; by hospitals, schools, and other organizations monitoring people; by public transportation departments and private transportation companies; and – of course – by the military. While the stated goal of using RFIDs is to track and manage products and resources more efficiently, the potential of RFIDs for surveillance and social control of people has caused vocal alarm among privacy advocates, technology critics, and religious groups.
Privacy advocates and others are concerned that RFIDs will enable ubiquitous identification and tracking of individuals, primarily through their products (clothes, books, ID cards, vehicles, food, etc.). For instance, a scheme by Gillette and UK supermarket chain Tesco to tag boxes of razors and coordinate those RFIDs with store-wide surveillance systems illustrates the advanced regulation of social relations made possible by these systems. In this case, covert pictures are taken of individuals who remove boxes of razors from the “smart shelf”; these images are then beamed to the PDA devices of store security personnel; and the RFIDs allow real-time tracking of those individuals throughout the store and, potentially, beyond. This development sparked significant public outcry, including on-line campaigns to “boycott Gillette.” What is interesting from a surveillance studies perspective is that RFIDs integrate with older forms of visual surveillance (via CCTV), which were focused on monitoring, to provide enhanced data-based surveillance predicated upon active prediction, identification, and tracking. Significant critique of RFIDs has also emerged from Christian fundamentalist religious groups in the U.S., who interpret these technologies as “the mark of the beast” and, therefore, harbingers of the apocalypse. These groups, which are found mostly in on-line settings, base their interpretation on the “Book of Revelation” which states that “[The beast] causes all, both small and great, both rich and poor, both free and slave, to be marked on the right hand or the forehead, so that no one can buy or sell unless he has the mark.” From this perspective, implanting RFIDs into humans (for which the company “Verichip” received FDA approval in 2004) represents an advanced form of “the mark,” and thus cause for personal intervention (to avoid taking the mark oneself, perhaps unwittingly) and collective mobilization (to warn others). Interestingly, privacy advocates and Christian fundamentalists agree that societies must critically investigate the social ramifications of RFID technologies, but they come to this shared conclusion from radically divergent political orientations – leftist-progressive and ultra-conservative, respectively.
