An ID Number for Everything 391
jon323456 writes "Put this in your privacy pipe and smoke it. According to news.com, MIT researchers have cooked up a new barcode that has enough dataspace to include a unique serial number for everything. And in combination with RFID tags...."
And we wants this why? (Score:2, Insightful)
I don't remember anyone complaing about not having enough barcodes etc...
Re:Barcode? (Score:3, Insightful)
Applications in lost good recovery (Score:5, Insightful)
IPv6? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Applications in lost good recovery (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:An ID on every car axle? (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, imagine how awful it would be if every car had a unique identifier associated with it. You could be identified wherever you go by anyone with access to the right equipment.
Ever heard of a license plate?
And a distributed database to track it all. (Score:3, Insightful)
To have any useful application, those codes would have to be linked to transactions and locations.
Imagine trying to update the transactions and locations of just every can of Coke sold every day.
Manufactured
Shipped from the manufacturing plant
Received at the warehouse
Shipped to the store
Sold to the customer
OK let's have some fun here (Score:2, Insightful)
But if you are not doing anything illegal you have nothing to worry about
Tell that to the Cubans who simply want to loan books to their friends---oops Animal Farm, 1984, the Bible are illegal in Cuba.
Re:Applications in lost good recovery (Score:5, Insightful)
A little over-the-top with the sales pitch (Score:3, Insightful)
Wrong. Completely wrong. If you have ever worked for a major retailer, you will come to understand this reality.
ID's are not a panacea. You have to have a system of control and accountability over your inventory that makes use of a unique ID and checks itself constantly, forcing correction.
Re:Wow this is pretty dumb.. slow news day? (Score:2, Insightful)
That might not sound very significant but it is.
So what happens.... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Applications in lost good recovery (Score:5, Insightful)
Um, I'm gonna say "not bloody well likely" to that. A few years ago when my car got broken into, my cellphone, digital camera, PDA and CD player were all stolen. They all had serial numbers, which I had documented, and I gave the info to the police. What happened? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Just because it has a unique ID labelled on it (whether it's a number or a barcode or a hologram or anything else!), doesn't mean you can recover it any easier.
Hell, doesn't pretty much everything have a serial number now anyways? Yeah, so what if my couch might have the same serial number as my computer monitor; I'm still not going to confuse the two.
Re:No more inventory counts (Score:5, Insightful)
You'll always have a need to do a physical audit.
RFID tags attached to PACKAGING not PRODUCT (Score:3, Insightful)
Why not just attach the RFID tags to the product packaging rather than permanently to the product itself. The packaging gets thrown away, not the product. Most of the privacy issues simply disappear. (Other than that someone could run your trash through an RFID scanner, but would still need access to a database in order to determine that that number is a particular subversive book that you should not be reading.)
I'm not saying it's a total solution to the problem of RFID tag privacy. But if tags were affixed to packaging rather than products, most / many privacy issued just go away. (Some remain.) Or have I overlooked something major?
Re:And we wants this why? (Score:2, Insightful)
Moving to 14 digits will mean 100x more possible barcodes.
Moving to 14 bits from 12 would mean 4x as many!
I'm unimpressed with this invention because in the 70's barcodes encoded around 40 bits of information at near zero cost apart from using some space on the label
and in the article is says that the cost is currently in the 5c to 10c range per device
Re:Applications in lost good recovery (Score:5, Insightful)
You, person #825765.983.9782.2987634 have hereby been fined $500 for littering. Coke can #178246.886.1235.783553 was found on 29-8-2005 in an area not sanctioned for waste disposal. Bank and customer records show that you purchased the aforementioned can, therefor the fine is yours. This fine can not be contested as our Object Tracking Database is infallible. Have a nice day.
Never mind that some homeless guy fished your can out of the trash and dropped it later.
Re:Something I hadn't thought of... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:96 bits??? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:No more inventory counts (Score:2, Insightful)
Of course, but it's faster and easier to have your physical auditors just running around looking for damaged goods than it is to have them walking around with clipboards counting everything.
Not anything like RFID (Score:2, Insightful)
Y'see, if a policeman asks to scan my barcode every time I get on a bus or train, I know that I'm being monitored, and I can avoid it if I really want. If shop owners want to scan my barcode before I enter a store I can refuse, or go to another store. Or remove the barcodes from all my things.
However, if the RFID in my shoes is logged by the government owned scanner on every street corner, I'll have no idea about it. I can try removing the chips from all my clothes, but the chances are I'll miss one.
RFID is scary because it allows you to be identified or monitored without your permission and without your knowledge. People dislike RFID because they aren't disabled when you leave the store from which you bought your item, and the only uses of an active RFID chip on something you have legitemately bought are privacy invading.
(And just to prempt some replies, I really don't buy this 40cm range crap. 40cm max now, on consumer tech maybe. 40cm max in 5 years time, on equipment owned by the government, I highly doubt it.)
A world that never forgets (Score:3, Insightful)
Databases of this scale are immensely dangerous regardless of what trivial conveniences they allow. These databases can take our lives out of their social context and make us vulnerable to blackmail and extortion by public officials.
These databases also violate the Fourth Amendment. What about a future where law enforcement officials don't even need to step on a person's property to execute a search?
Simply, privacy is fundamentally important and is a fundamental human right. Only when citizens can control their own information, can a proper balance of power be mainained in a representative democracy like the USA. Remember, those who hold the information are those who are truly in power.
Re:96 bits??? (Score:5, Insightful)
Example: IIRC there are less than 256 countries in the world. One possible IPv6 allocation is an 8-bit country code field embedded in the 128-bit address, leaving 120 bits for each country to address devices. And then in the US, for instance: 6 bits for the state field, 8 bits for the county field, 8 bits for the city field, still leaving 98 bits for addressing *per city*. A similar example holds for 96-bit barcodes.
Confusing article. (Score:4, Insightful)
Bit of a "Duh" if you ask me. Of course it has to be done, but this is pure implementation territory: it doiesn't affect the privacy issues on bit.
Mind you, I do wonder what the delta cost on the RFID chip of moving from 96 bit to (say) 128 bit - or even 256-bit. While I agree that these things are going to be produced in trillions and therefore millionths of a cent add up, I would have thought that most of the cost was constant per unit - slicing, packaging, testing etc.
With equal accountability? Not likely. (Score:3, Insightful)
Reality is that the likelihood of extortion and blackmail over previous events in life becomes far less likely if everyone is held accountable. Currently the system is built more around how much money one can throw to make things go away.
The sad state of affairs, particularly in the US, is that everyone is expected to live up to a high level of morality, because everyone hides what they've done wrong. When no one can hide what they've done wrong, the system as a whole becomes far less black and white.
The real issue of privacy is whether or not we can build a system by which equal accountability will be maintained, not whether or not being able to hide one's past is a right.
Re:An ID on every car axle? (Score:3, Insightful)
If your car's whereabouts were tracked and stored in a database, there's the chance the employere could find that their employees are interviewing, which customers are shopping around and where, etc. What if you were recorded simply driving down a street within minutes of a crime committed by someone else? What's your alibi? There were no witnesses to the crime other than the database, of course.
Re:96 bits??? (Score:3, Insightful)