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RFID Tattoo for Tracking Cattle and Humans 181

Posted by Zonk from the one-mammal-is-as-bad-as-the-rest-go-reptoids dept.
ack154 writes "The Register reports that a St Louis based company, Somark Innovations, has successfully tested RFID tattoos to be used for tracking cattle and other animals. Details are limited for the actual tattoo, but it's said to contain no metals and can be read up to about four feet away. Engadget has some more details on the matter. And yes, the article does mention RFID tattoos are possible for people, specifically the military. From the article: 'The system developed by Somark uses an array of needles to quickly inject a pattern of dots into each animal, with the pattern changing for each injection. This pattern can then be read from over a meter away using a proprietary reader operating at high frequency.'"
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RFID Tattoo for Tracking Cattle and Humans More

RFID Tattoo for Tracking Cattle and Humans

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  • Could have just said 'tracking cattle' (Score:5, Insightful)

    by MECC ( 8478 ) * on Friday January 19, 2007 @08:48AM (#17679820)
    The poster could have left off the 'and humans' part.

    • Re:Could have just said 'tracking cattle' (Score:5, Insightful)

      by solevita ( 967690 ) on Friday January 19, 2007 @08:50AM (#17679854)
      From the summary:
      the article does mention RFID tattoos are possible for people, specifically the military

      It's a sad thing to see - RFID is essentially a stock tracking system, add it to people and you too are stock to be tracked.
      • ... same as serial numbers and bar codes.

        I don't see why people get their panties in a bunch over RFID when it doesn't offer anything that we don't already have with bar codes.

        • Re:Could have just said 'tracking cattle' (Score:5, Insightful)

          by solevita ( 967690 ) on Friday January 19, 2007 @08:59AM (#17679972)
          A couple of brief reasons:

          1: Barcodes can't be read at distance, without me knowing about it. If somebody, for example, tried to read a barcode in my passport, I'd know. I wouldn't know if somebody had tried to read a RFID tag in my passport.

          2: I'm sure that if the article related to barcoding cattle and soldiers, you'd have received similar comments. To be honest, I don't want RFID or barcodes printed on me for the world to see.

          • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

            by mikkelm ( 1000451 )

            2: I'm sure that if the article related to barcoding cattle and soldiers, you'd have received similar comments. To be honest, I don't want RFID or barcodes printed on me for the world to see.

            I'd go out on a limb and guess that what he meant was that it was alarmist. This isn't about the use of RFID as such. It's just a new innovation using the technology. Mentioning that humans could be tattooed as well is superfluous and not at all different from saying the same thing about any tracking technology used for animal life. "Barcodes/RFID/generic radio tags/GPS/ect is used to track animals and could be used to track humans, too! Your privacy is at risk!". It'd be slightly annoying to have to r

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by rifter ( 147452 )

              "2: I'm sure that if the article related to barcoding cattle and soldiers, you'd have received similar comments. To be honest, I don't want RFID or barcodes printed on me for the world to see."

              I'd go out on a limb and guess that what he meant was that it was alarmist. This isn't about the use of RFID as such. It's just a new innovation using the technology. Mentioning that humans could be tattooed as well is superfluous and not at all different from saying the same thing about any tracking technology used

              • here are companies now that require you to have an RFID chip emplanted in you in order to work for them.

                You don't need the implant in order to work for them, just to access the data center.

                • Re: (Score:2)

                  by rifter ( 147452 )

                  "here are companies now that require you to have an RFID chip emplanted in you in order to work for them."

                  You don't need the implant in order to work for them, just to access the data center.

                  At CityWatcher.com that is correct. There were other locations where all workers were required to be tagged, and some of those are listed in the wikipedia RFID site (which I thought I had linked, but apparently did not) and in other places. In any case the distinction is not very relevant with regard to slashdotters

            • Hehe, new innovation. Yea. Luckily that whole 'tattoos on humans to track them' is just crazy sensationalism.
              It could never [umn.edu] happen [reviewjournal.com] in reality [cnn.com].

              Sorry you got annoyed. We'll try not to let it happen again.

              (Tagging your ass with an RFID is the government's wet dream. Anybody that thinks otherwise is deluding themselves.)

          • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

            by d3ac0n ( 715594 )

            A couple of brief reasons:

            1: Barcodes can't be read at distance, without me knowing about it. If somebody, for example, tried to read a barcode in my passport, I'd know. I wouldn't know if somebody had tried to read a RFID tag in my passport.

            2: I'm sure that if the article related to barcoding cattle and soldiers, you'd have received similar comments. To be honest, I don't want RFID or barcodes printed on me for the world to see.

            Ok, a couple problems here.

            1) If you RTFA, you will note that the RFID tag is

            • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

              by Nitage ( 1010087 )

              If you RTFA, you will note that the RFID tag is only readable from "Up to four feet away".
              I frequently find myself less than 4 feet away from other people - in crowds, in bars, on planes/trains/buses

            • Re:Could have just said 'tracking cattle' (Score:5, Insightful)

              by walt-sjc ( 145127 ) on Friday January 19, 2007 @09:58AM (#17680734)
              If you RTFA, you will note that the RFID tag is only readable from "Up to four feet away". Somehow I don't think that really counts as a great distance.

              I think 4 feet is plenty. Someone doesn't have to "wand" you, they just need to walk past you with a reader in their pocket. Also think about readers at entrances to subways, on the "walk" button poll at every street corner, entrances to buildings, on the money collector on the bus, etc.

              The whole RFID thing is pretty disturbing when you look at the behavior of governments throughout history, and the behavior of the US government recently. The trend towards tracking and investigating everyone in more and more detail every month is not encouraging at all. I'm not concerned too much about today or tomorrow, but 20 years from now when the cost of readers is $2, and they can communicate wireless to a central reporting system - all in the name of anti-terrorism. I used to think that this was all tin-foil hat stuff, but recent (past 4 years) actions by the government have changed my mind.

              GB isn't much better at the moment with tracking cameras everywhere, automated license plate readers, etc.

              • Re:Could have just said 'tracking cattle' (Score:5, Insightful)

                by run_w_xcors ( 1032842 ) on Friday January 19, 2007 @10:37AM (#17681332)
                GB? When's the last time you looked at all the cameras that are pointed at you in the US? A friend of mine and I were walking around San Francisco and I told him to count the amount of cameras he saw while walking around town. Just about everywhere we went (admittedly, in nice parts of town, not so much in say, the Tenderloin) we could see some form of camera that could possibly be pointed at us. To make matters worse, I got stopped on the street by a crew of people shooting a video for a handheld video camera (only making things worse because it was ironic we were just talking about being recorded in public). Now look at school initiatives to place cameras in all classrooms. Our children are being raised with digital eyeballs on them. When they get older, they won't know any better than having cameras pointed at them. Tin foil hat stuff...heh. Remember when Greenpeace was a bunch of stinky hippies on a boat? Now a former presidential candidate is running around talking about global climate problems. Conspiracies aside, there are tons of information gathering tools in use by the government. At this time the good news is that you're still protected by the constitution, unless of course, an executive order trumps that in times of "emergency".
                • Oh, I wasn't saying that GB was worse, just that the US isn't alone in people tracking activities.

                  As a side note, statistics show that cameras don't deter crime in SF. Crime in areas with cameras went up at the same rate as areas without.

                • Re: (Score:2)

                  by sco08y ( 615665 )
                  A friend of mine and I were walking around San Francisco and I told him to count the amount of cameras he saw while walking around town.

                  You're right in that most major US cities are like that, but then most major US cities are run by Democrats. You don't get that shit in the red states.
            • is only readable from "Up to four feet away".
              a high gain directional antenna with receivers (tranceivers? these are passive, or only semi-active, right?) tuned to the same frequency would get better spatial resolution and standoff range than what is likely present in the standard receiver.
              Think of WiFi (std 802.11). normally very local, but with high gain directional antennas, people have used it for long range networking.
              Alarmist summary, yes. Misplaced fears, maybe. Incorrect technically, not n

            • Re:Could have just said 'tracking cattle' (Score:5, Interesting)

              by Kozz ( 7764 ) on Friday January 19, 2007 @10:22AM (#17681122)

              ... it is useful for identifying bodies that have been badly mangled due to things like bombs, mines, and other explosives.

              Or it could also be used specifically to TRIGGER bombs, mines and other explosives upon detecting a particular group of persons, or even an individual that matches an exact code.

            • You won't notice if... (Score:5, Insightful)

              by sacrilicious ( 316896 ) <qbgfynfu.opt@recursor.net> on Friday January 19, 2007 @10:44AM (#17681458) Homepage
              You are going to notice if someone walks up [to within 4 feet of] you and starts wanding you to get an RFID signal.

              Sure, one wouldn't notice if someone dressed in an LED clown suit with a megaphone started jumping up and down with a wand announcing, "Please remain immobile, I am about to scan you." But you're not going to notice if there's a reader embedded in the wall of a hallway where you're walking.

            • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

              by zombiestomper ( 228123 )
              If you RTFA, you will note that the RFID tag is only readable from "Up to four feet away". Somehow I don't think that really counts as a great distance.
              When's the last time you saw a doorway over 4-feet wide? Unless you plan on staying in the wide-open spaces the rest of your life, you're going to be scanned and tracked. All it takes is a simple scanning device and a building entrance. They already have tags and scanners at doors for tracking stolen, they just add a new scanner that tracks RFID and vi

            • If you place RFID readers at certain strategic locations, you can go a long way to detecting the presence of, say, pedophiles that have been paroled and are hanging out near a school (assuming you have hidden RFID readers near schools, of course.)

              There must be some term coined by now, akin to Godwin's law, that as the length of a discussion increases, the probability of someone using combatting pedophillia to justify their argument approaches 1.

              However, unlike Godwin's law, the person who brings up pedophil

            • Yeah, we could use them just on criminals and the military, just like fingerprints. Of course, it won't be more than a few years before schools start offering to tag your kids "for their protection", you know... just like fingerprints. Of course, a few years later, we can start requiring them for getting a drivers license, you know... just like finger prints. After all, 'driving is a privilege', right? You don't have to get a drivers license. You can just use all the really good public transportation
            • One of the interesting things about technology is that it rarely gets worse, which is to say: *today* the reader can scan you from about four feet away. What about next month when a new design can do 8 feet? and next year when it can do 40? At what distance do you get nervous about any arbitrary stranger being able to unambiguously identify you without your knowledge? For me, *any* distance is too far. But, hey, maybe you've never had a stalker.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by npsimons ( 32752 ) *

              If you place RFID readers at certain strategic locations, you can go a long way to detecting the presence of, say, pedophiles that have been paroled and are hanging out near a school (assuming you have hidden RFID readers near schools, of course.)

              This and the registering of sexual offenders has always bothered me, and not just because of the privacy implications or the fact that sometimes innocent people are convicted or because "sexual offenses" can be something as simple as being seen peeing in the bush

            • " But for Soldiers the RFID tattoo has a great advantage over the dog tag as it cannot be lost. If it is small, removable via inexpensive laser surgery, and placed on a couple different points around the body, it is useful for identifying bodies that have been badly mangled due to things like bombs, mines, and other explosives."

              G.I.s already provide DNA samples. DNA in bones and teeth survives fire and decomposition much better, making RFID unnecessary.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by sco08y ( 615665 )
              2) In the case of regular citizens, I absolutely agree with you. But for Soldiers the RFID tattoo has a great advantage over the dog tag as it cannot be lost. If it is small, removable via inexpensive laser surgery, and placed on a couple different points around the body, it is useful for identifying bodies that have been badly mangled due to things like bombs, mines, and other explosives.

              All military personnel have their DNA on file for that purpose.
          • "We don't need to see your papers or ID. We already know who you are, and where you have been."

        • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

          by Ziwcam ( 766621 )

          ... same as serial numbers and bar codes.

          I don't see why people get their panties in a bunch over RFID when it doesn't offer anything that we don't already have with bar codes.

          The issue I would have with this, being ex-military myself, is the fact that an RFID tattoo would be permanent. When you're done with the military you can just throw your ID card away. Not-so-easy when that ID is tattoo'd permanently into your skin.

      • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

        by ElectricRook ( 264648 )
        Actually, I think the people tracked as "stock", would become "Livestock".

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Goaway ( 82658 )
        It's a sad thing to see - RFID is essentially a stock tracking system, add it to people and you too are stock to be tracked.

        How, exactly, do you think the military works? Every soldier is treated as a precious little snowflake?

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by eno2001 ( 527078 )
        American and European humans are ALREADY stock to be tracked. There was a tipping point in the late 80s/early 90s when business became powerful enough that they lost interest in you buying their products. That wasn't profitable enough. The new profit center is buying, selling and trading humans and it happens daily. Do you honestly think that television ads and the companies that make them make much money from getting you to buy a product? They make MUCH more money by selling YOU to their true customer
      • Tony Blair's shiny, happy New Labour New Britain is well ahead of you:

        Microchips for mentally ill planned in shake-up
        http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/n e ws/2007/01/17/ncrime17.xml [telegraph.co.uk]

        'Radical measures for tackling crime - ranging from monitoring the behaviour of the mentally ill with radio chips to hormone injections for sex offenders -- are to be considered by the Government in a wide-ranging policy review ordered by Tony Blair.'

        The whole briefing document is at http://www.cabinetoffice. [cabinetoffice.gov.uk]

      • It's a sad thing to see - RFID is essentially a stock tracking system, add it to people and you too are stock to be tracked.

        Hmm, how about we just put it on my girlfriend? My ex is going to get it as is, god knows that bitch was a heffer.

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by garcia ( 6573 )
      The poster could have left off the 'and humans' part.

      Then it would be a real news site and not Slashdot. They have to keep raising the bar to set themselves apart from the rest!

    • Should have just said 'and humans' (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I think it be daft to have said only "tracking cattle" when there are far more applications which are patently obvious. The first "harmless" use is proposed as soldiers. Next, it will seem logical to track inmates of correctional institutes. Perhaps other behavioral institutes could benefit. Sex offenders. Prison guards. Other security applications.

      Then, won't someone think of the children? They'll be far safer if we know where they all are at any given moment.

      Plus, it will aid in all types of commerce
    • I live in the foothills and ran across this at my local far and took this picture [edified.org]. It's the visible tattoo option.

      Pretty incredible stuff!

  • eh? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Phil246 ( 803464 ) on Friday January 19, 2007 @08:49AM (#17679834)
    If its really rfid, the pattern of the dots wouldnt matter since it would have its own chip etc to send a unique id back. Optical patterns are irrelevent with it.

    If its a pattern, and using a propriatory ( presumably optical ) reader, this is not radio based tech and thus not rfid.
    surely?

    • Re:eh? (Score:4, Informative)

      by FooAtWFU ( 699187 ) on Friday January 19, 2007 @08:54AM (#17679896) Homepage
      RFID means that they send out a radio pulse with an RFID reader, and they get something back. If the pattern of dots can somehow elicit the proper response on the proper frequency, then it's RFID, whether or not it's in a neat little grain-of-rice-sized microchip of some sort.

      I'm not sure whether this can conform to the same specifications as what we normally consider RFID, but it's probably something they can read with radio waves, not an optical scan. Radio wave scanning can detect patterns and stuff too, you know.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Joebert ( 946227 )
      More importantly, if theese tattoos go through the same transformation as my tattoos titties, will I one day be arrested for trying to impersonate Arnold Schwarzenegger ?

    • Re:eh? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by mrogers ( 85392 ) on Friday January 19, 2007 @09:04AM (#17680024)
      My guess is that it uses reflective glass beads [wisegeek.com] injected into the skin with compressed air [wikipedia.org]. The pattern could then be read with any electromagnetic wave that can penetrate a few millimetres of skin, eg microwaves.
    • Placing simple radio responding cells (RFID chips ) in a pattern would form an array. The pattern of chips would become an antenna array.
      • Placing three boxes of Cream of Wheat directly in front of your eyes would put them within your field of view. The pattern of boxes would become a field of wheat.
        • Yes, exactly, and if they were radio responding, turning them on-off in a sequence would form a three dimensional shape, which would be a wave. You just made a radio wave based on the shape of the elements of the array.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by LMacG ( 118321 )
      At the company's website [somarkinnovations.com], they say it is
      a proprietary ID system based on a biocompatible ink tattoo with chipless RFID functionality. When applied, the ink creates a unique ID that can be detected without line of sight.

  • Tattoos as ID? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Vinegar Joe ( 998110 ) on Friday January 19, 2007 @08:50AM (#17679856)
    Didn't work out so well the last time somebody tried it.

    • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

      by Marko DeBeeste ( 761376 )
      When they came for the Jerseies, I didn't protest, because I wasn't a Jersey

      When they came for the Angus, I didn't protest, because I wasn't an Angus

      When they came for the Herefords, I didn't protest, because I wasn't a Hereford

      When they came for the sheep, there was no on left to protest for me

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Tim C ( 15259 )
      I wasn't aware that the Nazis experienced any particular problems with their system of tattooing people.

      Now if you want to argue that the circumstances surrounding the scheme and the motivation for it were particularly awful I'd be in full agreement. The scheme itself, however, I believe was a success.

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by Tired_Blood ( 582679 )
        I wasn't aware that the Nazis experienced any particular problems with their system of tattooing people.
        Members of the Waffen-SS had a tattoo [wikipedia.org] that indicated their blood-type. This identifier helped war-crime prosecutors considerably, so being branded in such a way did prove very problematic to those soldiers after the war.
  • Poor cows :(

    What good would a four-feet RFID signal be in the middle of Basra? (of course, I know the signal would be routed, but still...not that great really...)

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Joebert ( 946227 )
      The corral gate they eventually walk through isn't 4 feet wide.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by QuantumRiff ( 120817 )
      While I disagree with this idea completely, the one thing I could see as a "benefit" for the soldiers would be to have scanners in the hospitals (mobile and permanent) as well as mobile scanners for medics. Might be useful if someone is badly injured or burned, can't find the dog tags (they blew away!) or something, perform a quick scan, and know that its Gunnery Sargent Hartman (the senior drill instructor!), he is allergic to penicillin, blood type 0-, and has a pin in his leg, so you can't put him throu

  • No offense but... (Score:1, Insightful)

    by KKlaus ( 1012919 )
    I don't really see many additional privacy concerns here, seeing as RFID capsules already have been implanted in people. I guess this tech represents another theoretical vector (to the extent that its cheaper or more durable), but really the whole putting it in people thing and associated privacy issues seems pretty contrived for this issue, and only present to create artificial buzz. Here's a hint, when implanting objects (or dyes, etc) in animals, don't be surprised if those same objects can go in peop

  • Animals! (Score:5, Funny)

    by nighty5 ( 615965 ) on Friday January 19, 2007 @08:58AM (#17679950)
    "Somark Innovations, has successfully tested RFID tattoos to be used for tracking cattle and other animals."

    So when does every member of Congress receive their tattoo?

  • Just what every military wants, a mechanized, automatic, failsafe way for enemies to detect and therefore kill your troops.

    I personally don't predict a lot of RFID tagging in the military.

    • How long until someone invents an RFID-tracking RPG?
    • Remember the lame ass Star Trek Insurrection, or whatever they called it... little probes "tagging" people for transport.

      Now imagine them killing people, and homing in on the "tagged" people.

      • If we could build nano-machines, we wouldn't need tags. Want to kill a person? Steal one of his hairs, program the nanite to home in on his DNA, and then drop a bunch in the punch-bowl at the next party. Done and done.

        Or, want to commit genocide? Figure out a unique genetic trait possessed mainly by your "target", and then release the nanites into the population at large. Granted you'll probably take out a few hundred thousand people who don't fall into the target category, but genocidal maniacs aren't

  • Good for the sheeple (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 19, 2007 @09:02AM (#17680008)
    I say we tag everyone apart from those with the hutzpah to refuse. Then us untagged folk can self-identify and conspire to clean up the gene pool.
  • Are these tattoos shaped like barcodes? All I know is that if an EMP devastates the United States, I'm going to move to Seattle, join the fight against Manticore and get a chance to meet Jessica Alba (with sexy results)!

  • mark (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    *cough* mark of the beast *cough* *cough*
    • That's exactly what I thought, although probably not in the same context.

      How do we fight this? Use the Christians. (I don't see why cynical good and cynical evil can't both play this game.)

      "OMGWTF. It's the mark of the beast! JUST LIKE IN THE ACID TRIP AT THE END OF THE BIBLE. The sky is falling!"

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by takeya ( 825259 ) *
        Excellent point - it could easily be fought using the majority of the population's fear of the mark of the beast - just make them "realize" that this is it
  • What do you expect an antenna (whether chip or tattoo pattern) to do but receive all that EM energy and convert it to a small, localized, but sub-dermal and therefore very painful burn.

    Hmmm... I don't think the military want it and I don't think any human in their right mind want it either (Implicit question regarding the sanity of those already implanted intentional).

    Who needs to be a so-called "Revelation nutter" not to want to shun this? (And talk about "argumentum ad hominem - abusive" label! not that s

  • No metal? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Cheesey ( 70139 ) on Friday January 19, 2007 @09:09AM (#17680088)
    Details are limited for the actual tattoo, but it's said to contain no metals and can be read up to about four feet away.

    No metal? This doesn't sound like a radio transceiver at all. Can you make an electronic device without using any metals?

    I wonder what it actually is. Glorified barcode?
    • It uses very sophisticated materials that can be read using a device that emits electromagnetic radiation in the 400-700nm range.
    • Anything that produces a discontinuity in the refractive index will interact with radio waves in detectable ways. It helps to be about a quarter-wavelength or larger in size, and sizes near a multiple of a half-wavelength can resonate - thus interacting very strongly. But any discontinuity will be detectable.

      Synthetic aperture radar techniques would be able to image the pattern in two dimensions. These resolve distance by using a "chirp" - a swept-frequency pulse of significant duration - and can resolve

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Cheesey ( 70139 )
        :) You should be in the patent-writing business!

        (I guess it is just a barcode after all)
  • Just put your arm in one, and tada! You've got your own personalized barcode..

  • Evolution of tracking. (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Humans already have multiple tracking methods, fingerprints, dna, phermones, iris identification, and even facial recognition. Most of these aren't useful in tracking and identifying animals. In the past hot iron branding has been the major identification for cows and this is just the natural evolution of that tracking method. If only they can track e. coli laced food this way as well...

  • Mistake for covert ops (Score:4, Insightful)

    by devnullkac ( 223246 ) on Friday January 19, 2007 @09:17AM (#17680196) Homepage

    Unless the tattoo is easily and cleanly removable, it would be a mistake to use on the general military population, since tattooed grunts couldn't aspire to covert ops (too easily identifiable).

    • One wonders if this tattoo can be removed by laser without more damage to the wearer than with an ordinary tattoo...

  • PR (Score:1)

    by KKlaus ( 1012919 )
    You know you'd think they could have done a better job with their PR. I'm pretty sure identifying tattoos + people are not a winning mix, and I can't imagine trying to convince someone to use one of these. "No its fine! Think of all the other people that have done it before you... of wait... er...."
    • Synthetic-aperture radar reader technology should work fine with some of the current tatoo inks, too. This just optimizes the ink for maximum reflection to make the job easier and the range larger.
  • Just like sub-dermal microchipping this process is invasive and has the potential for complications such as infection, allergic reactions and other issues. There is still technology in development though to implement non-invasive techniques such as iris recognition which are much more promising long-term in terms of animal identification. Here's a good dutch web site, with mediocre english translation, that details some problems with microchipping in particular: http://www.invisio.nl/antichip/ [invisio.nl]
  • They could use the RFID Ink technology to pickup FM radio stations so I might have easy listening jazz stations where ever I go, yeh, cool man.
  • This new tattoo technology is really the mark of the beast (literally) lol
  • I bet they RFID tattoo all the "detainees" in Children of Men [imdb.com].
  • take the mark?
  • Can mine look like a dragon or a skull? That would kick ass d00d.
  • I see problems every time after this that I try to walk out of the supermarket through the anti-shoplifting detectors.
  • How does RFID work? Well a scanner emits an alternating electromagnetic field. The RFID chip induces this field and gets enough electrical potential within it to activate and emits its code to the scanner. Clearly, in order to do this there must be an integrated circuit involved in the RFID chip itself.

    Here is what I don't understand - If this "tattoo" contains no metallic elements of any sort, how precisely is it supposed to induce an electromagnetic field from a 4 ft away, let alone kick back a serial
  • Seems anything used by the military would have to be resistant to EMP. Has anyone discussed that yet in relation to RFID?
  • Though of course, it is the wrong management technique.

  • Innovation RFID with temperature (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Camel Pilot ( 78781 ) on Friday January 19, 2007 @01:25PM (#17684110) Homepage Journal
    At one time I did some work for a company that uses a purely passive (no battery) RFID inside the cow [magiix.net]. They embed a temperature a/d device within a microchip RFID to provide identification along with accurate body temperature measurement. The device is packaged in a bolus that sits in the cow rumen. When the cow walks by a reader board the id and temperature is transmitted. The cool thing is that the device is energized by the reader board so that no battery is required.
  • "Baby, that tattoo you got is really hot! No, I mean it's hot to the touch" "Hey man, why are you pointing that radar gun at my girlfriend?"
  • In europe, if you ask your dog to get passport for international travel, they ask you to inplant IC (some RFID device) into your dog at vet. So this is no new technology thing.

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