Really tiny RFID tags

Incredible technology on its own merit, like many others, but the privacy and ethics concerns do make it frightening. I vote for a rule: "RFID's should not be used on humans except in special very limited cases (tracking prisoners in a prison for example)". I don't even think tracking employees in a company should be accepted as that offers a can of works of abuse.

That idea by Eric sounds like something worth considering. I really hope some sort of a sophisticated anti-tracking technology gets developed just in case to prevent RFID human tracking abuse. A technology should basically either completely block, disable or scramble the signal to a point of it being useless to the tracker.

It can be done of course, someone with knowledge and resources just has to do it. If DRM can be hacked, RFID tracking can and should be hacked too.

Of course humans shouldn't be trackable, but they often are as a side effect when RFID tags are used to replace barcodes. For example you may own a pair of shoes, a bag and a coat that all contain barcode replacing RFIDs. The combination of these three could be unique, and therefore it could in theory be used to track you. Practice may be different.

Personally I'm more worried about tracking using security cameras than I am about RFIDs. I once wanted to declare some random day to be "give-a-security-camera-the-finger-day", but I figured that was not the way in which I would like to get famous .

Hmm, RFID's instead of bar codes will be tough to get rid of if it becomes a norm. Besides, why would anyone be able to have anything to do with an item I purchased once I payed for it? Scan it in the store, charge for it, and then cut me loose. I don't want any tracking technology being built in my property.

Security cameras are bad yeah, but they have their place in specialized locations, as long as it's not public places and streets.. There ought to be some balance with that.

I don't know, to be honest, what of the two is worse.

It could be interesting to try to figure out the longest possible reasonably straight route possible without leaving the sight of security cameras. It could be much longer than you would expect because there are cameras in some trains... Just walking it might be up to a few kilometers.

Anyway, what is more of a problem: tracking by devices that are everywhere, or tracking that requires special equipment?

It's possible to "fry" RFID chips using something you can make out of a camera and some wire. You just have to know there is one. Can we do the same with security cameras? Yes, but that's not allowed .

Who says it will be allowed with RFIDs?

Oh well, it would still be a few steps before that'd happen I guess, when we'd be dangerously close to if not already in the dystopian society.. yeah that 1984 stuff..

But you know, we ought to be cautios on both counts and on all counts when it comes to privacy and freedom. Neither the cameras nor RFID technologies are exempted from what should be watched for.

If you own something, nobody can forbid you to break it (except if it is an animal, of course). So if you bought something that contains an RFID tag, nobody can stop you from frying the tag. Cameras, on the other hand, are owned by someone else, and much more practical spy tools too.

Perhaps we should advocate for a barcode replacing RFID system with the following properties:
- tags are unique per product, not per item
- tags are destroyed after payment, so you won't pay for the same shoes every time you walk into the shop... and you can't be tracked.