Radio frequency identification (RFID) has seen widespread integration across a wide variety of industries and vertical markets in recent years. One source of growth has been large-scale, "open-loop" RFID adoption by major organizations such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc, the largest US retailer, and the US Department of Defense. These two huge entities essentially forced adoption from their supply chain partners and vendors with mandates.
Since these RFID initiatives several years ago, many smaller enterprises have chosen (or in the above scenarios, been forced) to adopt passive RFID - typically a battery-less unit comprising an IC (which modulates/demodulates an RF signal) and an RF antenna - largely due to the comparative cheapness and maturity of passive RFID versus active RFID (which utilizes a battery and features longer-range two-way communication).
Smaller
enterprises adhering to the supply chain requirements of a major retail
customer like Wal-Mart have been a significant driver of "open-loop"
RFID activity. Otherwise, the complexity and cost of ensuring data
security in an open-loop network has been largely prohibitive to
smaller enterprises.
Recent development of RFID air interface standards and security technology promise to make it easier and safer to implement open-loop RFID-based asset tracking systems.
Implementing an open-loop RFID system involves sharing critical asset data, often over the Internet, with partners. The sensitive nature of this kind of information forces data security to be taken seriously at the beginning of an RFID project. Companies therefore usually look to proven, standardized technologies that provide robust security and offer flexibility to the needs of their supply chains.
Since there is no single global public body that governs the frequencies used for RFID, global standardization has focused on improving how an RFID tag interacts with a reader. RFID in the 1990s experienced communication problems in the "air interface" and in recent years global supply chain standards have emerged to address this issue. In late 2004, EPCglobal (a joint venture between the logistics trade groups GS1 and GS1 US) was granted approval of its Class 1 Generation 2 UHF Air Interface Protocol Standard, commonly known as the Gen 2 standard. The Gen 2 standard has essentially become the backbone of passive RFID and in 2006 was adopted with minor modifications as the international standard ISO 18000-6C.
The international standard defines air interface-related parameters, such as operating frequency, channel accuracy and bandwidth, modulation, bit rate and transmission order, and frequency hop rate. This has improved tag throughput and read accuracy, along with the global interoperability, and has enabled Gen 2 chip vendors to sell to companies looking to implement open-loop RFID on a global scale.
Several major retailers announced new RFID projects based on Gen 2. For example, the Falabella Group, a major retailer in Latin America, identified the data reliability of Gen 2 as a core factor in its decision to go with an RFID inventory project, as Gen 2 met its internal requirement of 98% RFID reading accuracy.
The direction of RFID security technology research has been largely influenced by collaboration between the US government and private research firms. In December 2008, SecureRF Corp of the US received a research grant from the US Air Force to investigate an advanced method of secure, satellite-enabled RFID. The purpose of the US Air Force RFID system would be to locate and track mobile assets without exposing targeting information, tactical locations or logistics information to unfriendly forces. The proposed global asset tracking system would use an encrypted military or commercial satellite network, rather than the more common fixed RFID reader infrastructure or cell phone network coverage.
by Michael Thuresson
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