Douglas Adams would have said it had he been alive. RFID hype and panic cycles are notorious. Either RFID is end all to this world's problems - when it helps mankind be ever more dare I say be more efficient by keeping track of its myriad consumables, or it is the root of all evil - when it stops pacemakers and defibrillators from working. The recent article that has caused all this brouhaha is an innocuous and well researched and lucidly written paper by 5 dutch researchers, published by the Journal of American Medical Association (JAMA for short).

Quite Simply all that is being said by the paper is this - "Strong RF signals cause EMI (Electro Magnetic Interference) in electronic devices thereby disrupting their normal mode of operation". Specifically it says, off-the-shelf RFID readers can cause malfunction of "critical care equipment" in hospitals when used in their proximity.

It doesn't make any assertion about RF signals causing bodily harm at all, just in case you were wondering.

Hmm.. that's fair isn't it? - If I use my cellphone (1-4W) next to a speaker, it causes the speaker to sputter, so it is quite likely that a strong RF emitter like a 3W RFID reader (by comparison a microwave typically radiates 700W) should cause problems when put next to an electronic device. The 2.5G iphones radiate about 1.59W and the article points out that a similar study carried out in 2007 by the same researchers has found that newer cellphones cause similar problems like shown with RFID in the proximity of critical care equipment.

Woah! what is more common - a cellphone or a 3W UHF RFID reader?. Last I heard we had half the population of this world outfitted with a cellphone, but only a few tens of thousands of UHF RfID readers sold. Let's take solace in the fact that although the research is credible and regulation should therefore take some kind of action, we better worry about cell-phones first.

Alright, so I said we have time but does it still mean RFID has no future in Hospitals?. Let me try and be as resounding as I can about this - RFID is a general term encompassing many different frequencies, power-levels and applications. Failing in one very specific and worst case test of RFID, DOES NOT mean the death of RFID across the board.

Infact, the most common frequency in use in hospitals for consumables authentication, patient management and drug tracking is 13.56 MHz (typically at 200mW) which surprisingly finds no mention in the paper. Instead a 868Mhz reader operating at potentially more than the 2W ERP allowed by European regulations, which hardly is popular in hospitals to begin with is a huge cause for concern - why again?!. This is like being afraid of all tomatoes unequivocally because there is one out there that can potentially harbor salmonella - you would have to be a little paranoid to stop eating tomatoes altogether won't you?.

All being said, one must give credit to the effort put by the researchers ( test cases are online at http://www.amc.nl/?pid=5266) and their results but we must take a deep breath, be rational and NOT PANIC.

Perhaps it was the plethora of sci-fi movies painting implantable RFID microchips as a means for Big Brother to track your every move. The concept of implantable tracking devices evokes fears of stolen identities, information misuse, and a general lack of privacy. Will better security be the ultimate solution or the Achilles heel to implantable RFID?

Implantable RFID is in wide use today. It is estimated that at least 2 million cats and dogs have been tagged with implants. In fact, as I write this blog, my dog Riley’s HomeAgain Microchip Identification card sits here next to the computer. Despite the wide adoption of implants for animals worldwide, the biggest issue in the United States has been the use of a standardized tagging system. With several different implant manufacturers using proprietary tagging technology, the problem hasn’t been with hackers stealing Fido’s social-security number, but rather the failure to identify lost animals. This has required some shelters to carry more than one reader, or purchase multi-protocol readers – an expensive proposition for some volunteer run organizations.

So what about human subjects? VeriChip was the first company, in 2004, to receive FDA certification to implant their RFID microchips into human patients. Privacy advocate Katherine Albrecht may have said it best, “A man with a chip in his arm may soon find himself wondering whether that cute gal on the next bar stool likes his smile or wants to clone his VeriChip. It gives new meaning to the burning question, 'Does she want my number'?" Since FDA approval, a whole host of problems has prevented the widespread adoption of VeriChip's implant:

• Availability of Information – VeriChip uses a proprietary web-based interface. Therefore, availability of patient information is not always guaranteed – a major concern for an emergency room environment.
• Health Risks – given the fact that chips make use of some metals, there have been reports of incompatibility with these implants and MRI devices. VeriChip therefore does not recommend that chipped patients undergo an MRI unless they are fully conscious. There are additional reports that these implants assist in sarcoma formation and are also possibly linked to the development of fast-growing, lethal cancers. Incidence of malignancies has been reported in lab rats and has not been extensively studied in human or pet subjects.
• Religious Concerns – many religions oppose implants and body modifications, a major hurdle in the international market.
• Privacy – VeriChip uses a 16-digit identification number which is linked to a patient’s health record. Even if a hacker were to obtain this unique ID, they would need to have gained secure, password protected access to VeriChip’s patient database to make use of the patient information. However, plans on how to clone VeriChip implants are widely available and can easily be found with a quick web search.

Given all of these challenges, it is clear why the adoption of RFID implants has been slow. With the continued development of international RFID standards, and the use of low-cost external tracking devices, such as patient wristbands, RFID may prove to be a more suitable method for tracking patients - which creates lots of questions revolving around the sustainability of the implantable market. It is for these reasons that may have led VeriChip to ultimately announce the sale of its Implantable RFID Business last month. There may be no need to invest in tin-foil deflector beanies after all!

Not one year goes by when the RFID market is projected to grow at an even more resounding, oh! last year is so out of fashion rate. This year has been little different with the latest report from ABI giving us another giant glimmer at the end of the tunnel, a sort of pat in the back saying carry on because the rewards are stupendous for those who persevere.

ABI in their latest report released last month (week of the 19th May) assert that sales will grow at a lip-smacking 15% annually between 2007 and 2013 reaching an eventual target of 9.7B. This they say could have been much faster had it not been for slower than expected growth in the more high volume segments like access control, toll management etc.

The Skeptic in us will question - do these projections really hold up? Well, discerning members of the cynics club should take a look at what ABI said to all of us back in 2003 , (http://www.rfidjournal.com/article/view/506/1/1) when they made the assertion that the RFID market will be worth a healthy 3.1B. The good news is that well, mostly the analysts agree that in 2007 the world did a little better than expected by grossing in 4.9 B in RFID sales. The sour news is that the analysts back in 2003 were nowhere close in their assertion that most of this value will be garnered in the operations/supply chain sector. By even the most optimistic estimates the combined market share of the asset management and supply chain sector is at 13%, (http://www.idtechex.com/products/en/articles/00000813.asp) and has decreased from the then 20% instead of growing to 42% as predicted.

Ah! great, the market is much bigger than ABI could have imagine in 2003 you say, well, it is nice if you are the one looking outside in, but for those who are trapped in this RFID bubble it means one thing and only one thing - the market is larger sure, but way more fragmented then we could have imagined in 2003. Not only do we have a plethora of frequencies, a plethora of regulatory environments and standards, a plethora of vendors and SI's but now we have an ever increasing plethora of applications. Say hello to a market with a Pareto distribution. Can't say if the Industry has grown up but it sure has grown fatter.

How fat can fat be? To illustrate this I can't help but make the hackneyed comparison of one wireless technology to another, in this case RFID with the cellphone industry. Recently I heard that ITU is announcing that by the end of the year half the world's population will have been handed a cellphone over which they will merrily be making small talk with their next door neighbour. 3.3 B in the last 20 years is an impressive feat no doubt but when you realize that RFID companies are trying to similarly slap a tag to everyday objects from pill bottles to freight cars, the mind boggles knowing that an average new yorker alone has access to 10B different product choices. So, either the analysts at ABI are right and the growth rate is 15% for the next 30-50 years till we tag everything around us or in reality the growth rate is going to be much larger, say, maybe twice as much... From my own experience working on embedded projects I can tell you one sure thing, that the wackiest RFID application you can dream of is already in production

With all of our customers, this is usually the first question that we need to address, “Should I use HF or UHF?” The easy answer is, of course, UHF allows for longer range, HF requires proximity. I read an article the other day about a vendor that believed this and tag price was all they really needed to know, and they are now starting to think they made the wrong choice.

In later posts we will go into more detail, but for now here is a quick overview of differences in tags and in readers. HF tags typically have a large user memory bank, memory on the tag that a user can use however they please. Certain HF tags also use secure communications protocols, protecting data as it moves between the reader and tag, and can provide anti-counterfeiting measures for high value products. But security and memory come at a price, literally, with some tags costing more than $1 per tag.

On the other end, UHF tags are almost the complete opposite. Smaller memory, usually only enough for an Electronic Product Code (EPC), no secure protocols, and long read range, all for much cheaper than HF tags. However, UHF tags with large user memory are starting to gain traction, and some tag manufacturers have started making inductive UHF tags, which have a more restricted range, but are extremely inexpensive. As a result, I wouldn’t be surprised to start seeing UHF gaining popularity in more markets.

But the story doesn’t end there. HF readers are much cheaper than UHF readers, NFC phones are becoming more popular, and contactless payment is becoming more pervasive (been to Best Buy lately?) all support for HF. So what does all this mean? In my opinion, it comes down to this: if you have many items to tag and few read points (like in a warehouse), UHF is a more logical choice, but if you have many read points in many places (such as cell phones) or you are tagging high value items, HF will be more beneficial. There are always exceptions, but this is a good start to making sure you don't end up with millions of the wrong type of tags.

Here are some insights from our Founder, Sean Loving from recent history: 

It appears as though some are taking sides in the RFID Frequency War. Most agree the *war* is between 900MHz UHF and 13.56MHz HF as the better solution for item level RFID tagging. Last month at the RFID World Conference in Dallas, Texas several people asked me "what frequency is going to win the war for item level tagging"? Then in just the past couple of weeks there have been several noteworthy op ed, articles and events that continue to explore this question.

There was that report from Odin about UHF versus HF for Pharma SCM and ePedigree. One important note is how the conclusions were based on their comparison of E-field UHF with H-field HF.

And there have been several other recent op eds and articles [pdf] that further explain some of the issues important to this *war*.

I think the discussion (thankfully) is starting to expand to include other factors that are equally as important as frequency. Namely, some of these articles and reports are starting to discuss "coupling".

Finally, the industry is starting to understand that coupling, the wireless but physical connection between tag and reader, is independent of frequency.Coupling is something the industry is only starting to recognize as a key RFID systems level consideration. Here are a few terms to keep straight for these two basic types of coupling:

Electric field coupling, E-Field, Capacitive Coupling, Far-Field, Dipole antenna, Magnetic field coupling, H-Field, Inductive Coupling, Near-Field, Loop antenna

As a long time technical expert, I started SkyeTek already with several years experience making E-field tags and readers at both LF and HF – I think before Matrics and Alien were sampling their first UHF tag silicon.Now there appears to be a reverse opportunity for making inductive coupling tags with UHF tag silicon.The promise is to solve some remaining problems with UHF item level tagging, and to further drive the economy of scale for Gen2.

Indeed, SkyeTek applauds some of the new tag product announcements and the flurry of reader, antenna, and installation development that will necessarily follow to provide among other things - UHF item level tagging.

The result is that more products, systems and applications than ever will become RFID-enabled.

Until now the industry has focused more on the differences than the similarities between HF and UHF.Now that's starting to change as awareness continues to grow. SkyeTek is a neutral party because we provide Tagnostic(R) HF and UHF RFID reader technologies that easily configure for use with either type of coupling. Because we don't prefer either frequency HF or UHF, we can provide the best solution for our customers, instead of looking to force our solution on the world.

Some commentary from Sean Loving, SkyeTek Founder:

Now there’s a bad idea. When I first heard about the Baja Beach Club application I loved it, but I thought “Oh boy, this is going to freak out lots of people”. Then the Mexican judges started chipping themselves, then came the FDA approval for VeriChip, and recently the chipping of some US officials. I say go ahead and chip yourself if you want - but don’t even think about mandating implants on me, because I promise to take up arms against that kind of nonsense. In my opinion the worst thing about implanting humans with RFID is how it gives fearful people something more to worry about. Indeed, using RFID to track humans really touches a nerve, doesn’t it? For example I recently heard that RFID helped prevent an infant from being abducted from a North Carolina hospital. My first thought was “Hooray RFID”. But after a little research I learned it was the parents that were attempting to “abduct” their own child. Then I thought “Oh no, RFID has now been used to keep a child from its parents”. Alas, it’s no surprise that all these new uses of RFID are bringing such questions and controversy to the spotlight in the public debate over RFID.

Waving your phone over the cash register to pay for your groceries will happen. Uptaking a new song into your iPod by scanning an RFID tag will happen. Having your oven receive cooking instructions from an RFID tag in the food packaging will happen. But although implanting RFID in humans is unfortunately already happening, I am not concerned that this is a sign of Armageddon. As a member of the world society, I do agree completely that we should not allow ourselves to trick ourselves into fulfilling the prophecy of Revelation 13:16-18, as some of the anti-RFID Christians warn. And although Revelation, like all good prophecies, has deep meaning and wisdom, fear not people of Earth because RFID is not the mark of the beast. For soon enough there will be DNA scanners that can access the unique code that God put into each of us. And so this debate will shift again, this time with new Bible verses as supporting evidence.

No, I am not afraid of the end of the world, but I am concerned that more fear than good will come from the reckless use of RFID. In my opinion RFID scanners, like DNA scanners or the Internet or any technology, should be used for the good of people. So I want to shift the debate away from how we can outlaw RFID, to a more pragmatic debate on how we can best utilize this simple but powerful technology. The SkyeTek inbox is open for suggestions. As an industry leader, SkyeTek is unique among other RFID technology providers because we focus on humane, positive uses of RFID, intentionally attempting to avoid and prevent the misuse of the technology. Beyond the mundane applications like manufacturing and inventory control, some of my favorites so far have been ScripTalk the talking Rx pill bottle reader for the blind, the various children’s museums like EdVenture and the Exploratorium and Wiley’s Woods, and the DR-1000 that was designed to assist caregivers in eliminating mistakes at the hospital bedside.

We at SkyeTek are lucky to be exposed to ideas in their infancy. Lots of ideas. Working for SkyeTek, where we are focused on the embedded reader market, the ideas about how RFID will change the world go way beyond tracking goods. We sit with customers every week who tell me about their visions. Some simply want to improve existing products by adding RFID as a feature to do the same thing they’ve always done – but better. Others are integrating RFID with sensors, controls, wireless networks, and other technologies to create new and unique products. If even a small percentage of these ideas succeed, we stand to see a revolution in retail marketing, life-changing advances in medical treatment, a change in what we carry in our pockets, and countless other improvements in the way we move through our day. We might even have more fun on our vacations. (We're still engineers at heart, so we love automation and streamlined processes).

There has been much press in the last few months about security and privacy concerns related to RFID technology. Even The Today Show had a segment questioning whether the new smart cards were really that smart. First of all, I think it’s GREAT that RFID-enabled technologies are entering the American vocabulary on morning shows next to what to wear for fall and how to cook the best Thanksgiving turkey. Surely, this is a positive indication that RFID is starting to take hold and becoming more relevant to our everyday life. But to address the controversial issues surrounding RFID, these are nothing more than challenges that will take time and creativity to overcome. And overcoming these challenges is what makes working with emerging technologies fun!

RFID is still a relative newborn in terms of mass adoption. Of course, the internet wasn’t born overnight, barcodes took 30 years to become pervasive, and the evolution of cell phones and other mobile computing and communication devices is still evolving. All of these technologies changed the way people live, and we are excited to think of all the ways that RFID is likely to do the same.

These entries will focus not just on the neat ideas that will revolutionize the way we live our lives, but also discuss the associated challenges whether they be technical, political, social, or economical. By discussing these issues, I hope to open a dialogue for creative solutions that we at SkyeTek are now and continue to be aggressively involved in solving.