- Image by Getty Images via @daylife
RFID is an interesting and useful technology. One of the great things about it is that it’s simple enough that even a lay person can understand quite a lot about how it works. From a technical standpoint, the most important things to understand about RFID are probably the standards, data access, encoding, transmission, power source, and frequency. This article will discuss RFID standards, data access, and encoding.
Most communications technologies rely on widely set standards. Since electronics can only speak in 1s and 0s, an on state or an off state, it takes many levels of protocols to translate from electronically stored data into something humans can understand; standards “standardize” those protocols so that technology from various manufacturers can be used together. RFID, being a relatively new technology, has a lot of standards, and many of them are proprietary. A few of these standards will probably emerge as leaders over the next several years; until then, you probably need to stick to a set system produced by one manufacturer.
Data access is a very important concern with RFID. Security is difficult with any wireless technology, simply due to the nature of a broadcast–that anyone can pick up a signal that is broadcast. In the case of RFID tags, the information to be concerned about is the identifier stored on, and broadcast by, the tag. While the ID stored on each tag is unique, it can be duplicated onto another card by someone with the right tools and know-how. Many people think that RFID should not be used for the security applications it is popularly used for now because the encoding for these tags is not very good. Even some of the more secure versions of RFID technology, which tend to be far more expensive, have a poor security track record.
Standards and encoding are some of the most important things to consider in implementing your RFID system. It’s important to keep to a single standard, so that you don’t have compatibility problems in your system. You should also be sure you are aware of the security limitations of RFID.