RFID Evolution
- RFID Special Issue

The origins of RFID are from World War II. The IFF transponder, was invented by the British in 1939, to know whether the aircraft was friend or foe.

In its simplest form a product tag, made of a microchip with a tiny antenna, is attached to a product. An associated tag reader puts out electromagnetic waves. The tag antenna receives the waves and the tag itself draws power from the field generated by the reader, powering the chip, and then modulates the reader signal, sending it back where it is converted into digital data.

According to wikipedia, in 1945 Léon Theremin invented an espionage tool for the Soviet government. Even though this device was a passive covert listening device, not an identification tag, it has been attributed the “first known” device and a predecessor to RFID technology. The technology used in RFID has been around since the early 1920s according to one source (although the same source states that RFID systems have been around just since the late 1960s).

The present avatar of RFID.

RFID is already widely used in many office buildings, allowing companies to control and monitor its employees movement in and out of the premises, through proximity cards and door card readers. Many clothing retail outlets also use RFID technology for electronic article surveillance and to protect against theft and shoplifting. Some government agencies also employ RFID to monitor offenders at home. Other examples of how RFID is used are as follows:

Access control

Puneet Mehrotra is a columnist for HindustanTimes.com and a web strategist at www.cyberzest.com You can email him on puneet@cyberzest.com