A systematic review of RFID applications and diffusion: key areas and public policy issues

For example, after serious attack by Osama Bin Laden on 9/11, the American government decided to implement an RFID tag embedded e-passport and VISA waiver program. The US government asked their member countries to implement e-passport by late 2005 and soon US member countries like ROK and EU started to use e-passports. Currently, no one can enter to United States without an RFID tag based e-passport.

Especially in developing countries, governments usually adopt brand new IT technologies, but their low level of socio-economic infrastructures may prohibit the efficient operation of technology.

For instance, RFID applications may lack social virtues like trust, ethics, and democracy. It is essential to understanding how a rapid diffusion and massive applications of RFID generate conflict or harmony among human behaviors, digital literacy, institutional rules, and technology.

US Army and its allies could not only manage weapons and soldiers but also identify who was the enemy or not (Castro and Wamba, 2007). This whole project of developing an RFID based identifying system was known as IFF (Identify Friend of Foe).

See more various examples of RFID applications at the website (https://epic.org/privacy/rfid/)

In 2004, the US Army adopted RFID during the Iraq war to track Iraq troops. Not only these, the US Army piloted 4 projects using RFID; identifying material locations, weapons deteriorations, hazardous material tracking, and asset tracking (Anon 2002).

The New York City government also started an RFID e-seal pilot project in the New Jersey Port. Once RFID read and scan the tag, it can identify the contents of the container box. Also, the port of Tacoma and Seattle planned to adopt E-Seals, made of metal bolts with embedded RFID devices to ensure its security (Konsynski and Smith 2003).

Calpatria prison, located in Los Angeles, adopted a prisoner monitoring system using RFID chips in 2000 as the very first pilot using RFID in prison management in United States (Kim 2008). According to regulations of Calpatria prison, all the prison inmates were issued bracelets in which RFID chips were embedded. Since the pilot project at the Calpatria prison was successful, the local government let other prisons in Los Angeles adopt the innovative bracelet. The LA County prison started to use a brand new bracelet in response to the state government’s order; it is reported that through its adoption the prison could increase efficiency and effectiveness and decrease crimes occurred between inmates simultaneously (Nicholas 2008).

For instance, city governments in the Gifu and Osaka prefecture provided RFID tags that can be attached in students’ schoolbags to public elementary schools (Ema and Fujigaki, 2011). Similarly, in Haewoondae beach, one of the most famous vacation spots in South Korea, Busan Metropolitan City provides for parents RFID embedded bracelet that enables tracking exact location of their child by a smart phone (http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&mid=sec&sid1=102&oid=001&aid=0003353674).

This project began in 2002, but it took 3 years to fully implement for all 16 US passports (Meingast et al. 2007). The appearance of the e-passport is very similar to old passports, but woven into the paper of the passport, there is RFID tag that information about owner of the passport is included. Information about nationality, sex, age, and so on is scanned, as airport staff members scan the passport through RFID reader (Lorenc 2007). The US government did not stop at this point and adopted VISA Waiver Program. By 2005, the US member countries had to adopt RFID based e-passports and VISA Waiver Programs in order for their citizens to enter the United States because without e-passports, passengers could not be accepted at American points of entry. Today, the e-passport includes not only individual data but biological data, such as fingerprints (ICAO TAG MRTD/TWF 2004).

E-Government News, “EU Asks US for Time to Issue Biometric Passports”. iDABC European e-Government Services, 1 April, 2005.

For instance, Wicks et al. (2006) reported that this RFID based hospital management system is very effective in reducing management costs because embedded RFID tags can track lost or hidden expensive equipment. Miller (1999) pointed out that the potential of RFID technology can be expanded in tracking the location of patients and controlling the drugs. Also, Chowdhury and Khosla (2007) argued that RFID technology can be effectively used not only in hospital equipment management but also in patient management.

According to statistics published by the Institute of Medicine (IOM), about 44,000 to 98,000 people die in the USA per year because of improper drug administration (Kohn et al. 2000). To rectify this phenomenon, in 2004 the US government and US FDA recommended pharmaceutical industries to implement RFID tags to prevent the production of counterfeit drugs (Wyld, 2005). The Florida state government added legal regulations to this recommendation in 2006. If a pharmaceutical industry located in Florida does not attach RFID embedded tags on its products, it has to face substantial financial penalties (Skinar 2005).

For instance, RFID technology saved Singapore and Taiwan from SARS attack around 2003. Two public hospitals in Singapore in 2003 adopted RFID technology to track staff, patients, and visitors in order to trace people who carried the SARS virus. The RFID information database saved all the data collected from each individual’s RFID tag for 21 days, which was thought to be long enough for expression of SARS virus (Nicholas 2008). A similar process was done in Taiwan too. During the SARS period, five hospitals, including Taipei Veteran’s General Hospital, implemented RFID tags to track patients who had possibility contracted the SARS virus (Kuo et al. 2004) with strong government support.

One peculiar characteristic of this system as compared to other systems is that visually impaired people are both the reader carrier and the service beneficiaries, simultaneously. Generally in government service delivery using RFID technology, the service provider usually carries RFID tag readers and service beneficiaries usually act more passive roles by attaching RFID tags. But in this Pakistani case, the service beneficiaries can identify objects around them by operating RFID tag reader they have.

The Australian government passed legislation on mandatory use of RFID tags in the livestock industry, so Hossain and Quaddus (2014) categorized Australian case as a very rare and special adoption case. According to Trevarthen and Michael (2007)’s case study, one of the Australian farms where the RFID tag is implemented, farmers not only track the exact location of the cows but also check the condition, identify cows and even feed the new born cows automatically by using an RFID system.

Usually people throw waste in various places. They may throw it away at their houses or at work places, like an office. Since the RFID tag is only attached to a garbage can in house, it is impossible to track all types of waste throwing behaviors. Inevitably, this shortage of storage capacity leads to selective waste collection monitoring.

The faraday cage is an object in metal; proponents of this device argue that faraday cage can prevent hacker’s attack because electronic devices are prevented from passing through the object (Ezovski et al. 2007). But speculation about stability of this technology still remains. Lorenc (2007) reported that if there is no additional technology, the faraday cage cannot preserve sensitive security.

As a matter of fact, there are two kinds of RFID tags, the passive tag and the active tag. These two tags provide owners with different benefits and liabilities. Active tags are implemented by a power source, such as small battery. Active tags are more efficient and safe in protecting privacy than passive tags, so sensitive organizations like military prefer active tags to passive tags. But ordinary consumers have less accessibility to active tags because active tags are much more expensive than passive ones (Jensen et al. 2007).

According to Laurie (2007), even without physically losing an RFID tag, private information can be stolen because what’s inside RFID tags can be skimmed quite easily. If we can build a device that enables us to transmit an arbitrary number, invading the internet based database is theoretically possible.

For instance, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Procter & Gamble Co. in autumn 2003 planned a very interesting experiment to check the potential deficiencies of RFID technology. Customers of a Wal-Mart store in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma were secretly tracked through RFID tags while purchasing lipstick that Procter & Gamble Co. made (Barut et al. 2006).

For instance, Hwang et al. (2009) and Numann & Hogben (2009) categorized various kinds of privacy attack cases that can possibly occur. According Hwang et al. (2009), technological deficiency enables hackers to engage in cloning, eavesdropping, replay attack, denial of service, forward security, tag tracing, individual data privacy, and data forging. Specifically, the hacker can read the tag and then clone the tag (cloning), surreptitiously listen to all the communications between and the tag (eavesdropping), repeat or delay the message (replay attack), send large amount of message to break down RFID system (denial of service), compromise a tag (forward security), trace the exact location of the tag (tag tracing), find out shopping trend of the consumer (individual data privacy), and modify information saved on an RFID tag (Data forging). In addition, Numann and Hogben (2008) categorized the privacy attacking cases more briefly. According to their research, the hacker can attack RFID tag in some ways. First, the attacker can open a connection to the chip and can steal the data inside (skimming). Second, the attacker can intercept the communication between tag and reader (eavesdropping). Last, the attacker can track the exact location of the tag or the person.

In Thailand, most of the farms are trying to adopt an RFID system in farm management, but RFID technology is widening the gap between poor and rich farmers. Poor farmers are usually less educated people who have hardly had any experience using digital technology like RFID. On the other hand, well-educated wealthy farmers face low entry barriers and easily adopt the technology. Rich farmers armed with innovative technology not only make enormous fortunes by increasing efficiency but also by replacing poor labors with RFID embedded devices. According to the Thailand Ministry of Labor (2006), most farm labors are afraid of being replaced. Unfortunately, this phenomenon eventually correlates to a serious gap between rich and poor.

The government has invested a huge amount of money to buy necessary devices such as readers, tags, hardware, and so on, but in the long run cost of management will decrease. On the other hand, the waste industry could carry a very heavy debt. The waste contractors have to deal with expensive RFID tag rental and as well as the cost of construction simultaneously. Although this situation is totally unfavorable for them, the waste management industry cannot resist to this policy because the Chinese government is the entity which has made the use of RFID policy and set prices. The industry has no other choice but consent.