What's All The Fuss About Anyway?

      RFID stands for Radio Frequency Identification, an evolving technology based on communication between wireless tags and readers. A good example of a tag: one of the ubiquitous plastic objects mounted on a car or truck windshield for automated toll payment. The corresponding reader in that case is the wireless toll plaza device that collects information from the tag.
      RFID has had a dramatic impact on toll operations, particularly in the Northeast where E-ZPass has eliminated once intractable toll plaza traffic jams as well as many toll-collecting jobs.
      For the most part, toll collection RFID involves what are called passive or read-only tags that simply provide the identity of the vehicle and corresponding toll payment account. Wal-Mart took things one step further, requiring vendors to provide active – or read-write – tags.
      Active tags allow Wal-Mart to read the tag on delivery, of course, and also to write information to the tag. That information can then be read further along the supply chain. An active tag carries a history of an item through the Wal-Mart supply chain.
      RFID advocates foresee an international logistics system in which virtually everything is tagged – every piece of merchandise, carton and envelope – and can be tracked through universally compatible transponders at manufacturing plants, warehouses, truck terminals, airports and even along highways.