Among the presentations that raised eyebrows at the recent DefCon convention in Las Vegas was one from RFID Guardian: A portable device that "offers personal RFID security and privacy management for people," as the Website of the RFID Guardian Project puts it.


In other words, the RFID Guardian can detect RFID tags and readers in the immediate vicinity and emulate tags, and then spoof RFID readers into believing that there tags present when there are none, or that there are no tags when they're actually present.



Developed by a team led by Melanie Rieback, a Ph.D. student at Vrije University in the Netherlands, the Guardian is currently in the prototype stage. But Rieback, an American doing her graduate work under Professor Andrew Tanenbaum of Vrije, definitely sees it as the forerunner of a consumer device.

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RFID chips for migrant workers in the US?


VeriChip chairman Scott Silverman's appearance on American TV this week has raised fears of the introduction of RFID technology.


According to RNIF, he "bandied about the idea of chipping foreigners on national television Tuesday".


RINF said Silverman appeared to be emboldened by the Bush Administration call to know "who is in our country and why they are here". He told Fox & Friends that the VeriChip could be used to register guest workers, verify their identities as they cross the border, and

"be used for enforcement purposes at the employer level". He added: "We have talked to many people in Washington about using it..."

There's a long journey between having a lobbyist wittering on Fox & Friends, and any policy decision, even if former Homeland Security boss Tommy Thompson sits on the Verichip board - but the story shows the level of anxiety about radio frequency ID chips in society generally.


In Europe, according to the Financial Times,

"the EU's information society commissioner, Viviane Reding, wants a debate about the security and privacy issues surrounding RFID".

That's a preparation for an e-privacy review this year. But the real story, suggests the FT, is the discovery that RFID really isn't ready for prime time.

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