Time to Buy a New Shirt, Dave

By Mark Baard

02:00 AM Apr. 18, 2005 PT

CHICAGO -- Consumer retailers and manufacturers this week promised 
to help shoppers disable or discard the radio tags attached to their
purchased items in coming years -- if that's what shoppers really
want.

The companies are trying to appease consumer and privacy advocates,
who worry that the data gathered from radio-frequency identification
tags -- item descriptions and unique ID codes -- will be married with
shoppers' personal data, making the tags into tracking devices for
marketers, thieves and, possibly, the government. 

The companies, chiefly retailers and their suppliers, say they will
self-enforce policies requiring them to inform consumers whenever the
tags are present on packaging or within products. Some technology
firms, such as IBM, are also making devices known as kill machines
that will be able to disable the tags after checkout.

But the companies appear to want consumers to keep RFID tags attached
to their clothes and other items, to make them available to internet-
connected reader devices in stores, homes and on the street. That way,
companies like Wal-Mart, Target and Best Buy can pitch new products to
consumers based on what they are wearing or carrying, wherever the
companies find them.

Shoppers who keep the tags will be able to easily return items for
refunds and credit, even if they lose their receipts. Retailers can
match each RFID tag to a customer's loyalty card or credit account
number used at the time of purchase, said Joseph Tobolski, an
associate partner at Accenture Technology Labs in Chicago. 

(snip)

Accenture has dubbed its vision for RFID-enabled marketing "silent
commerce." The company's Silent Commerce Center, which Tobolski heads,
is one of several research groups worldwide developing kiosks, store
shelves, medicine cabinets and even bedroom armoires that read the
RFID tags on purchased goods and offer consumers new products to go
along with them.

Keeping the RFID tags in working order is in the consumer's best
interest, said Tobolski and others who attended an RFID industry
conference in Chicago last week. Furnishings and appliances throughout
future "smart" homes and stores will read the RFID tags on purchased
goods to ensure consumers never run out of milk or medicine, or even
walk out the door wearing the wrong tie, the industry representatives
said.

Accenture has several silent commerce projects in the works, all of
which combine RFID readers with internet-connected phones and other
systems. In the "real world showroom" (an Accenture scenario),
shoppers with RFID-equipped mobile phones can buy nearly anything 
they point their devices at, from neckties to used cars. 

(snip)

Full article at Wired News ...
http://wired-vig.wired.com/news/privacy/0,1848,67237,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_5

Cheers, Steve...

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