On today’s edition of the NPR program “Day to Day,” I speak with host Madeline Brand about RFIDS — radio frequency ID tags — and the technology’s potential impact on commerce and personal privacy.
Wal-Mart executives are scheduled to meet with some of their top suppliers today to establish RFID compliance standards. Participants in the meeting to be held near Wal-Mart’s Bentonville, Arkansas headquarters are said to include Kraft Foods, Proctor & Gamble, Tyson Foods and Unilever. A number of large IT companies are also expected to be in town for an RFID-related tech event slated for Wednesday, including IBM, Intel, Microsoft, Philips Semiconductor and SAP.
Both Wal-Mart and the US Department of Defense plan to require that their major suppliers implement the wireless tracking technology by early 2005 — a move similar to Wal-Mart’s push for UPC (bar code technology) some two decades ago.
Link to “Day to Day” home, listen to the archived show here after 12PM Pacific.