“Fingerprinting” RFID Tags
In recent years, RFID tags have been a growing trend in many sectors of business worldwide, as RFID tags have allowed more efficiency out of companies who have begun to use them. RFID tags could soon even be in your passport or drivers license, as they can store such information on small chips that would be scanned at the border or airport upon exit or entry to the United States. Using a new method developed at the University of Arkansas, engineers have found a way to “fingerprint” your RFID tags, allowing you to distinguish originals from clones.
Radio Frequency Identification tags are used in many industries, and provide a wide range of services. RFID tags have been used in hospitals to help monitor patients, in airlines to track luggage, by construction companies to track equipment and so much more.
With all the great things RFID chips have done, and will doing in the months and years to come, there are a few major problems with the RFID solution. One of the biggest issues in the industry is RFID tag security. Hypothetically, lets say you have an RFID chip in your Passport. Contained in that RFID tag could be your name, address, social security info, places traveled and other personal information. Currently, if somebody were trying to steal you identity off a RFID tag, they simply would require basic RFID knowledge, a cheap RFID Tag reader and a computer. From there, the thief could simply look at all of your information, take down what he or she wants or even clone your RFID tag and copy all of your private information onto another copy/clone.
The reason the engineers at Arkansas refer to the system as a fingerprint, is because they have discovered that individual tags are unique, not because of the data or memory they contain, but because of radio-frequency and manufacturing differences.
A passive RFID tag harvests its power from the RFID reader, which in turn sends radio frequency signals to the tag. The tag, which consists of a microchip connected to a radio antenna, communicates back to the reader. Working to determine the best placement of RFID tags on packages, engineers measured tags’ minimum power response at multiple frequencies.
The researchers did this by using an algorithm that repeatedly sent reader-to-tag signals starting at a low power value and increasing the power until the tag responded. Radio frequencies ranged from 903 to 927 megahertz and increased by increments of 2.4 megahertz. These measurements revealed that each tag had a unique minimum power response at multiple radio frequencies. Moreover, power responses were significantly different for same-model tags, which means that even tags of the same make and model containing the same information can still be uniquely identified.
This is an important discovery, as the security of businesses, government/military and consumers needs to always be a top priority, especially for such a growing industry. RFID tags have only become more useful, and will continue to grow more secure and useful.
