The concern for unauthorized access and invasion of privacy are a very real concern; Introduction of RFID tags in our clothing

BY SIMONE J. SMITH

Everything, and I mean everything that you say or write within view of, or earshot of cameras and microphones can and is observed by our government. Our global leaders have the ability to do things like listen to everyone’s phone calls, read texts, read your emails, follow your internet searches, track your location (via GPS in your phone), and remotely activate people’s cell phone cameras and microphones to listen and see what people are doing in real time.

This type of surveillance was foreshadowed in the book 1984, written by Orwell to caution future generations of the dangers of an all-controlling government. Comparisons between Orwell’s novel about a tightly controlled totalitarian future ruled by Big Brother are in fact quite similar to today ‘s world.

It was on June 6^th, 2013, that Americans learned that their government was spying broadly on its own people. That was when The Guardian and The Washington Post published the first of a series of reports put together from documents leaked by Edward Snowden. The material exposed a government-run surveillance program that monitored the communications records of not just criminals or potential terrorists, but law-abiding citizens as well.

He was charged with theft of government property, unauthorized communication of national defence information and wilful communication of classified communications intelligence. Facing up to 30 years in prison, Snowden left the country, originally traveling to Hong Kong and then to Russia to avoid extradition to the U.S., all because he exposed what most people already suspected; that we as citizens of the world have no privacy.

During the Davos meeting in May 2022, the World Economic Forum (WEF) announced its intentions to take tracking a step further; they want to place RFID tags in our clothing.

Radio-frequency identification, or RFID, tags put out a “pulse” that can be read/scanned by an electronic reader. RFID tags are cheap, battery-free and washable, which makes them appealing to developers.

“By attaching these paper-like RFID tags to clothing, we were able to demonstrate millimetre accuracy in skeletal tracking,” says Haojian Jin, a Ph.D. student in CMU’s Human-Computer Interaction Institute. Scientists believe that RFID-embedded clothes could be an alternative to motion tracking devices like the Fitbit. RFID could also surmount camera-based systems like Kinect for controlling avatars in virtual environments.

What is attractive about RFID tags is that on average, they cost less than a dollar. Most smartphones can’t currently read 900 MHz RFID applications, but including that capability in future handsets could unlock a cheap alternative to pricey wearable sensors.

There are some benefits that include: finding lost children, locating elders who have Alzheimer’s disease, processing and tracking employee work hours, and if your personnel work in or around hazardous areas, it’s important to know where your people are at all times.

However, the concern for unauthorized access and invasion of privacy are a very real concern. Nothing in this world is 100% hack proof, and in the last few years, we have seen how the tracking and tracing of global citizens can be extremely dangerous. It is unfortunately another way to control the movement, thoughts, and lives of all of us.