Subject: [NEXTEL-1] MIT winds down radio tag activity

From: [email-masked]
Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 23:41:18 -0400

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Subject: [SV_RFID] MIT winds down radio tag activity
From: "Richard M. Smith" <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 22:49:30 -0400

http://news.com.com/2100-1008_3-5095957.html?tag=nefd_top

MIT winds down radio tag activity

Last modified: October 23, 2003, 4:02 PM PDT
By Alorie  <mailto:[email-masked]?subject=FEEDBACK:MIT winds down
radio tag activity> Gilbert 
Staff Writer, CNET News.com

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The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is ending a four-year
collaboration with dozens of blue-chip companies that set out to advance a
new frontier of information technology known as radio frequency
identification. 

The
<http://news.com.com/redir?destUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.autoidcenter.org%2F&site
Id=3&oId=2100-1008-5095957&ontId=7343&lop=nl_ex> Auto-ID Center, the radio
frequency identification (RFID) research group that MIT and its industry
partners formed in 1999, is disbanding its current form at the end of the
month, MIT said. The center was given the task of developing and field
testing a new breed of computer network that can track the location of
everyday objects, such as razors and shoes, through an elaborate system of
radio frequency-emitting microchips and readers. 

Auto-ID Center sponsors, including Coca-Cola, Gillette, Target, Home Depot
and Wal-Mart, have poured about $20 million into the project since its
start, said Kevin Ashton, executive director of the Auto-ID Center. 

The university will continue to do RFID research through a new organization,
called Auto-ID Labs, Ashton said. The former Procter & Gamble executive is
leaving MIT at the end of the month as part of the transition. 

The reason for the change is that RFID technology has advanced to the point
that the next steps of its development, namely the coordination of technical
standards and specifications, go beyond MIT's mission as a research
university, Ashton said. MIT handed off
<http://news.com.com/2100-1017-5069619.html?tag=nl>  the administration of
RFID standards and other duties in September to EPCglobal
<http://news.com.com/redir?destUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.uc-council.org%2Fepcglob
al%2F&siteId=3&oId=2100-1008-5095957&ontId=7343&lop=nl_ex> , a joint venture
of the Uniform Code Council and EAN International, which oversee global bar
code standards. Auto-ID Labs has licensed its RFID technology to EPCglobal
(formerly AutoID Inc.), and the fees from that agreement will fund its
research, Ashton said. 

The winding down of the Auto-ID Center marks the end of a controversial
chapter for the vaunted institution of higher learning. The center drew MIT
into a heated public relations battle this year when Wal-Mart, Gillette and
other Auto-ID sponsors began attaching RFID chips to
<http://news.com.com/2100-1017-979710.html?tag=nl> merchandise sold in
stores, sparking intense criticism from consumer-privacy advocates. 

Worried that RFID could lead to unprecedented levels of consumer
<http://news.com.com/2010-1069-980325.html?tag=nl> surveillance, privacy
activists organized protests and called for boycotts of the companies
testing the technology. 

While acknowledging the privacy implications of RFID as a legitimate issue,
Ashton said he wouldn't do anything differently if he had to do it over
again. 

"It's a very serious issue, and it needs to be addressed very seriously," he
said. "But not all the (media) coverage has been terribly serious, and not
all the criticism has come from terribly serious people." 

One of the most outspoken critics of the Auto-ID Center has been privacy
activist Katherine Albrecht, the head of Consumers
<http://news.com.com/redir?destUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nocards.org&siteId=3&oId
=2100-1008-5095957&ontId=7343&lop=nl_ex> Against Supermarket Privacy
Invasion and Numbering. She called for worldwide boycotts of clothing
<http://news.com.com/2100-1029-995744.html?tag=nl> retailer Benetton and
Gillette after each discussed plans to put RFID chips or "tags" on their
products. Albrecht also criticized the Auto-ID Center for trying to downplay
the privacy concerns over the technology after finding documents on the
group's Web site that contained public relations advice on how to
"neutralize opposition" to RFID systems. 

Albrecht said the center never took her complaints to heart. "The only thing
I have seen is lip service being paid to" these privacy concerns, she said. 

In what may be one of its first concrete steps to address the issue, MIT
plans to hold an RFID privacy workshop next month. Ashton and his colleagues
at the Auto-ID Center helped organize the event, which is sponsored by the
MIT Media Lab and another university department, Ashton said. 

Despite the controversy, major companies are moving ahead with plans to use
RFID systems in stores and in warehouses. Retail giant Wal-Mart, for
instance, has a big RFID project under
<http://news.com.com/2100-1022-1013767.html?tag=nl> way involving hundreds
of its suppliers. And U.K. retailer Marks & Spencer began an RFID trial
<http://news.com.com/2100-1039-5092460.html?tag=nl>  in one of its
London-area stores this month. The shift of RFID out of the halls of
academia indicates it's becoming commercially viable technology, Ashton
said. 

"The thing has gotten too big for the university to handle," he said. "We're
not going away, but the transition to this new organization is recognition
that the (RFID) system is going live." 

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