Read Any Good RFIDs Lately?

Sez here that some 300 libraries in the U.S. have adopted radio-frequency identification (RFID). The tags help libraries track books, but will they eventually make readers more trackable, too? According to the story, "Privacy advocates fear that books bearing the new tags might make it easy for government agents armed with subpoenas or hackers armed with know-how to find out who is reading what, and when."

The privacy risk is currently low; in fact, there's now more privacy because you can check out books without using a librarian. For the threat to rise, you'll need a world of linked databases and common RFID standards, among other developments.

Thanks to ArtsJournal