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RFID Guardian: A Battery-Powered Mobile Device for RFID Privacy Management

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Information Security and Privacy (ACISP 2005)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNSC,volume 3574))

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Abstract

RFID tags are tiny, inexpensive, inductively powered computers that are going to replace bar codes on many products, but which have many other uses as well. For example, they will allow smart washing machines to check for incompatible clothes (e.g., white shirts and red socks) and smart refrigerators to check for milk that is too old to be consumed. Subdermal tags with medical information are already being implanted in animals and people. However, a world in which practically everything is tagged and can be read at a modest distance by anyone who wants to buy an RFID reader introduces serious security and privacy issues. For example, women walking down the street may be effectively broadcasting the sizes of their RFID-tagged bras and medical data without realizing it. To protect people in this environment, we propose developing a compact, portable, electronic device called an RFID Guardian, which people can carry with them. In the future, it could be integrated into PDAs or cell phones. The RFID Guardian looks for, records, and displays all RFID tags and scans in the vicinity, manages RFID keys, authenticates nearby RFID readers, and blocks attempted accesses to the user’s RFID tags from unauthorized readers. In this way, people can find out what RFID activity is occuring around them and take corrective action if need be.

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© 2005 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Rieback, M.R., Crispo, B., Tanenbaum, A.S. (2005). RFID Guardian: A Battery-Powered Mobile Device for RFID Privacy Management. In: Boyd, C., González Nieto, J.M. (eds) Information Security and Privacy. ACISP 2005. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 3574. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/11506157_16

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/11506157_16

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-540-26547-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-540-31684-8

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

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