In the case a maternity ward, an RFID tag is incorporated into the bands that both the parent and infant wear. The system can then determine if an infant leaves the ward without his or her parent and provide notification, such as an alarm, or lock down the doors until the matter is resolved.

The same scenario can be used in theme parks where RFID tags carried by a lost child can allow a parent to pinpoint where the child was last seen.

David: Do you see this as an advantage or as the encroachment of Big Brother?

Martyn: RFID systems like this are not implemented overnight. After discussing the pros and cons with stakeholders, if RFID will enable a process or address an existing issue, then trials happen, and systems evolve.

Many examples as the ones above may use opt-in participation or other methods, with the end result being to get the most out of a system and reduce security concerns, while demonstrating the benefits of the system and gaining trust in it.

I've seen stories around the use of RFID in schools in Asia, but have not read much about it in North America yet.

David: What sorts of RFID applications can be used to increase corporate knowledge and not just generate loads of data?

Martyn: Infrastructure products such as RFID Anywhere focus on letting application developers define what RFID data is important to them, allowing the useless data to be discarded as soon as possible.

For example, if an application only cares when an item enters or leaves a room, the software infrastructure that interfaces with the reader should be able to report on only this data and possibly add more value to it along the way, which takes the burden off the end application to deal with the volumes of raw data.

David: Are there other sensors that work in tandem with RFID? What do they do?

Martyn: We see most RFID deployments requiring additional sensors, whether to increase the performance of RFID, or to help enable further process automation. An infrastructure such as RFID Anywhere is required to integrate all of these sensors together into what is called an "Intelligent Sensor Network."

David: How would environmental sensors, for example proximity sensors and temperature sensors be used in an RFID application?

Martyn: These are used to increase RFID performance. Examples include integrating an RFID reader with a proximity sensor that turns on the RFID reader when a package enters the area, using a temperature sensor to monitor a freezer and if the freezer goes above a certain temperature, using RFID to take an inventory of the freezer and send an alert to the manager.

These sensors are often plugged right in to RFID readers that have general purpose input/output (GPIO) ports.

David: Are there feedback mechanisms, like light stacks, used as well?

Martyn: These simplify the process of giving feedback to a worker based on RFID activity. For example, the system could turn on the red light if the RFID reader didn't read all of the tags it was expecting on an order about to be loaded onto a truck.