Industry awareness of RFID's positive impact on retail growing

RFID technology is fueling sales growth across the retail map, enabling sellers to pinpoint exactly where inventory needs replenishment. Target has been particularly successful with RFID technology, applying the tech to inventory replenishment. Apparel in particular has benefited, allowing the popular retailer to enhance operational efficiencies and better cost management. Macy's is another retailer experiencing success with RFID. The department store intended to fit all inventory with RFID tags b y the end of 2016, an ambitious project that will likely pay off in terms of lean inventory as well as ease of inventory replenishment.

Global RFID in Healthcare Market Set to Grow Exponentially

North America, followed by Europe, has the largest market for RFID in healthcare due to government initiatives, major drug counterfeit events and rise in need for reducing cost and increasing operational efficiency in healthcare sector in this region. Asia is expected to show high growth rate in the RFID in healthcare market in next few years due to low cost of original equipment manufacturing (OEM) services provided by china and rise in adoption of RFID systems in healthcare in the region.

Rise in demand for RFID in healthcare sector for increasing operational efficiency, growing concern about drug counterfeit and safety, government initiatives, increasing need for reducing operational cost in healthcare and rise in incidence of medical device theft cases are driving the market for RFID in healthcare. In addition, a large number of applications of RFID in healthcare are driving the market for RFID in healthcare.

However, lack of awareness about RFID, installed base of barcode systems and lack of standardization are some of the factors restraining the growth for global RFID in healthcare market.

Growing demographics and economies in the developing countries such as China and India and low cost of RFID component such as original equipment manufacturing (OEM) services provided by China are expected to offer good opportunities in RFID in healthcare market in Asia. In addition, broader application of RFID technology in healthcare and rise in need for innovation in RFID technologies are expected to offer new opportunities for global RFID in healthcare market. Increasing number of mergers and acquisitions and rise in number of collaborations and partnerships are some of the trends that have been observed in global RFID in healthcare market.

KOAMTAC Debuts KDC270 Bluetooth Barcode Scanner For iOS, Android And Windows Smart Devices

The KDC270 is a next generation barcode scanner with cutting-edge CCD, Laser, and Imager scan engines available. This new scanner features a clean design, vibration setting to enhance silent mode, and a wider range of operating and storage temperatures than older KDC models. Five power stages allow for extended operating time of up to several weeks once fully charged; a backup battery allows seamless real-time clock operation. The KDC270 comes with 8MB memory allowing for more than 400,000 UPC product barcodes in data collection mode or more than 60,000 records in database mode. The KDC270 comes in Bluetooth HID, SPP, and MFi modes as well as USB HID mode allowing for connection to any smart device..

Honeywell announces patent suit against Code Corp. over barcode scanners

On Thursday, January 19th, multinational engineering and manufacturing firm Honeywell of Morris Plains, NJ, announced that it had filed a patent infringement suit against electrical equipment manufacturer Code Corp. of Draper, UT. The suit targets barcode scanning products manufactured and marketed by Code; Honeywell alleges that these scanners practice technology covered by its patents.

New Handheld RFID Readers Locate Tags Within Centimeters

This month, RFID reader technology company AsReader, Inc. released a new handheld reader with a 10-meter (33-foot) read range, which is available in two different models, ASR250G and ASR251G. Firmware from RFLocus enables users to not only interrogate an ultrahigh-frequency (UHF) RFID tag, but also identify in 3D where that tag is located in relation to the reader, within a matter of centimeters. The ASR250G is designed to be small and low in cost, the company reports. The handheld employs Apple iPhone- or Android-based devices, connected to the reader, to enable operation with an app.

Rail passengers pilot Bluetooth and geolocation service for ticket-free travel

Passengers on UK rail company Chiltern Railways will soon be able to travel without tickets using a service integrating a mobile app with Bluetooth and geolocation services, which will track commuters throughout their journey, give them access through ticket barriers and automatically charge them the best price for the route taken. Arriva UK Trains is piloting the service in collaboration with technology provider SilverRail Technologies on its new route between Oxford Parkway and London Marylebone.

Jubilee Launches Voters Smart Card

Jubilee Party on Friday launched a smart card as a measure to ensure credible recruitment of members and deal with challenges involved during political party primaries. The launch was led by Party leader President Uhuru Kenyatta and his deputy William Ruto. The smart card will be used to access polling stations by party members, verified and authenticated using a smart phone before one can vote.

RFID Consortium Announces Patent Portfolio License to Convergence Systems Limited

The RFID Consortium announced it has entered into a Patent Portfolio License with Convergence Systems Limited (CSL). Through the RFID Consortium, CSL has access to an international portfolio of essential UHF RFID patents for its RFID tags, readers, antennas, modules and other hardware.

"By licensing the patent portfolio from the RFID Consortium, CSL is taking advantage of a centralized and cost-effective method for obtaining rights under multiple patents held by all of our Members," said Alan Melling, a spokesperson for the RFID Consortium. "CSL joins other major licensees including 3M and Zebra Technologies in accessing a portfolio of patents to allow it to build leading-edge RFID products and solutions. In addition, CSL is now permitted to use the Consortium logo on its RFID products. The Consortium logo on a product assures customers that the product is properly licensed through the Consortium."

"The RFID Consortium license offers a streamlined method for CSL to access UHF RFID technologies critical to the development of our RFID solutions portfolio. This license provides peace of mind to our customers in all vertical markets we serve, including logistics, supply chain, manufacturing, pharmaceutical, access control, transportation, retail and military," said Jerry Garrett, Managing Director of Convergence Systems Limited.

The RFID Consortium promotes adoption of UHF RFID by offering vendors access to patents essential to practice the UHF RFID Standards announced by EPCglobal and ISO (International Organization for Standardization) at a reasonable cost. This licensing program is intended to provide predictability and stability as well as facilitate the widespread adoption of UHF RFID technology, which improves efficiency in shipping, inventory management, and other applications, providing significant benefits to manufacturers, retailers, and consumers. RFID Consortium members include 3M Innovative Properties Company; ETRI; LG Electronics, Inc.; and Zebra Technologies Corporation.

Photo Maschinenjunge 

Bizerba Adds Digimarc Barcode to Boost Business Efficiencies

Digimarc Corporation (DMRC) announced that Bizerba, a provider of weighing, slicing and labeling technology, has integrated Digimarc Barcode into its retail scale labels. The benefits of this innovative technology will include increased productivity at checkout, the reduction of barcode swapping, and improved customer engagement.

Digimarc Barcode is a unique data carrier that can be applied across the entire surface, including in the background of text areas. Thus, it can be incorporated into deli or bakery labels without taking up space like traditional barcodes. These Digimarc Barcodes support GS1 application identifiers such as price, weight and sell-by date commonly used with variable measure fresh food items like meat, cheese, seafood and prepared foods.

Digimarc Barcodes replace space-consuming DataBar codes, allowing retailers to easily transition to GS1 Application Identifiers without disrupting label designs or using additional label media. The space efficiency of Digimarc Barcodes can help retailers save money on label media costs, because they need to use less label printer paper each year. Use of Digimarc technology reduces read failures at checkout because Digimarc Barcodes can be scanned at any angle, and are not susceptible to tears, wrinkles, stains or smudges. And because Digimarc Barcodes can cover the entirety of printed labels, instances of fraud from label swapping are lessened considerably. Customers can also scan the labels with smartphones to access a wide range of potential content, such as cooking instructions, nutritional information and in-store coupons.

Digimarc Barcodes will be available as an optional feature for Bizerba KH, KH II, XC and MC class system scales sold in North America. Learn more about Digimarc Barcode at https://www.digimarc.com/products/discover/barcode. 

Analysts tip mobile payment market to hit $3T by 2022

The global mobile payments industry is set to be worth $3.39 trillion by 2022 driven by markets in Asia Pacific, Allied Market Research predicted. The US-based research company forecast the sector will continue to be led by SMS and WAP-based payment systems. However, it added an increase in the number of NFC Point of Sale terminals and campaigns driven by large players providing mobile wallet services will also provide robust growth to this segment.

St. Paul recycling bins contain controversial tracking chip

There's something inside St. Paul's new recycling bins that residents may not have realized: a tracking chip. While the chip has proven controversial elsewhere, St. Paul says it isn't using it to monitor recycling. Still, civil liberty advocates have concerns. The tiny electronic chips, known as RFID or radio frequency identification, allow recycling equipment to scan and identify the cart by passing a detector nearby.

How the barcode changed retailing and manufacturing

In 1948, N Joseph Woodland - a graduate student at the Drexel Institute in Philadelphia - was pondering a challenge from a local retailer: how to speed up the tedious process of checking out in his stores by automating transactions. A smart young man, Woodland - known as Joseph - had worked on the Manhattan Project during the War, and had designed a better system for playing elevator music. But he was stumped. Then, sitting on Miami Beach while visiting his parents, his fingertips idly combing through the sand, a thought struck him. Just like Morse code used dots and dashes to convey a message, he could use thin lines and thick lines to encode information.

Avery Dennison Enables Omnichannel Success With RFID Technology at NRF 2017

Avery Dennison Retail Branding and Information Solutions (RBIS) and RFID solutions will attend the 2017 National Retail Federation’s (NRF) Annual Convention and EXPO. The company will host an Exhibitor Insights discussion with performance brands lululemon and adidas on how RFID is a key enabler in omnichannel success and will showcase its latest innovations in RFID solutions, Janela Smart Product Solutions, designer partnerships, and its printer products series.

Through its RFID innovations, Avery Dennison is enabling the connection between the physical and digital worlds, connecting products with the internet of things to improve consumer omnichannel experience.

“The entire shopping experience is strongly impacted by product availability,” said Francisco Melo, vice president and general manager, Global RFID, Avery Dennison. “As the physical and digital worlds continue to merge, consumers expect a seamless experience across all channels. RFID not only improves inventory accuracy and visibility, it also enables item-level consumer engagement to transform the retail experience and build a consistent engagement platform both online and offline.”

Ekster convenient wallet can be tracked

Ever lost your wallet? It has to be be one of the worse feelings. Not only is your money there, but it is also home to your driver license, IDs, credit/debit cards and other crucial belongings. Arguably the coolest feature in the Ekster 2.0 wallet is the fact that it can be easily tracked with Tile Smart Location Technology. The wallet will sync with your smartphone via Bluetooth. If it happens to be misplaced, the user can easily find its last seen location in a map.

Techddi.com introduces Barcode Generator for Mac OS X

Barcode maker software plays important role in various organizations to generate barcode labels for labeling on products and manage inventory control in computerized way. If you are using Mac OS X system and searching Barcode Software for Mac, your search ends here. Techddi.com Company launched Barcode Generator for Mac OS X with advance technology to create barcode labels with different barcode font symbologies as per industrial requirement. Mac barcode maker software is useful for small as well as large business organizations including Retail, Shipping, Distribution, Inventory, manufacturing, Warehousing, Post Office, Banks, Healthcare and other organizations.

Mac barcode label maker software provides complete solution to generate and print barcode labels, stickers, coupons, rolls and tags as per industrial need. Software easily installs on all latest versions of Mac OS X including Leopard OS X 10.5, Snow Leopard OS X 10.6, Lion OS X 10.7, Mountain Lion OS X 10.8, Mavericks OS X 10.9, Yosemite OS X 10.10, El Capitan OS X 10.11, Sierra OS X 10.12 and other. Mac barcode design software provid advance Batch Processing Series feature to generate multiple barcode labels with different barcode value, barcode header and barcode footer value. Software facilitates to set barcode properties using General Settings, Font Settings and Color Settings. 

Winning and losing with RFID

As with any new technology, RFID has areas of tremendous success and places where it may not be as functional. One success story is in the apparel industry, where research firm IDTechEx predicts 4.6 billion RFID labels will be used in 2016. And that’s a market penetration of only 15 percent. The technology works for clothing because of the wide range of colours, sizes and styles, which are incredibly hard to track through the supply chain any other way. Stock accuracy can be as high as 95 percent, minimizing costly out of stock situations, which in the world of ‘fast fashion’ can be deadly to a brand. But while RFID has been influential in supply chain management and is key to current market trends, there are places where it just doesn’t add value.

CDTA launches smartcard payment program

The Capital District Transportation Authority unveiled a new smartcard program that enables customers to load cash onto their card and then tap it to pay their fare. Called Navigator, the program will be expanded later this year to enable people to use it on their phones. "Our Navigator smartcard prepayment system is changing the way the Capital Region looks at transit," said David Stackrow, chairman of CDTA's board of directors. "After a year of field testing, we're happy to announce CDTA's Navigator is ready to hit the streets."

Coming to Wells Fargo: Card-free ATMs

You'll soon be able to take cash out of a Wells Fargo ATM without using a card. Starting this spring, customers can use their smartphones to withdraw money. Here's how it will work: You'll log in to the Wells Fargo (WFC) app and request an eight-digit access code. At the kiosk, you'll enter the access code and your regular ATM code to start the transaction.

Starting this spring, customers can use their smartphones to withdraw money.

Here's how it will work: You'll log in to the Wells Fargo (WFC) app and request an eight-digit access code. At the kiosk, you'll enter the access code and your regular ATM code to start the transaction.

Code to Launch the CR950, an Aggressive 2D Barcode Reader

The CR950 is an easy-to-use, entry-level barcode reader that rapidly decodes 1D and 2D barcodes, including PDF417 and QR barcodes, while outperforming single-line laser scanners and linear imagers with full omnidirectional barcode reading.

Furthermore, with Code's 2D Revolution decoding platform, the CR950 can quickly read barcodes printed on highly reflective driver licenses and mobile device screens to speed up in-store credit applications and loyalty program workflows.

The CR950 provides this tremendous value with the same lightweight ruggedness customers have come to expect from Code. And as with all Code readers, the CR950 is designed to be ready-to-use, right out of the box for seamless integration to any POS or other data entry system.

Scandit, which replaces barcode scanners with phones, closes $7.5M

For some reason Swiss startups have gained a good reputation in enterprise, SAAS, fintech and logistics — and nowhere is this better represented than in Scandit which emerged from Zurich a few years ago. Their idea was simple enough. Use a smartphone camera to capture barcodes instead of an expensive proprietary scanner, and wrap a suite of hardware and software around it. Here they are demoing it to us in 2012. But now, as you can see from this video, the tech has reached incredible levels of accuracy.
It’s not much of a surprise then that they’ve closed a $7.5m Series A funding round with London-based VC Atomico.

TechUK launches framework to build public trust in the IoT

Industry association techUK has launched a set of high level principles designed to help build public confidence in the internet of things (IoT), partly in response to a number of high-profile incidents that have seen IoT devices and sensors compromised and co-opted into botnets by cyber criminals. The programme, Trust Principles in an IoT World, is designed to serve as a simple framework for businesses and developers to create greater consumer confidence in the IoT and help it grow, said techUK.

Novanta to Acquire the RFID Assets of Trimble

Novanta Inc. has reached an agreement to acquire the assets of ThingMagic, a division of Trimble, for $20 million in cash.  The transaction, subject to customary closing conditions, is expected to close in the first quarter of 2017.  

ThingMagic, based in Woburn, Massachusetts, provides Ultra High Frequency (UHF) RFID Reader Modules and Finished RFID Solutions to original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) in the medical and advanced industrial markets. ThingMagic's business operations and product offering will be combined with the Company's JADAK business. 

The transaction is expected to be immediately accretive to Novanta's operating cash flow and non-GAAP earnings per share on a full year pro forma basis. ThingMagic's actual revenue and earnings contribution to Novanta's 2017 financial results will depend on the ultimate date of the closing of the transaction, among other factors.       

Headquartered in Syracuse, New York, JADAK is a market leading provider of embedded data collection and printing solutions for medical OEMs serving the healthcare and life science markets. JADAK has a wide array of data collection products and services, including machine vision, RFID, bar code scanning, and thermal printers that help customers solve unique inspection, tracking, scanning and documenting challenges. JADAK has established itself as a strategic partner for today's top healthcare companies through its flexible, customer centric approach and its wide range of capabilities.

How Zebra Technologies might save the department store

E-commerce is squeezing conventional retailers hard. But their struggle is a business opportunity for Zebra Technologies. One of the few ways that brick-and-mortar merchants like Macy's or Sears think they can at least slow the loss of sales to Amazon is to let customers order online but pick up or return merchandise in their stores. To do that, retailers have to know exactly what's on the shelf in their stores at all times. That's where Zebra comes in. The company, best known for bar-code labels used to tag everything from jeans to hospital patients, also sells RFID equipment that stores can use for real-time inventory.

Apple Granted an RFID Tag Microchip Integration Design Patent

Apple's Senior VP of worldwide marketing Phil Schiller introduced the iPhone 7 on September seventh and informed us that they had added Felica, Japan's version of NFC, to the iPhone 7 and Apple Watch Series 2. In October Apple's CEO tested out the technology in Japan when taking a ride on the Yamanote Line railway. Felica uses NFC-F technology which is a faster form of RFID with Type B communications. Today we learn that Apple was granted a patent for an RFID tag and microchip integration design. The technology was gained through LuxVue Technology, a company they acquired back in 2014. Whether today's patent is used in Apple's iPhone today or this is something for the future is unknown at this time, but the patent does reference Japan's faster RFID standard.

Whirlpool's new microwave oven is a foolproof solution for culinarily-challenged kitchen dummies

For one reason or another, some people refuse to learn even the most basic culinary skills, resigning themselves to a life of burnt toast, artery-clogging takeaways and regular bouts of salmonella. Now, Whirlpool has created a solution that means even biggest kitchen dummy has no excuse for fluffing their next meal. The manufacturer of kitchen appliances has created a new smartphone app called Scan-to-Cook, which lets users scan in the barcode of pre-packaged ready meals and have the precise cooking instructions sent straight to the oven or microwave. This means even the responsibility for setting the right temperature and timing the cooking time is taken out of the diner's hands.

Mojix Brings Transformational RFID, Big Data Analytics and Blockchain Technology to NRF Retails Big Show 2017

Mojix, Inc. will showcase hands-free RFID, inventory analytics and blockchain technology solutions at the National Retail Federation (NRF) Big Show in New York City on January 15-17 at the Jacob K Javits Convention Center. Located on Level 1 in booth #526 and Level 3 in Microsoft booth #2803, Mojix will highlight RFID-based real-time inventory solutions that provide retailers with higher revenue and margins, omni-channel excellence, better customer service, and a more efficient supply chain.

Mojix will be introducing TurboAntenna, an advanced RFID antenna that enables, for the first time, real-time, hands-free inventory for retailers. TurboAntenna solves the hardest challenges of RFID in retail by eliminating employee compliance issues with handhelds (exacerbated by a 60% employee turnover rate) and solving the ?static tag problem" that results from thousands of non-moving RFID tags. TurboAntenna significantly enhances the performance of hands-free RFID, delivering not only sales lift, but extending the benefits to include better customer service, more competitive omni-channel execution and streamlined in-store operations.

Mojix is also announcing the availability of its new Retail Task Management App. This exciting new tool helps retailers increase sales by using RFID data to trigger and streamline tasks such as replenishment. Available to users of Mojix's OmniSenseRF Inventory Service, the Task Management App runs on iOS or Android devices carried by employees, notifying them when action is needed and providing an elegant and simple interface to prioritize high-value items and streamline execution. The App supports multiple scenarios, including basic replenishment and ?hot replenishment," when some SKUs are out-of-stock and a new shipment arrives. The App syncs with the Mojix ViZix IoT Software Platform that managers can use to get up-to-the-minute status on inventory and replenishment performance at the SKU, department or store level.

Bosch Dev Kit to Ease IoT

At the Consumer Electronics Show German company Bosch Sensortec  tried to demonstrate its prowess by introducing a fistful of innovative applications and IoT enablers for original equipment manufacturer (OEM) devices featuring mobility, logistics and Industry 4.0. One premier proof-of-concept device was a cigarette-lighter sized Retrofit eCall IoT that plugs right-in to the cigarette lighter hole (usually called the auxiliary power jack) present on every car. This IoT module turns any vehicle (whose driver has a Bluetooth-equipped smartphone) into a GM-like On-Star or Ford-like Sync equipped vehicle including roadside service, emergency dispatch and even concierge services like finding restaurants and booking hotels.

B.O.S.’ RFID Received an Order for an RFID System from One of the Biggest Public Libraries in Israel

B.O.S. Better Online Solutions Ltd. a announced today that its RFID and Mobile Division won a bid for the integration and installation of an RFID system in one of the biggest public libraries in Israel. The order amounts to approximately $250,000 and the system will be installed in 2017.

The system is comprised of automatic self-service stations, staff stations, security gates, and RFID tags that are affixed to the books. The system was developed by Bibliotheca. BOS will be responsible for the integration and installation of the system and the conversion of the existing barcode tags into RFID tags.

NHS barcode project aimed at improving patient safety

Six NHS trusts piloting a barcode system for tracking patients, devices and staff are showing promising signs of improving patient safety, the Department of Health says. The Department of Health claimed that its £12 million ‘scan4safety’ project could save lives and up to £1 billion in the next seven years. The savings and safety benefits are based the assumption that barcoding and other auto-ID technologies are taken up systematically across the NHS.

Deutsche Telekom shuts down NFC SIM-based mobile payments service in Germany

Deutsche Telekom has discontinued its NFC-based MyWallet mobile payment service in Germany, citing a lack of customer use and doubts over whether a SIM-based solution is going to be adopted as a standard in light of “internationally competing companies” investing heavily in competing approaches. Customers are not accepting the system as we had hoped they would and our customer numbers have been in the low tens of thousands, the mobile network operator told NFC World.

RFID tags help Berendsen turn IoT to its advantage

Mention the Internet of Things (IoT) and the images conjured up are sensors on lamp posts or assembly lines being constantly monitored. Bed sheets and pillows cases less so. However, for textile management firm Bernedsen IoT is now core to its operations, helping it track the millions of items of laundry it processes every day for hotels, restaurants and hospitals up and down the UK. With so many customers the firm is on a constant cycle of receiving dirty items, cleaning them, and shipping them out again, in what the industry dubs the "linen cycle".

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Because we rely on advertising to fund our journalism, please disable any ad blockers from running on V3, then reload the page to see the rest of this content. You can find more information about this here.With so many customers the firm is on a constant cycle of receiving dirty items, cleaning them, and shipping them out again, in what the industry dubs the "linen cycle".

Volkswagen targets mobile payments business with parking service deal

Volkswagen Financial Services AG, the financial services division of German vehicle manufacturer Volkswagen Group, has bought mobile payment platform PayByPhone to highly increase its involvement in mobile payments around the world and to establish a 'separate business field around the theme of parking'. At the moment, parking procedures and their billing are often cumbersome, time-consuming and a sore point in many cities throughout Europe and the world, says Christian Dahlheim from Volkswagen Financial Services AG.

AT&T strengthens Internet of Things (IoT) offerings with Gemalto’s remote subscription management solution

Gemalto is supplying AT&T with a remote subscription management solution that will help enable its customers to deploy new and highly secure IoT applications in the U.S. and globally.

Gemalto’s  LinqUS On-Demand Connectivity (ODC) subscription management solution and GSMA M2M 3.1 compliant Embedded SIMs (eSIMs) will simplify the logistics of providing mobile services for Enterprises requiring global mobile connectivity for IoT applications and provide improved life cycle support for their subscriptions.

Gartner, the information technology research firm, reports the IoT ecosystem is growing massively, with 6.4 billion objects to be connected in 2016 and 20.8 billion connected by 2020. Gemalto’s GSMA-compliant ODC and eSIM solutions are key enablers for global mobile operators, service providers, and OEMs to accelerate new device onboarding and service rollouts while reducing costs, increasing revenue and security for businesses adopting IoT solutions.

What Does 2017 Hold for the Internet of Things?

The Internet of Things (IoT), which links mobile devices, wearables, home automation devices, cars, and other gadgets to each other and the cloud, is frequently considered the next big growth market for hardware and software makers. Cisco estimates that the number of connected devices worldwide will double from 25 billion in 2015 to 50 billion by 2020. That's why chipmakers like Intel and Qualcomm launched new low-power chips for IoT devices, and networking leaders like Cisco and Juniper Networks added IoT features to their networking hardware and software. Looking ahead into 2017, the battle over the IoT market will likely heat up as these companies expand their hardware and software ecosystems.

Trade group releases new specs for NFC devices

The NFC Forum has announced the availability of three adopted and one candidate technical specifications, following approval by the board of directors. The specifications are available on the NFC Forum website. Significant enhancements to these specifications include the addition of Active Communication Mode for Peer-to-Peer Mode communication, support of NFC-V technology compatible with ISO/IEC 15693 and the introduction of the NFC-V-based Type 5 tag allowing NFC devices to communicate with a broader range of devices and tags.

Scientists to Discard RFID Technology Used in Passports, Credit Cards from Being Hacked

The technology, which allows fast, automated identification of physical objects, is also a staple for many industries – factories and warehouses use it to track inventory and manage supply chains, pharmaceutical companies deploy it to track drugs, and courier services use it to tag deliveries. “A security breach in RFID applications would leak valuable information about physical objects to unauthorised parties,” said Li Yingjiu, associate professor at the Singapore Management University (SMU), reports The Business Standard. Security breaches can easily occur because RFID technology sends information to the electronic RFID readers and therefore, hackers can easily access or meddle with the information.

Responding to disaster with IoT and SDN mesh

Communication is always important, but during a disaster it becomes paramount. Hard phone lines are an afterthought, if they’re still standing. If phone lines go down, we’re left with cellular networks that quickly become overloaded. Indeed, the internet is the backbone of contemporary communications, from email and Twitter to Instagram and WhatsApp. If we suffer an internet outage, we’re at a loss for how to communicate with the connected world. It takes time to implement these provisional solutions. The equipment needs to be transported, deployed and initialized.

Oxigen plans to launch single QR code to achieve interoperability with banks

Oxigen services Pvt Ltd is planning to launch a single Quick Response (QR) code between Visa, MasterCard, Rupay and itself by the first week of January, with the aim of achieving interoperability with banks. The QR code will be deployed in 50,000 to 1 lakh outlets across 50 major towns in India. Using the QR code, a merchant will be able to accept payments from Oxigen, Visa, MasterCard or Rupay users. There will be no need for separate QR codes for different entities.

An interoperable QR code to make payments more easy t

Visa, Mastercard and Rupay are all set to launch a quick response (QR) codebased application that would enable merchants accept payments from customer's mobile phone without the bulky, expensive point of sales (PoS) machines. At a time when mobile wallet companies are going on a blitzkrieg onboarding merchants to accept QR code-based payments, the biggest hindrance for customers is that these codes are not read across all wallet applications.

Here comes Citi Pay

Citi is going the Chase Pay route with mobile payments and has introduced a standalone digital wallet app called Citi Pay. Citi will make Citi Pay available to all of its customers for online and in-app purchases, thanks to a partnership with MasterCard and the network’s Masterpass service. Customers with an Android device will have the ability to make in-store purchases via NFC at contactless point-of-sale terminals. Citi Pay is not available as an iOS app.

Smart card for city buses in Sambalpur

Pre-paid smart card cards will be introduced for (Indian) city bus commuters by March. Chief executive officer of paschim Odisha paribahan company Bipin Bhatia said it would provide a cashless commuting experience. The commuters can purchase the card from the office of the company that will be set up at the newly-established modern bus terminus in Ainthapali. The commuters can scan the card in a device handled by the conductor to deduct the exact fare for the journey.

My Nintendo Gives Members Check In QR Codes

Ahead of the North American Nintendo Switch Preview Tour, Nintendo has updated the My Nintendo website. Each member of My Nintendo can now find a Check In section under his or her account information. Here, people can find a custom QR code tied to the account. My Nintendo member benefits will be offered to people who present the QR code and use it to check in at such an event.

Rebecca Minkoff Brings Self-Service to Its SoHo Store With RFID

Luxury handbag and accessories retailer Rebecca Minkoff is piloting a radio frequency identification-based self-checkout system that allows customers at its New York store to select an accessory they want, make a purchase on an Apple iPad and unlock that item's security tag so that they can leave the store without having to wait in line. The solution is provided by technology startup QueueHop in a display unit modified by Rebecca Minkoff to match the store's aesthetics. The solution consists of the self-checkout unit, which features an RFID interrogator to read a product's hard tag, an iPad mounted on the wall to accept credit-card purchases, and a slot in which the hard tag can be read via another RFID reader. The tag can then be removed after the purchase.

Researcher Develops Better Safeguards For RFID Technology

The feel-safe quotient with radio-frequency identification technology that spread in credit cards, passports, and office passes may become a chimera if the thin layer of security is breached by hackers. The technology, already a staple of industries, serving well for automated identification of physical objects and warehouses including supply chains, can also be abused. Reflecting the concern over the consequences of RFID technology being compromised, a Singapore-based academic has proposed a wider review of security protocols in the expanding technology.