Coke's RFID-Based Dispensers

Coke's RFID-Based Dispensers Redefine Business Intelligence -- Business Intelligence

Freestyle will let Coke more easily test new drink flavors and new beverage concepts, such as adding various vitamin combinations to flavored waters and juices. The dispensers each contain 30 cartridges of flavorings that mix up 100 different drink combinations. The cartridges are tagged with radio frequency ID chips, and each dispenser contains an RFID reader. The dispensers collect data on what customers are drinking and how much, and transmit that information each night over a private Verizon wireless network to Coke's SAP data warehouse system in Atlanta. The company will use the data to develop reports that assess how new drinks are doing in the market, identify differences in regional tastes, and help fast-food outlets decide which drinks to serve.

privacy advocates worried about RFID security

Radio frequency technologies are put to tests of security - The Boston Globe

The same technological advances that are making personal computers smaller and phones more energy-efficient are turning gadgets that use radio frequency identification, or RFID, into appealing targets for hackers.

Radio frequency chips and antennae, which typically transmit small amounts of data in quick exchanges with reader devices, are used in E-Z Pass systems on highways. Consumers who tap their MasterCard PayPass bank cards on wireless readers are also using RFID technology.

But as radio frequency chips evolve to store more data and to transmit signals over greater distances, the devices can also be coaxed into giving up personal information, specialists say.

Nicole Ozer, technology and civil liberties policy director at the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California, is among the privacy advocates worried about RFID security. Ozer said an RFID-enabled passport card issued by the Department of Homeland Security and the State Department, called US Passport Card, is vulnerable to wireless attacks.