Ever dreamed about doing shopping without waiting for the salesperson to scan all products with a barcode reader? And moreover all your products gets recorded within a matter of seconds, you get your invoice, pay and move on. You're not far from the time when you will be actually experiencing this. RFIDs have made it possible to tag anything in the world with wire-less technology and hence no physical or visual contacts required to identify things. In Pakistan, not many people are familiar with RFIDs whereas this technology is now used worldwide for different types of everyday jobs including security, comfort, ticketing, management and many more applications.

RFID stands for Radio Frequency Identification. It is used in a way that the implemented devices use radio waves to automatically identify people or objects. There are several methods of identification - like the barcode, by storing a serial number, and perhaps other information on a microchip that acts as an antenna generally known as the RFID TAG. The tiny RFID tag enables it to transmit the identification information to a detector. The detector reads the radio waves and gets the digital information that can then be passed on to computer which can then make use of it.

RFIDs in Pakistan

Amazingly as the world is getting to know about RFID and making an impact to a few finite companies worldwide, it's impression is also being made to some companies here in Pakistan. Organizations such as NADRA are already quite ahead in implementation of this technology by using RFID tags in the new Machine Readable Passports (MRPs). NADRA's Vehicle Identification and Tracking System (VITS) also uses a good support of RFID in practical execution of the system.
The Machine Readable Passport (MRP) system developed by NADRA for Pakistan is one of the few of such kind in the world, in terms of the features and components it includes. Having the latest technologies in facial recognition and fingerprint identification, the E-Passport also introduces the RFID tags. This E-Passport will be the leader of all modern passports. An economical 4KB Radio Frequency Identification device (RFID) chip is burned into the passport to ensure no further tampering can be done on the passport.

The writer is an Engineer & a researcher in IT & Telecom. Besides doing his Masters, he loves to eye the current developments in emerging technologies. He can be reached at rafi@itinsight.info