Banned from Las Vegas?
Filed in archive Privacy and Security on February 17, 2004
InfoWorld points out this future scenario that could put a real crimp in your Las Vegas vacation plans:
You're going on vacation in Las Vegas, and ... you buy a book on card counting. Unbeknownst to you, it ... has an RFID tag impressed into the binding. RFID tags along with their antenna are already part of paper labels attached to shipping containers. It is no stretch to think how unobtrusive they might yet become.
Now as you enter the hotel/casino, an unobtrusive RFID reader tells management that you have in your possession a book on counting cards. The book has a unique serial number associated not with your credit card -- that would be illegal -- but with a customer ID, name, and address. The casino, in turn, subscribes to a service, maybe from Amazon, with a database of every book in print.
In a world of zero latency, as you passed through the doors, your photo was also taken and now it is distributed to every casino on the strip, so that every time you try to enter a casino, your image is matched to the database as a possible card counter, and two guys with closely cropped hair and tight-fitting sports jackets politely ask you to leave.
Interesting, but...this may fall into the "possible but unlikely" camp.
With the billions that casinos spend on sophisticated surveillance systems, it is hard to imagine a large enough ROI from installing RFID book tracking just to catch a few amateurs checking in with suspect gambling books (professional card counters would not need a book, would they?).
But I can think of a few other uses for RFID by casinos....
Now as you enter the hotel/casino, an unobtrusive RFID reader tells management that you have in your possession a book on counting cards. The book has a unique serial number associated not with your credit card -- that would be illegal -- but with a customer ID, name, and address. The casino, in turn, subscribes to a service, maybe from Amazon, with a database of every book in print.
In a world of zero latency, as you passed through the doors, your photo was also taken and now it is distributed to every casino on the strip, so that every time you try to enter a casino, your image is matched to the database as a possible card counter, and two guys with closely cropped hair and tight-fitting sports jackets politely ask you to leave.
Permalink: Banned from Las Vegas?
Tags: rfid vegas wireless privacy digital privacy+security social+networking market+size
Vote for Banned from Las Vegas?:
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Rating: 8.00 out of 1 vote(s) cast.
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Response from:
Anders
(02/17/04 6:11am)
Response from:
Anita Campbell
(02/17/04 8:57am)
Good point, Anders. Separating product databases from customer databases would go a long way toward addressing privacy concerns. The Marks & Spencer example in the post on your weblog is a creative, yet simple, way of dealing with this issue, that puts the choice (and thus the power) in the hands of the individual consumer.
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