Hedy Lamarr Invented RFID?

Filed in archive RFID Basics on November 22, 2004

Did you know that the sultry actress from the 1940's, Hedy Lamarr, invented RFID?

Neither did I. But that's who Tom Brady, Vice President of the Uniform Code Council, attributed the invention to, in a keynote speech last Friday at an event I had the honor of introducing him for.

If it had been anyone else who said it, I would have laughed thinking they were all wet. But, because of who said it, I googled "Hedy Lamarr radio frequency." To my amazement I found that it has been written up all over the Internet.

Hedy Lamarr was definitely ahead of her time. In addition to making soft porn in the 1930's before it was fashionable, she even beat Winona Ryder to the punch and became the first major actress arrested for shoplifting, back in the 1960's.

But, we're getting ahead of ourselves. Jump back to the 1940's. Hedy Lamarr and a gentleman by the name of George Antheil patented an idea for "frequency hopping." It was based upon player piano rolls!!! One of the more colorful accounts can be found at this Britney Spears site (I kid you not!).

But was it really RFID that she invented? Not exactly -- it was spread spectrum, a very important technology. As the Electronic Frontier Foundation noted in 1997 when it honored Hedy Lamarr:

"In 1942 Lamarr, once named the 'most beautiful woman in the world' and Antheil, dubbed 'the bad boy of music' patented the concept of 'frequency-hopping' that is now the basis for the spread spectrum radio systems used in the products of over 40 companies manufacturing items ranging from cell phones to wireless networking systems."