More About Protecting Children with RFID

Filed in archive RFID Basics on July 29, 2005

Most marketers will tell you that fear-based marketing messages are usually less effective than positive marketing messages. The negativity tends to turn people off, more than it motivates them to buy.

However, here is one fear-based marketing message that I suspect will get a warmer reception: RFID-enabled clothing to protect children from abductions.

SmartWear Technologies is a company that bills itself as providing "anti-abduction and missing persons RFID technologies." If you head on over to their website, you're met by a Flash video that shows pictures of high-profile child abductions and gives scary statistics about abductions ("every 18 seconds a child disappears...").

The SmartWear technology will be used on a new line of children's pajamas, with RFID tags sewn into the hems. If the tags go outside certain boundaries of the house, RFID readers will detect it and an alarm will sound.

According to a recent article in InformationWeek:

"A pamphlet or 'hang tag' attached to the garment will inform customers that the sleepwear is designed with SmartWear technology in an effort to prevent child abductions. It then directs parents to a Web site that explains how to activate and encode the RFID with a unique digital identification number. Parents will register with SmartWear to receive a unique number for each child to encode on the tags. No personal information such as name, address, or phone number is required. The site also provides information on the requisite readers and a low-frequency RFID Encoder connected through a USB port for a computer that will be available as part of home-installed package."

Let's just hope the bad guys don't catch on and start removing the clothing or the tags in an abduction.

Hat tip to Michael Domsalla of Techwear Weblog for the tip.

Tags: RFID; Business