EAN / UCP and Brussels, Belgium
Global Standardization Compliance by 2005
EAN -- European Article Numbering http://www.ean-int.org/
EPC Global -- Electronic Product Code http://www.epcglobalinc.org/
UCC --- Uniform Code Council http://www.uc-council.org/
Jose Luis Magana / AP file ...msnbc
Labeling ... it's not just for cans anymore
China's
Nat'l Product Code to compete with EPC global for
RFID -- Aug. 3, 2006 -- Market driven
However, China is still pursuing its own numbering system,
called the National Product Code,
which will compete against EPCglobal's Electronic Product Code
(EPC). China will also build and
maintain its own database with information on
products, manufacturers and transport methods, rather than
subscribe to EPC's, which will be maintained by
Verisign in the United States.
Ballooning market
In-Stat estimates that China consumed more than 180 million RFID
tags in 2005 and believes that more than 2.9 billion tags will be
shipped
by 2009.
The major application will be smart
cards, especially those used for China's national ID card
program.
Due to the lack of a draft spec, IC companies in China,
including Shanghai Huahong IC and Fudan Microelectronics, are
pursuing the ISO standard. Xu Li, director of the marketing
department at Fudan, said it has been easier to implement the
smart-card applications at 13.56 MHz, but UHF is still a
challenge for some local firms
http://www.eetasia.com/ART_8800428220_499488_8c3b0c05200608.HTM
Verichip used to be 125 kHz
but is now 134.2 kHz in order to conform to the rest of the
world's implanted chip frequency. The 134.2 has a longer read
range and is universal ( interoperable ). The standardization is
set by ISO out of Geneva, Switzerland.
America thus conforms to European standards.
ISO CHIP 134.2 kHz ...the Verichip
Florida firm VeriChip makes an FDA-approved
134 kHz RFID implantable tag
that the company markets both as a tool for providing emergency
care physicians access to their electronic medical files "
http://www.rfidjournal.com/article/articleview/2525/1/1/
Standard Scanners ( Readers, Interrogators ) Nov. 15, 2005
The new scanner was designed to read the vast majority
of chips in the nation's expanding companion pet marketplace that
use a 125 kHz radio frequency including chips that are encrypted.
The new scanner can also detect the presence of a 134 kHz radio
frequency chip, also called an ISO chip, which is commonly used
outside the country but is present in a small number of pets in
the U.S.
http://www.morerfid.com/details.php?subdetail=Report&action=details&report_id=920
RFID must have a label
with a global symbol ( image )- Feb. 13, 2006
Ed: When people are
verichipped, will they eventually be required to have an external
image "of the beast " ?
The legislation, if passed, would require that no item
“to which a tracking device or devices have been affixed or
implanted, shall be sold or offered for sale or provided to a
consumer without a label containing a universally
accepted symbol.” (New Hampshire House Bill
203-FN, Chapter 358-S-2 I).
This article contains a
photo gallery and a slideshow, both .
http://news.tmcnet.com/news/2006/02/13/1365597.htm
"Image of the Beast" Rev. 13 and Rev. 14 ....
labeling, logos, symbol, MARK, whatever
Standardization Code for of chip-scanners and databases -- Feb.
16, 2006
"Dog Identification Group"
Chris Laurence, veterinary director for the Dogs
Trust, says the UK has worked hard to address these
issues. The British Small Animal Veterinary Association has a
microchip advisory group that has helped develop standards and
the Dog Identification Group (comprising welfare
groups, vets and dog wardens, and chaired by Laurence) has worked
with chip manufacturers, distributors and inserters to
develop a code of practice.
"The databases are also all accessible by a single point of
contact, and that's taken quite a lot of time to agree," he
adds.
Some newer chips contain a biosensor and can also send
the animals' temperature.
http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=264432&area=/breaking_news/breaking_news__business/
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2006/02/18/2003293576
Smart card alliance for interoperability -- Jan. 2005
Amsterdam, Luxembourg, Munich, and Paris--The
world’s leading smart card manufacturers--Axalto, Gemplus
International S.A., Giesecke & Devrient, and Oberthur Card
Systems--have announced the creation of the Smart
Payment Alliance (SPA), a non-profit association
dedicated to fostering and facilitating the usage of smart cards
to make payments. The SPA is committed to promoting chip
card-based payment applications, improving value-added
application interoperability, establishing relevant
specifications, and improving security and quality.
http://www.contactlessnews.com/news/2005/01/25/leading-card-suppliers-create-smart-payment-alliance/
RFID tags : Longer read-range; more interoperability --Nov. 5,
2004
which gives a read range of 2 to 3 meters (up from 0.6
meters). This will allow interoperability with tags in Europe,
where RFID devices can use 2 watts of power and where regulations
are being considered to allow RFID readers to operate between
865.6 MHz and 867.6 MHz. The power limit for the revised
frequency band of 923 to 925 MHz (formerly 924 to 925 MHz) i
http://www.rfidjournal.com/article/articleview/1224/1/1/
RFID Protocol
Leading manufacturers and technology providers of data collection
and RFID (radio frequency identification) have submitted an RFID
protocol definition that would pave the way for rapid adoption of
a new worldwide RFID standard known as EPC UHF Generation 2.
Companies supporting the protocol include Royal Philips
Electronics, Texas Instruments, Impinj, SAMSys, Q.E.D Systems,
UPM Rafsec, and Intermec, along with several others.
The proposed RFID definition currently is in development by
EPCglobal Inc., an arm of UCC.EAN charged with establishing the
EPC system. The proposed definition meets user requirements
outlined by the world's leading retailers and others, including
the U.S. Dept. of Defense, the companies said. It fully meets
user requirements, works worldwide, meets international standards
and provides a path to low-cost RFID tags and readers.
http://www.yenra.com/epc-uhf-generation-2/
http://www.rfidjournal.com/article/articleview/941/1/1/
Need seamless systems to work
with Verichip-- Nov. 1, 2004
The fact is that the technology does not do much to solve the
problems of keeping track of patients and their information in
medical environments has gone largely unnoticed. About a third of
the cost of health care in the United States is the result of
managing information such as patient health records, according to
a study by the Boston Consulting Group. Many health care
institutions and providers can't effectively track patient data
within their own walls, much less across the entire health care
system. That's why patients have to continually fill out forms
detailing their personal information and medical history.
RFID implants won't solve these problems, because the problems
are caused by the inadequacies of the health care system's IT
infrastructure and practices. If health care providers don't have
a consistent database of patient information they call up at key
moments during the treatment process, properly identifying the
patient is meaningless. http://www.reed-electronics.com/eb-mag/article/CA475425?industryid=2119
Standardization;
Networking your pet-- August 20, 2004
The problem has been that the American and overseas
systems are incompatible. So some organizations in North America
that maintain identification databases are switching to the international system in
the hope of one day linking North American pets and owners to a
global database.
Right now, most pet microchips and scanners used in the
United States operate on a radio frequency of 125 kilohertz. But
the chips used in much of the rest of the world
operate at an international standard of 134.2 kilohertz,
Ms. Richey said.
Several groups have already begun using the 134.2 kilohertz chip,
including the Oregon Humane Society in Portland, which started
implanting them in January, said Sharon Harmon, executive
director of the society.
It's a mistake to have a technology used only in the
U.S.," she said.
"One worldwide standard
will provide the ultimate protection for pets."
Read-Write Chips
But Dr. Walt Ingwersen, a veterinarian in Whitby, Ont.,
who has served as chairman of the Canadian Veterinary Medical
Association's microchip committee, said that smarter,
read-write chips are on the way. Mr. Ingwersen is now a
member of a technical committee that is developing
international standards for the advanced transponders.
"The animal's ID number will remain the same on the
chip," he said, "but the contents will be
updatable."
http://www.globetechnology.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20040804.gtpetaug4/BNStory/Technology/
Texas Instrument Standardization
TIRIS (Texas Instruments Registration and Identification
System). While its initial offering was aimed at animal
identification, the company views the RFID market as
having many opportunities.
http://rfid.frontlinetoday.com/1090.htm
Jan 1 -2005 deadline ( 5 months away)
For the past 30 years, U.S. products have been labeled with
12-digit UPC symbols. But outside the United States and Canada,
retail products are marked with EAN-8 and EAN-13 symbols, using
the European Article Numbering system. To sell those products in
the United States and Canada, manufacturers have to relabel them
with a 12-digit UPC symbol, adding expense and delays, according
to the Uniform Code Council.
After Jan. 1, Uniform Code Council "company
prefixes" will no longer be issued to new companies based
outside of the United States and Canada. "Therefore, these
new companies will be marking their products with EAN-8 or EAN-13
symbols," according to the council. This means that U.S.
retailers need their computers to be able to recognize the EAN
tags.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104-5266112.html
Standardized global Bar-Code :
European Article Numbering Code (EAN)-- July 12, 2004
activated Jan. 1, 2005 ...GS
1 ..... now 13 digits
With the new mandate
from the Uniform Code Council, the North American arbiter
of bar codes, the bar-code scanners of North American retailers
will be expected to read the 13-digit product codes. The
12-digit codes do not die; systems that can read 13-digit codes
can also read 12-digit codes.
The bar-code standards bodies are becoming a single global group
as well. EAN International, based in Brussels, and the Uniform
Code Council, based in Lawrenceville, New Jersey, will be folded
into one organization, called GS1, next year. The
global headquarters will be in Brussels.
http://www.iht.com/articles/528868.html
http://www.adams1.com/pub/russadam/upccode.html
EAN / UPC
The EAN/UPC system is a worldwide
product marking system that maintains uniqueness of every product
manufactured globally that is sold at point of sale. There are
two parts to the Universal Product Code (UPC). One is the
symbology and the other is the coding system.
UPC is ubiquitous. When people think bar code, the image in their
mind is a UPC symbol. It has been successfully employed in the
retail industry in the United States and Canada since 1973
http://www.autoid.org/Primer/ean_upc.htm
Standards
There's a standards struggle, too. Kimberly-Clark, Target,
Wal-Mart, and many other well-known companies have been pressing
for several years for standards on what data is included on an
RFID chip and how readers and tags communicate, initially as
members of the Auto-ID Center and now by participating in EPCglobal
Inc., a joint venture between EAN International
and the Uniform
Code Council. A single RFID standard has yet to emerge, and a
fragmented approach could sink the effort. "We're going to
do this one way," Target CIO Paul Singer said at the retail
conference. "I really believe that's critical for making
this happen."
http://www.informationweek.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=20900361
From the newswire:
Standardization
will multiply rfid tags ubiquitously
A milestone was reached this week, when an
international group refereeing the two groups succeeded in
getting consensus on a single global protocol, said
Henri Barthel, a Brussels-based manager with EAN International,
the not-for-profit organization that oversees the bar code system
and will help oversee the radio tagging.
At the same time, efforts are under way to harmonize
ultrahigh frequency, or UHF, bands used by the radio
tags, which work in the range of 860 to 960 megahertz. Problems
include the fact that the frequency used for RFID applications in
most European countries is reserved for military applications in
France and in Poland.
With standards falling into place and
initial trials in the United States and Europe reporting positive
results, a strong uptick in demand for the radio chips is
predicted over the next 12 to 18 months, said Christophe Duverne,
vice president for marketing and sales at Philips
Semiconductors' identification group, which makes the radio
chips.
Gerd Wolfram, project manager in charge of Metro
Group's Extra Future Store in Rheinberg, Germany, noted that
before every product sold in stores can be tagged,
radio tag readers will have to be installed on all store shelves and the check-out process
changed.
http://www.iht.com/bin/print.php?file=527198.html
EPC Global
fights royalties -- September 1, 2004
No one knows how the lawsuit will play out, but it flies
in the face of the Electronic Product Code Global group's plan to
set a standard -- and hence jump-start adoption -- by companies
giving up claims to licenses and royalties. The fear is that
royalty payments will keep tag costs high, stalling widespread
adoption.
This wrangle is affecting standardization, too. EPC Global is now formulating what the third generation of tags will be, and concern is rising about stepping on possible patents. China is also proving to be an impediment. Speculation is rife that Chinese retailers may adopt a different standard, creating a problem for global manufacturers wanting to sell to the world's biggest consumer market. While analysts are hopeful Wal-Mart could influence China to join ranks, Intermec's lawsuit could complicate matters, Prodromou says. "One thing China is dead-set against is paying royalties," he says.
RFID has other problems, but most won't become issues until
individual items start being tagged. One is the basic laws of
physics. Radio waves can't penetrate metal or liquid
easily. Today, you couldn't mark an individual
package of Baby Wipes inside of a big case or pallet and expect
the RFID readers to pick it up. http://www.technewsworld.com/story/36266.html
EPC
Global elects new president -- August 2, 2004 ---
Electronic Product Code
( Chris )Adcock's appointment
was approved by the boards of both the EAN International and the
Uniform Code Council, which are copartners in the EPCglobal joint
venture. EPCglobal said Adcock would begin his official duties as
EPCglobal president on Sept. 1.
He will split his time between two offices that will be
located in London, at the e.centre
(EAN UK), and in
Lawrenceville, N.J., at the headquarters of the Uniform Code
Council.
The organization is working aggressively to create a
second-generation global standard for EPC systems operating in
the UHF spectrum. It is also working to
develop standards for the EPCglobal Network
(the global system that will allow companies to use EPC
technology to track and share supply chain information),
to promote EPC technology outside of its roots in the consumer
packaged goods and retail industries, and to prove there is a
business case for adopting EPC technologies.
http://www.rfidjournal.com/article/articleview/1071/1/1/
RFID World Australia stalled by Standardization
Sydney plays host to RFID World today but not a single vendor
will be offering Electronic Product Code (EPC) compliant products
simply because the specifications are yet to be ratified.
In fact the standard, ISO18000 has only recently been agreed
upon.
In the US the frequency is 915MHz at
4W; locally however, the ACA [
Australia] has only approved 915MHz to be used at 1W
which restricts the distance at which tags can be
read.
An industry push is under way to change it to 925MHz
at 4W, according to Geoffrey Ramadan, chairman of
Automatic Data Capture Australia. Ramadan said that while waiting
for standards to be ratified, companies can run RFID trials with
the tags that are available now.
http://www.arnnet.com.au/index.php/id;149890906;fp;2;fpid;1
More alphabet soup:
UPC -- Universal Product Code
UCC Net Registry http://www.uccnet.org/
GDSN -- Global Data Synchronization Network ( by October 2004 )
http://www.ean-int.org/Doc/NR%204-04%20GPC%20UDEX%20alignment%20210504%20FINAL.doc
UDEX , a global standards organization based in
the United Kingdom, maintains a database of coded product
descriptions linked to Universal Product Codes (UPC) bar codes
(EAN codes in Europe).
http://www.paperclick.com/press/pr_detail.cfm?ID=2
GPC -- Global Product Classification
GSMP -- Global Standards Management Process
ISO
Why the ISO 14443 Standard matters ( rms )
American Express, MasterCard and Visa have
endorsed the ISO 14443 standard for contactless payment
applications. "In essence, banks want to put a credit card's
mag stripe data onto an RF chip," says Andy Richardson,
TI-RFid's strategy manager for wireless commerce.
Prior to the establishment of the ISO 14443 standard, credit card
issuers had been generally reluctant to do this. That's because
the data transmission rate was too slow to handle relatively
large amounts of encrypted financial data.
http://www.rfidjournal.com/article/articleview/327/1/1/
American Express developed ExpressPay in conjunction with Texas
Instruments RFid Systems, a world leader in radio
frequency identification (RFID) technology. The ExpressPay key
fob and reader are designed with an open architecture that is
compatible with RFID industry standards (ISO/IEC Standard 14443).
The ExpressPay key fob includes a number of security features,
including data encryption. The ExpressPay reader can be
implemented at merchant locations easily. It works with their
existing point-of-sale system and is free to merchants during the
pilot. Charges are authorized and processed through the existing
credit and charge card payment network.
http://www.ti.com/rfid/docs/news/news_releases/2003/cust7-16-03.shtml
Articles on implanted rfid microchips....dead or alive
Corpse ID
Forensic experts want the use of microchips to become the new
standard in corpse identification.
The chips were used as tags to identify bodies of the Dec 26
tsunami victims for the first time in the world, Dr Pattana
Kitkailass of the Police Forensic Institute.
They agreed the technique should be the standard
for identifying corpses whenever there is a major disaster
Dr Pattana said the numbers could disappear completely if bodies
were too decomposed. Microchips were a much more reliable form of
identification. Each chip was about the size of a grain of rice.
They could be implanted in a skull and had a life of up to 75
years.
Pol Col Ponprasert Ganjanarintr, superintendent for police
foreign affairs, said more than 2,400 corpses had been implanted
with microchips so far.
http://www.bangkokpost.com/News/19Jan2005_news08.php
http://www.guardian.co.uk/tsunami/story/0,15671,1382758,00.html
Subcutaneous Chip
One Barcelona man who had the
nightclub chip implanted told a newspaper that he would love to
have his Social Security number, ID card and credit card on a
subcutaneous chip so he would no longer have to carry a wallet
Most consumers, meanwhile, don’t want to carry or use a
token, device or cell phone to authenticate their transactions,
Gartner’s survey found.
http://moneycentral.msn.com/content/Banking/FinancialPrivacy/P90679.asp
Armenia : chip interview
The US suggests uniting the
social cards and ID cards in a microchip and instilling it in
human beings to be sure they won’t get lost or misused.
http://www.azg.am/?lang=EN&num=2005011902
Another reason for the chip--military IDs stolen
http://www.wjla.com/news/stories/0105/200259.html
DNA and microchip
The final death toll
may change slightly, "but if we match the DNA tests of the
dead and their relatives, we will likely find that the missing
people are the unidentified dead," he said.
This is the world's first such integrated operation using the
world's best and latest technology and specialist expertise from
all over the world," said Australian police Inspector Jeff
Emery, who heads up the DVI information centre.
http://www.turkishpress.com/world/news.asp?id=050111191340.prn92nns.xml
Monopoly on tags
A Birmingham, Ala.,
microchip manufacturer has sued Avid Identification Systems of
Norco and Digital Angel of St. Paul, Minn., alleging in a $10
million suit that the two companies are participating in a
"monopolistic conspiracy" in the marketing of microchip
ID tags for pets. The suit filed by Crystal Import of Birmingham
seeks to have Avid make its microchip encryption technology code
public. Another suit filed last May in San Diego alleged that ID
tags implanted by Banfield, The Pet Hospital, at 400 PetSmart
stores across the country gave owners a false sense of security.
Banfield used Crystal Import Corp. microchip technology that is
widely used outside the United States, but is only in use at
limited spots in the United States.
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/business/20050112-9999-1b12calbrfs.html
New ISO doggie-chips 132 khz
Last year, the
Oregon Humane Society began buying and implanting the new
134-kilohertz microchip -- also known as the International
Standards Organization (ISO) chip -- from a Canadian company
called Pethealth Inc.
http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/news/1103547369277750.xml
Salvation www.cybertime.net/~ajgood/sal.htm
Bible www.blueletterbible.org