- RFID WHERE?
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- You'd better look at your shoes, socks and underwear!
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- Protesters will gather today in Manhattan to greet attendees
of the third annual "RFID in Fashion" conference, an event organized
to promote the use of RFID in clothing and footwear. Dr. Katherine Albrecht,
the Harvard-educated privacy campaigner featured in the film "Freedom
to Fascism" and co-author of the bestselling book "Spychips,"
will be on-hand to speak to attendees arriving for the opening keynote
this afternoon at NYC's Fashion Institute of Technology.
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- The conference features two days of speeches and events
to advance apparel-industry uses for controversial Radio Frequency Identification
or RFID technology. Past attendees include New Balance Athletic Shoes,
Reebok, Levi Strauss, American Apparel, Liz Claiborne, and Jockey, along
with retail outlets The Limited, Timberland, and Dillard's.
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- Albrecht planned today's protest after discovering the
conference would promote the use of RFID in individual clothing items.
Known as "item-level tagging," the practice of placing RFID tags
on consumer items (rather than on crates or pallets in a warehouse) has
been widely condemned by privacy and security experts.
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- Experts caution that such tags pose huge privacy and
safety risks to the public. Used to track inventory in warehouses, RFID
tags can easily be used to track people as well a fact that can be
exploited by marketers, government agencies, and criminals. IBM, for example,
has patented RFID "person tracking units" for placement in walls
and floors to allow marketers and government agents to secretly monitor
people's movements. They suggest using the devices in public spaces like
shopping malls, theaters, elevators, and restrooms once RFID is implemented
at the item level.
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- "Consumers shouldn't have to worry about tracking
devices being sewn into the seams of their clothing or pressed into the
soles of their shoes," said Albrecht. "We are putting apparel
and RFID companies on notice that consumers will protest any item-level
use of RFID on apparel."
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- In 2003, Albrecht's consumer group CASPIAN led a successful
boycott against Italian clothing manufacturer Benetton. The resulting worldwide
opposition forced the company to cancel plans to sew millions of RFID tags
into women's garments.
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- "Consumer awareness and opposition to RFID has grown
exponentially since 2003," Albrecht said. "Any U.S. company foolish
enough to use RFID on apparel will face stiff repercussions."
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- The RFID in Fashion 2008 conference website can be found
at: http://www.rfidjournalevents.com/fashion/
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- ABOUT CASPIAN
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- CASPIAN (Consumers Against Supermarket Privacy Invasion
and Numbering) is a grass-roots consumer group fighting retail surveillance
schemes since 1999 and irresponsible RFID use since 2002. With thousands
of members in all 50 U.S. states and over 30 countries worldwide, CASPIAN
seeks to educate consumers about marketing strategies that invade their
privacy and encourage privacy-conscious shopping habits across the retail
spectrum
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- OUR WEBSITES
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- Human Chipping: http://www.AntiChips.com RFID Tagging:
- http://www.spychips.com Shopper Cards:
- http://www.nocards.org Boycott Gillette:
- http://www.BoycottGillette.com Boycott Tesco:
- http://www.BoycottTesco.com Boycott Benetton (2003):
- http://www.BoycottBenetton.com
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- ABOUT KATHERINE ALBRECHT
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- Dr. Katherine Albrecht is widely recognized as one of
the world's leading experts on consumer privacy, retail issues, and RFID,
or "Radio Identification Technology." She holds a Doctorate in
Education from Harvard University, was appointed by NH Governor John Lynch
to serve on that state's two-year RFID study commission, and is the director
of CASPIAN, a 20,000 member consumer privacy organization she founded in
1999.
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- Since 2003, Katherine has led the fight against unethical
RFID use in products and in people. She regularly testifies before lawmakers
around the globe and has given over two thousand television, radio and
print interviews to news outlets like CNN, NPR, Good Morning America, Business
Week and the London Times, to name just a few. Executive Technology Magazine
calls Katherine "perhaps the country's single most vocal privacy advocate"
and Wired magazine calls her the "Erin Brockovich" of RFID."
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- CONTACT // LINKS
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- Dr. Katherine Albrecht Founder and Director, CASPIAN
Consumer Privacy (877) 287-5854, kma@spychips.com
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- ABOUT CASPIAN
-
- CASPIAN (Consumers Against Supermarket Privacy Invasion
and Numbering) is a grass-roots consumer group fighting retail surveillance
schemes since 1999 and irresponsible RFID use since 2002. With thousands
of members in all 50 U.S. states and over 30 countries worldwide, CASPIAN
seeks to educate consumers about marketing strategies that invade their
privacy and encourage privacy-conscious shopping habits across the retail
spectrum.
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- http://www.spychips.com/
- http://www.antichips.com/
- http://www.nocards.org/
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