Application of RFID system for the process control of distributed manufacturing system

Radio Frequency IDentification (RFID) technology successfully integrates radio transmitter and receiver, small size memory space and control circuitry to remotely store and retrieve data via wireless RF transceiver. As low-cost RFID tag can be massively manufactured by semiconductor industry, new applications associated with RFID technology have emerged rapidly such as inventory tracking, book storage and management, and airport baggage handling. Generally an RFID system is composed of many RFID tags (or tagged objects), at least one RFID reader, and one backend application system with database. An RFID tag gains its operation energy from query signals that are radio waves transmitted by RFID reader. Once a tag responds the query with its stored information to RFID reader, usually a unique identity number or string, the RFID system can recognize the tag carrier and perform required business logic operation. As RFID technique is widely used in supply chain management, the corresponding RFID application systems are expected to process and manage large amount of tagged objects at a predefined period of time regularly. Therefore, for large-scaled RFID applications, tag reading throughput is very critical since it will affect the total data processing time. To measure tag reading throughput of a RFID system, two performance criteria are usually adopted: tag reading delay and reader energy consumption [5]. As RFID reader and tag always communicate over a shared wireless channel, it is very easy to have signal collisions during a normal tag identification process when multiple tags exist in reader’s interrogation area. Signal collision results in query or data retransmission and eventually increases communication overhead and time delay of tag identification. Hence, an efficient tag collision arbitration mechanism is very important and critical for RFID systems to achieve effective performance. Existing RFID tag identification schemes can be classified into aloha-based solutions [3, 10, 12-13, 16, 21, 23-24] and tree-based solutions [1, 2, 4, 6-9, 14-15, 17-20, 22]. In aloha-based schemes, a reader estimates the number of tags in its interrogation area and broadcasts the total number of timeslots to each tag. Then each RFID tag randomly selects its own timeslot to transmit its ID without knowing which timeslots have been selected by other tags. By distributing tag responses to distinct timeslots instead of getting all tag responses at the same time, aloha-based schemes effectively reduce the probability of signal collision. However, aloha-based schemes have tag starvation problem in which certain tags may not

In this paper, we focus on configuring a low cost RFID (Radio Frequency IDentification) system with less RFID readers and low density RFID tag textiles for stable and accurate self-localization for an omni-directional mobile robot. An RFID system using multiple RFID readers and high density RFID tags has already been applied to an indoor mobile robot self-localization. However, the system production cost is relatively high. To reduce the production cost of the system while maintaining the self-localization performance, we redesign two new RFID systems configured with 20 RFID readers and 5 RFID readers enlarging the size of an RFID reader antenna. Particularly, a new likelihood function of the tag detection with the redesigned large size RFID reader antenna is proposed for Monte Carlo Localization (MCL). Furthermore, we come up with a novel arrangement of RFID tags installed in a hexagon pattern. The new arrangement of ID tags enables both low cost ID tag installation and high performance of self-localization. We examine the performances of robot self-localization with less RFID readers and lower density RFID tags installed on the floor based on MCL(Monte Carlo localization). The simulation demonstrates the validity of our proposed configuration of the RFID based self-localization.

최근 RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) 기술이 다양한 분야에서 관심을 받고 사용됨으로써 RFID 리더 제조회사들은 다양한 종류의 리더를 생산하고 있다. 현재 RFID 기술에서 RFID 태그 데이터 전송 형태는 EPCglobal에서 제공하는 표준 규약을 따르고 있지만 각 리더 별 리더 연결 및 통신 방법은 회사별로 다른 실정이다. RFID 리더를 사용하던 중 타 회사나 리더 인터페이스가 다른 RFID 리더로 변경하거나 새롭게 추가해야 하는 경우에는 사용자가 직접 RFID 미들웨어 개발단계로 돌아가 미들웨어의 내부 요소를 변경해야 하는 상황이 발생한다. 본 논문에서는 RFID 기술을 사용 시, 특히 여러 회사 또는 표준화되지 않은 인터페이스를 제공하는 RFID 리더를 사용하는 경우에 RFID 애플리케이션과 독립적으로 리더를 관리할 수 있는 리더 프레임워크를 개발하고자 한다. 본 리더 프레임워크는 RFID 애플리케이션과 RFID 리더 사이에 존재하여 RFID 리더 투명성을 제공한다. 본 리더 프레임워크는 현재 작동되고 있는 리더를 모니터링 할 수 있고, 리더의 속성을 확인할 수 있으며 RFID 태그 이벤트 정보, 시스템 로그 정보를 확인할 수 있다. 본 리더 프레임워크를 통해 수십 대의 이기종의 RFID 리더 상태를 용이하게 관리할 수 있게되며 애플리케이션 상의 코드 수정 없이 리더의 추가, 삭제가 가능하게 된다. More recently, variety RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) readers are produced by RFID equipment manufactures. Although a transmission standard instituted by EPCglobal is proposed for data transmission between the RFID readers and tags, other RFID reader protocols and the communication connection methods are be in use in other RFID companies. To replace or add the RFID readers of an RFID system, the developers should make changes to the core of the application and/or middleware. In this paper, we propose an RFID reader framework which can manage RFID readers without having to make changes the code of the application in environment with the growing number of heterogeneous RFID readers.This framework that sits on the layer between the RFID readers and the applications provides transparency to the RFID readers. Additionally, it can be used for monitoring the state and the property of all connected RFID, and for recording the RFID tag event logs and system logs. By using this framework, heterogeneous readers can be replaced and added without writing additional code in the applications. Consequently the readers can be easily managed and controlled by the RFID system administrator.

As radio frequency identification (RFID) technology matures, the application of RFID system also increased significantly and has been widely used in commodity storage, access management. We believe that it will become one of the major electronic money for the daily business consumption in the future. However, the stability and security of the data transaction will be more important for the demand of business applications. In the existed solution, we have not yet found an effective way that the Tag can be completely prevented forgery and attack. In this paper, we analyses the security problem of RFID authentication and propose security authentication for RFID tags based on a one-time password (OTP) authentication method. By the way of OTP authentication, we can improve the security of the RFID tag authentication. It can identify the authorized RFID Tag by additional OTP authentication. If an attacker uses eavesdropping to clone a RFID tag, the clone one can be identified by OTP authentication. We use RFC-6238 Time-Based One-Time password (TOTP) algorithm which is based on HMAC-SHA1 algorithm to enhance the authentication mechanism of RFID security. And we also use the computing power of NFC-enabled smart phone to generate TOTP by OTP generator which designed in this paper. The TOTP can be repeated and the security written to the tag. Thought using RADIUS authentication technology, manufacturers can easily apply this technology in the existing RFID system. It is easily provided to users to use roaming function between the different service providers, as long as they using the same frequency and standard of RFID technology.

A framework for performance and data quality assessment of Radio Frequency IDentification (RFID) systems in health care settings

Every year researchers and engineers are finding new and useful applications for Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) systems (Finkenzeller, 2003). Because of the growing use of RFID systems, many different areas of research have also been developed to improve the performance of such systems. A few of these areas of research include novel antenna designs (Rao et at., 2005; Calabrese & Marrocco, 2008; Amin et al. 2009), analysis on the backscatter properties of RFID tags (Yen et al., 2007; Feng et al., 2006), mutual coupling between RFID tags (Li et al., 2008; Owen et al., 2009) and the deployment of RFID systems to complex and extreme environments (Qing & Chen, 2007; Sanford, 2008). There are many aspects to each area of research in RFID. A major topic in many of these areas involves research on the antenna design for RFID tags. This chapter will focus on the design of efficient space-filling antennas for passive UHF RFID tags. First, an introduction to RFID systems is presented. This is done by describing the major components in a RFID system and how they communicate. Then, the particular backscattering properties of a passive tag are described from a unique electric field integral equation standpoint and from an overall systems perspective (i.e., using the Friis transmission equation). This discussion will then be followed by a section describing a practical design process of various space-filling antennas for passive tags. Finally, a summary of future work and a conclusion about the chapter is presented.

Private companies and government have decided to provide Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) systems in places of free access to the population. However, as a result of such exposition, these systems become vulnerable to Denial of Service (DoS) attacks that can cause unavailability in the services. Furthermore, another complicating factor in that context regards the equipment or devices used on RFID systems, since they operate in frequency bands reserved for secondary communication systems, and consequently they have too few computational resources to deal with malicious electromagnetic interferences. Therefore, in this paper an Intrusion Detection System (IDS) is proposed to identify the occurrence of the malicious behavior and to notify the system operator about one specific type of electromagnetic interference in RFID systems - the Jamming attack. The obtained results of the system show the jamming attacks are detected prior of having a significant impact on the communication between the RFID reader and the tag - i.e., the jamming attack was detected even with insufficient power to impact on communication.

Ultra high frequency (UHF) radio frequency identification (RFID) systems suffer from issues that limit their widespread deployment and limit the number of applications where they can be used. These limitations are: lack of a well defined read zone, interference, and environment sensitivity. To overcome these limitations a novel receiver device is introduced into the system. The use of such device or devices mitigates the issues by enabling more "anchor points" in the system. Two such devices exist in industry and academia: the Astraion Sensatag and the Gen2 Listener. The drawbacks of the Sensatag is that it offers poor performance in capturing tag signals. The Gen2 Listener is based on the expensive software defined radio hardware. The purpose of the thesis was to develop a receiver that will enable several new RFID applications that are not available with current RFID systems. The receiver, named ARR (Augmented RFID Receiver), receives tag and reader signals, which are decoded by an FPGA and the results are reported through Ethernet. This device is central to the augmented RFID system. To show the suitability of such an approach, the performance of the implementation was compared to the other two outlined solutions. A comparison of the read rate and range of the implementations were the defining factors. The analysis showed that the ARR is capable of receiving tag signals with a read rate of 50% for passive and 66% for semi-passive tags at a one meter distance and is capable of receiving tag signals at a maximum of 3.25 meters for passive and 5.5 meters for semi- passive tags, with the reader being within 8 meters of the ARR. Two applications were implemented to showcase the ARR: an RFID portal and protocol analyzer.

Remote technologies are changing our way of life. The radio frequency identification (RFID) system is a new technology which uses the open air to transmit information. This information transmission needs to be protected to provide user safety and privacy. Business will look for a system that has fraud resilience to prevent the misuse of information to take dishonest advantage. The business and the user need to be assured that the transmitted information has no content which is capable of undertaking malicious activities. Public awareness of RFID security will help users and organizations to understand the need for security protection. Publishing a security guideline from the regulating body and monitoring implementation of that guideline in RFID systems will ensure that businesses and users are protected. This chapter explains the importance of security in a RFID system and will outline the protective measures. It also points out the research direction of RFID systems.

The RFID (Radio Frequency IDentification) system is paid attention to as a new identification source that achieves a ubiquitous environment. Each RFID tag has the unique ID, and is attached to some object. A user reads the unique ID of a RFID tag with RFID readers and obtains the information on the object. One of the most important technologies that use the RFID system is the position estimation of RFID tags. The position estimation means to estimates the location of the object with the RFID tag. It can be very useful to acquire the location information of RFID tag. If a user can understand the position of the RFID tag, the position estimation can be applied to a navigation system for walkers. In this paper, we propose a new method named as Swift Communication Range Recognition (S-CRR) method as an extended improvement of the previous CRR method on the estimation delay. In this method, the position of RFID tag is estimated by selecting the communication area model which corresponds to those boundary angles. We carry out the performance evaluation by the experiments of RFID system and show the effectiveness of S-CRR for position estimation.

There are many protocols proposed for protecting Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) system privacy and security. A number of these protocols are designed for protecting long-term security of RFID system using symmetric key or public key cryptosystem. Others are designed for protecting user anonymity and privacy. In practice, the use of RFID technology often has a short lifespan, such as commodity check out, supply chain management and so on. Furthermore, we know that designing a long-term security architecture to protect the security and privacy of RFID tags information requires a thorough consideration from many different aspects. However, any security enhancement on RFID technology will jack up its cost which may be detrimental to its widespread deployment. Due to the severe constraints of RFID tag resources (e.g., power source, computing power, communication bandwidth) and open air communication nature of RFID usage, it is a great challenge to secure a typical RFID system. For example, computational heavy public key and symmetric key cryptography algorithms (e.g., RSA and AES) may not be suitable or over-killed to protect RFID security or privacy. These factors motivate us to research an efficient and cost effective solution for RFID security and privacy protection. In this paper, we propose a new effective generic binary tree based key agreement protocol (called BKAP) and its variations, and show how it can be applied to secure the low cost and resource constraint RFID system. This BKAP is not a general purpose key agreement protocol rather it is a special purpose protocol to protect privacy, un-traceability and anonymity in a single RFID closed system domain.

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) systems consist of Electric Tags, or transponders and RF tag readers, or transceivers. Auto-tags of the RFID system have the unique ID feature and are capable of carrying information, which adds the tags more capability of which could be read only or read/write. RFID systems are now being used by more and more organizations connected with management, tracing, and control. The purpose of this study was to develop a information protection system (named PC-guard) using systems engineering and RFID technology. The login verification code can be notified in advance by using the PC-guard system because every PC user having their own Auto-tag will be checked with PC RFID reader. The information in the PC will be protected with RFID and the vibration sensor as the PC be turned on and be invaded. The development of this system using Blanchard and Fabrycky's procedure intends to bring the advantages of time saving and reduced risk using RFID technology. The developmental test and evaluation in the RFID lab had been done. The test results show that the PC-guard system can be operated well to protect the information in the PC with an active RFID tag and a PLC procedure with vibration sensor.

Radio Frequency IDentification (RFID) systems have rich applications in daily life. A crucial problem in RFID systems is to estimate the cardinality of RFID tags. Most exiting probabilistic RFID cardinality estimation algorithms utilize a certain pattern hidden in the response vector formed by the tag responses to make estimators. In this paper, we argue that finding the patterns is actually not necessary! In this paper, we present a novel approach to RFID cardinality estimation by making the full use of the whole response vector. We characterize the critical relationship between the number of RFID tags and the specific distribution of the bits in the response vector. In this paper, we consider two kinds of responses, i.e., empty / non-empty responses and empty / singleton / collision responses. To cater for RFID systems with a very large number of tags, we also generalize our estimation approach to handle geometrically distributed response vectors. Both rigid theoretical analysis and extensive simulations have been conducted and the conclusive results demonstrate that our approach is more accurate than existing state-of-the-art RFID estimation approaches.

Two types of information, namely; related jobsite information along the process and feedback information have been found as essential elements for construction process improvement. In current practices, construction process has faced barriers in obtaining these two types of information. To overcome this problem, the new information system is proposed, namely; Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) system which consists of RFID as an automatic identification and data collection device integrated with database. Precast concrete installation process in housing projects has been selected to be a case study. The research had been initiated by reviewing related literatures and conducting field observations. The results of these initial studies are utilized as a basis in constructing the conceptual model of RFID application in precast installation process. The conceptual model is then realized by exploring the RFID characteristics and developing the prototype of RFID system afterwards. The exploration of RFID characteristics aims to reveal the basic characteristics of RFID that are essential to be recognized in supporting the proposed conceptual model. The general findings show that the tag orientations, tag positions, distance, interrogation angle, and the presence of other tags affect the RFID performance. The vertically oriented tag performs more superiorly than the horizontal one. The reading rate, the maximum amount of detected tags at once, and the minimum spacing distance between tags tend to decrease as the reading distance increases. The coverage area tends to be smaller when the reader rotates either horizontally of vertically. The design and development of RFID system is a prototype. It aims to enable the involved parties to collect the required data and to access the required information. The RFID system involves pre-input, input, and output modules. The pre-input and input modules collect associated data to the details of concrete panel information, and the information of precast installation process respectively. The output module presents the required information of the precast concrete panel and the information of the installation events. The information of the installation events is presented in forms of table and graphical views to provide simple analysis of the current precast installation practice. The RFID system provides related jobsite information and feedback information which can be used to improve the installation process of the precast concrete panels.

A radio-frequency identification (RFID) system has been considered as one of the most promising systems for information technology (IT) asset management because of its well-developed level of technology, worldwide standards and its lower price than other wireless protocols such as WiFi, WiMAX, and Bluetooth. However, RFID systems for IT asset management in business-to-business (B2B) environments are still limited by several constraints such as readable range, sensor capability, and battery problems inherent in existing RFID technologies. In particular, only few research works deal with asset management in a real office environment. This paper proposes a new way of managing IT assets using surface acoustic wave (SAW)-based RFID technology to solve these problems. To show its effectiveness and feasibility, the proposed approach analyzes RFID tag performance based on an electromagnetic test and measures the readability of SAW-based RFID in an office environment. Experimental results show that one of the most hopeful candidates for managing B2B IT assets is the SAW-based RFID system because of its batteryless passive RFID characteristic, relatively long readable range, its potential and inherent sensor capability, and its expandability compared to other RFID systems. Furthermore, the proposed approach systematically analyzes where to attach RFID tags on IT asset devices considering electromagnetic performance based on ID- and sensor-detecting capabilities, which suggests the most appropriate tag position on the device.