RFID Tags in Euro Banknotes

psychictv writes "CNET News.com is reporting that Euro notes could be embedded with RFID tags in the future. 'RFID (radio frequency identification) tags also have the ability of recording information such as details of the transactions the paper note has been involved in...'" The EU has been considering this for a while. You'll never even know they're there.

If you'll never know that they're there...

[Angry White Guy]

They'll never notice that you've taken them out.

Micrrowave your cash today!

Great for thieves, too!

[rnelsonee]

Since we all know portable RFID readers will become available commerically, what's to stop a thief from carrying around his reader and then summing up how much people in the street have in their wallets? Just wait around late at night, wait for some woman to walk by with $300, and then just rob her? I'd bet there would be more muggings if the average pay went from $40 to a few hundred...

uh, woah?

[spectral]

Damn, I didn't realize they could be that small.. I don't know how durable it would be though? If there was a way to make certain that they were in the notes, I could see it being a nice way to check to see if the notes added up to the value punched in by the cashier: a kind of redundancy. It would take a while til the new notes with these things were in decent enough circulation to make this viable, but would still be interesting. Too many people would start to rely on it though, which might not be a good idea.

I'm just wondering how easy it would be for something that tiny to get scratched/cut off? I'm not so worried about privacy implications (maybe I'm not paranoid enough), but I'm sure there'll be some posts of that line soon enough.

No, I haven't read the article. :)

One question...

[HomerNet]

Why bother? Why not push for full digital convergence and have everyone use EFT for ALL transactions? We're headed that way anyway, I haven't used paper cash in nearly a month now for anything.

Re:New mugging tool

[KDan]

Yeah but a rfid-reader wallet connected to the net could report that you've been mugged immediately and 'deactivate' all those notes, making the mugging pointless (the money stops working in all rfid-aware connected cash registers)...

Daniel

Record this transaction:

[Bonker]

European Drug Distributor: Hello, Mister Colombian Drug Lord. Here is the money, I promised you.

Drug Lord: Hola, my French friend. I assume you've prepared the money as I specified?

Distributor: Indeed! Not only are these new notes, freshly received through my cover business, but they have been washed in muddy water, microwaved, and then dried in my daughter's basement.

Drug Lord: Ecellent! Here is the ten kilos of my finest cocaine. Good day to you!

Yeah, a real drug transaction isn't going to go nearly like this, but having the money check what kind of transactions its going through isn't going to work if there is *any* kind of money laundering going on and if *any* kind of competant disabling of RFID tags takes place.

How well to RFID tags stand up to microwaving?

[Unknown Poltroon]

Just curious. THeoretically, of course.

This wont fly. If they dont have an anonomous way of spening the countries cash, they will use something else. Expect a huge groundswell of foregin cash and gold to get started. It is noones busisness what i spend my money on.

Re:Great for thieves, too!

[aug24]

Since most muggers are only after fifty bucks for a rock, prolly the opposite! Less crime through better targetting ;-)

J.

It's in the details?

[PoisonousPhat]

For one, anyone know what the usable range of these chips are? Must they be activated at point-blank distance, or can the stack of bills be IDd at once from a scanner a few feet away? The article says "With such tags, a stack of notes can be passed through a reader and the sum added in a split second, similar to how inventory is tracked in an RFID-based system." If said tags can then be activated at a distance, would they qualify as more of a surveillance device than a security feature?

Also, is there (or isn't there) the possibility of malfunction, intentional or not? Couldn't someone shoot some sort of HERF gun-type thing at a bag of loot and fry all the chips at once? Does a malfunctioning chip warrant the investigation of individual cases? Many questions down what looks to be the proverbial "slippery slope"...

Easy to disable? Philips RFID shows the problem...

[adzoox]

After reading this story about Philips making RFIDs "capable of being shut off" [zdnet.co.uk] I did some research on how this was done. Apparently the RFID is sent a magnetic signal. I found out, that it appears if RFIDS are subjected to very strong magnetic forces it disables them ANYWAY.

So, my question is, if RFIDs are to be embedded in money, will it still be accepted if the RFID is off or not working. Will you have to take it to a bank (hassle) and get the whole note replaced or REactivated?

I would think people that work in highly magnetic work conditions or that are subject to mild radiation (cell phone users, utility workers, possily computer users) might face this problem.

Re:Hey! I'm mugging you!

[Flabby Boohoo]

Kinda frightening that there are so many posts with this same logic.

Will this revive bartering?

[jcknox]

Remember back in 1999 when people were talking about how the Y2K bug would result in society reverting to bartering & precious metals currency?

I wonder if eliminating cash as a nontraceable currency will prompt the emergence of additional non-fiat currency preferred by the privacy-conscious.

I can hear it now: "That non-DRM PC will cost you $3000 credit, $2900 cash, $600 in gold, or 10 cartons of banned cigarettes."

War-Mugging???

[The Jonas]

Kinda like War-Driving but with a "Step 3: Profit!" Another good reason for me to stick to using my Debit Card for most transactions, but there's DARPA's Total Info Awareness project. I guess if we are made to be too paranoid to carry/use cash then all our non-cash transactions are more easily tied-in to us and trackable.

Black Market

[Schezar]

This is a good thing... for the US!

Before the Euro, the international black market dealt mostly in American currency. Part of the reason for that is the fact that it behooves the US economy's controllers to have large amounts of it's currency base outside of the country. (Think about it. Print more money, buy 'things' with it, make sure monies paid leave country. Monies are not local to the economy, so inflation does not increase. Oversimplified, yes, but I'm making a general point here.)

The Euro was a threat to that black market monopoly. A strong Euro would be serious competition, and would likely drive at least some of the US's expatriated currency back within its own borders, wreaking havoc with the economy.

With the advent of tracking capabilities in the currency itself, the Euro is keeping itself out of the black market, which is good for the United States.

Europe had a chance to take a bite out of US hegemony. So much for that ^_^

Re:Privacy

[Neophytus]

How can a chip identifying a piece of paper identify you? It would not be reprogrammed to track you personally, just the movement of the paper you hold. Unless you carried ID that reprogrammed it every time (defeating the point in paper money and coins) then there is no practical way that you could be tracked as the person buying porn. Heck, it would be astounding if they were able to track what the notes were actually used for, just where and when. The cops could always check security tapes because of the time ID, but porn isn't illegal so they would have no reason to waste the time.

Data can only be written on the chip's ROM during production, and not after it is out "in the wild," according to Hitachi. - No personal tracking.

Easier Counterfitting?

[Glitch010101]

"Besides acting as a digital watermark, the use of radio chips could speed up routine bank processes such as counting. With such tags, a stack of notes can be passed through a reader and the sum added in a split second, similar to how inventory is tracked in an RFID-based system."

Step one: locate RFID's in lot of 100's
Step two: cut them out
Step three: Paste them on counterfits
Step four: circulate RFID-less bills at McDonalds and other storefronts too busy to check for RFID's
Step five: Deposit cash! Your bills are the "real" bills now

Re:New mugging tool

[Surak]

I doubt it. The problem is that -- first off -- cash is a bearer instrument. That means it's legal tender for anybody that possesses it. You don't 'own' any of the cash in your pocket, the government does. So you have no legal right to deactivate the money. Burning cash or defacing it it anyway is a violation of federal law in most countries, including the U.S. (it's called 'destruction of government property').

Anyway, if that worked, there would be nothing to stop anybody from giving someone 'deactivated' bills especially since not everyone walks around with an RFID reader, nor is it likely that everyone will have one anytime soon. Then you just bought something using money that's basically worthless, at least at places that have RFID readers.

Re:One question...

[Dutchmaan]

Full EFT for all transactions is almost here, but I think people still need a measure of security in being attached to their wealth.

Control of ones wealth has been moved steadily out of the owners hands for years. Going from the gold standard to paper money was one step. A piece of paper showing your wealth, but in essence just a piece of paper... Now it's just numbers on a screen.. full EFT essentially cuts you off from financial anonymity.

I like EFT, but there should always be alternatives for those who are concerned with privacy issues.

Re:Black Market

[Izeickl]

As I mention above, the biggest threat to the US economy is the oil nations selling in Euros more than the dollar (as Saddam started too), if the UK joins the Euro and Brent crude starts being produced in a Euro nation, then this will only push them further into using Euro also, just now the US has a license to print money for the world, that could stop. The Euro is also on the border of many many eastern nations where the black markets are rampent and arab nations. But its what oil is paid for with that really matters.

Re:Where's that bill been?

[irc.goatse.cx troll]

Log whos using the ATM that spits it out, follow all registered exchanges. Of course, Evading it is as easy as trading your 'club card' around. (those bulk food stores where you can use a card to get a discount on some items)

Re:Gov't Survelliance

[harrkev]

Wouldn't this be a fairly decent way to track people? Most people carry money on them, and while the money wouldn't have a unique identifier, I'd imagine someone who's clever could sidestep such. But hey, it would probably be a great way to detect counterfeiting, you know, for about a month :-p Tinfoil hats encouraged while reading this post (Too late!)

No tin foil hats, but I can see a new market for tin-foil wallets and tin-foil purses.

A whole new product opportunity!

Re:Some people don't take credit.

[rjamestaylor]

• congress persons

and other public officials don't take cash, either. Instead they accompany lobbiests and labor union chiefs to Atlantic City/Las Vegas and get chips...lots of them.

Just note how "lucky" government officials seem to be at the casinos next time you view their tax returns...lots of gambling "winnings".

The things you learn from the people you know...

Re:Am I the only one ...

[entrox]

What part of "Euro Banknotes" didn't you understand? This has nothing to do with the land of the (supposedly) free, but with the union where we have mandatory ID cards, strict weapon laws and people who see black boxes in cars as a /good/ thing and don't distrust the government like the mostly paranoid americans.

All my Euros already have a serial on them, so if somebody wants to trace them from the ATM to the grocery, they could already do so. This paranoid mentality, which seems to be really popular around Slashdot is really bewildering to me.

A powerful tool, how will it be used?

[Qzukk]

I can see this as being a powerful tool used either for good or for evil. Imagine blind people being able to know how much they are carrying without having to read each bill individually (currently they have little portable scanners they can feed the bills through to identify the denomination). Or knowing when a cashier has been slipping cash into their pockets.

Now, imagine tracking every purchase you make and arresting you because you bought a bottle of superglue on one day, and on the next day bought a bottle of something else that can be mixed with superglue to make toxic gas. If there is no oversight, this could quickly be abused to create a police state. Other posts include muggers knowing whether or not you're a good target, and the like. Deactivating them wouldn't be such a good plan since the transaction trail would point straight to you as the last recipient before the rfid died.

Re:If you'll never know that they're there...

[Lynx0]

>They'll never notice that you've taken them out.
>Micrrowave your cash today!

Yeah, great idea, and with the silver strips in the bills you'll have twice as many after microwaving, too!

Re:New mugging tool

[Grayputer]

Hey you miss the obvious druggie usage. If all transactions are recorded, the drug dealers can check the cash to see if it was issued to law enforcement. If more than say 20% of the cash in a deal has been issued to law enforcement recently, then assume it is a sting and back out or take other action. But of course the drug transaction will be recorded as some trivial sale (or series of sales). No one is going to record the transaction as 'sale of illegal drugs' in the trans log. So drug dealers can attempt to use the system against the cops. Hey maybe this is a law the druggies lobby for and the cops lobby against, interesting twist of fate :-). Oh well, just a thought :-).

euro less bulky

[AT]

...and a key advantage of the Euro for blackmarket transactions is that the highest denomination is 500, instead of 100 for US bills. Which means approximately five times fewer bills for large transactions. I've heard the US is considering introducing the 1000 dollar bill into general circulation to compete.

Re:Privacy

[mdielmann]

I don't want just anybody having access to the information about where I buy everything from my lunch to my porn.

Yeah, I reserve those rights for my credit card providers, my bank, my grocery store, my gas station, and my pharmacy! Keep the government out of my privacy! It's mine to sell!

*/joke*

If you think I believe all that, you haven't read my .sig...

Incorrect

[dipfan]

Wrong, I'm afraid - the US economy does benefit from holdings of dollars outside its borders, in theory, but no-one is sure exactly if it does, or by how much, in reality. In any case, the benefit to the US economy is on foregone interest payments, and has nothing at all do with inflation - the amount of narrow money supply (notes and coins) in an advanced economy such as the US is so small as to be insignificant to the money supply and therefore have virtually no effect on inflation. The vast majority of the US money supply is in the form of financial deposits -- and the vast majority of US dollar holdings outside the US borders is also in deposit form - electronic rather than cash.
So your conclusion is false, and based on a false premise. The currency holdings of the black economy, while large, are insignificant compared to legitimate investment and trading flows.

Time to institute money swaps

[sacrilicious]

When money becomes trackable, perhaps even beyond the ability of a microwaving to fix, I will make it a regular habit to ask friends and acquaintences if they'd like to enter into an ongoing money swap arrangement. People engaged in this practice will make it a habit to carry, say, $200 in cash, and will make it a point to swap bills every so often. As long as this is an ongoing practice, it's not even necessary to efficiently randomize who has what bills; all you need to do when questioned by Homeland Security about hookers/dope/etc is profess to be a money swapper, and offer to call numerous witnesses to that fact; ergo, anyone could have been the person who plunked down bills that the atm originally dispensed to you. And the social practice of swapping bills will serve to draw like-minded people together.

What will and will not work.

[pair-a-noyd]

Microwaves. Won't work. The "chips" are far too small for the wavelength to touch them.

EMP. EMP *IS* microwaves. At least EMP that you can generate at home. NO go.

Bulk erasers. Very strong magnetic field *MAY* affect these but I doubt it, I would think they took this in account for people that work near strong magnetic fields.

HV. High voltage, like 200,000 volts and up, such as from a $20 stun gun should do the trick. Not many electronic devices can take that sort of jolt.

So, to zap your money, just lay it on a board and ZAP the crap out of it with a ~$20 stun gun...

For the money (pun intended) go with HV ZAPz!!

Re:euro less bulky

[Guppy06]

"and a key advantage of the Euro for blackmarket transactions is that the highest denomination is 500, instead of 100 for US bills."

On the other hand, a payment in nothing but 500.00 EUR notes has fewer serial numbers for law enforcement to keep track of.

The black market would rather deal in ubiquitous 10.00 USD and 20.00 USD notes and would generally use larger bills only if they have to.