Abstract
Abstract Radio frequency identification (RFID) is a widely used wireless technology for contactless data exchange. Owing to international standardization and one-way security nature of the communication protocol, RFID tags, holding sensitive information, may be a subject to theft. One of the major security loopholes is the so-called far-field attack, where unauthorized interrogation is performed from a distance, bypassing the user’s verification. This loophole is a penalty of using a dipole-like RFID tag antenna, leaking wireless information to the far-field. Here we introduce a new concept of anapole-enabled security, prohibiting far-field attacks by utilizing fundamental laws of physics. Our design is based on radiationless electromagnetic states (anapoles), which have high near-field concentration and theoretically nulling far-field scattering. The first property enables performing data readout from several centimeters (near-field), while the second prevents attacks from a distance, regardless an eavesdropper’s radiated power and antenna gain. Our realization is based on a compact 3 cm high-index ceramic core–shell structure, functionalized with a thin metal wire and an integrated circuit to control the tag. Switching scheme was designed to provide a modulation between two radiation-less anapole states, blocking both up and down links for a far-field access. The anapole tag demonstrates more than 20 dB suppression of far-field interrogation distance in respect with a standard commercial tag, while keeping the near-field performance at the same level. The proposed concept might significantly enhance the RFID communication channel in cases, where information security prevails over cost constrains.
Highlights
Radio frequency identification (RFID) is one of the commonly used approaches to a short-range wireless data exchange
These dips in the spectra are the anapole states, which were identified by observing Figure 1(b)
We optimize the switching between two anapole of the core–shell, which was analyzed in the previous section
Summary
Radio frequency identification (RFID) is one of the commonly used approaches to a short-range wireless data exchange. Small transactions do not require an authorization, opening a significant security loophole, which is a penalty of using wireless technologies for customers’ convenience Those types of attacks are performed from short distances owing to aspects of low frequency (125 KHz, 13.56 MHz) electromagnetic designs. The goal of our investigation is to develop a tag, which will be immune to far-field attacks and, on the other hand, will be freely accessible from a short distance, maintaining the wireless nature of the RFID communication channel. The security in this case is not provided by a software encryption, but granted by antenna design, ensuring unconditional operation in the frame of the RFID standard. RFID operation and far-field attach suppression is analyzed before conclusion
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