Development of Consumer RFID Applications and Services

Abstract

Basically RFID is a wireless communication technology within the L1 (Layer 1, the physical layer of the OSI 7-layer Reference Model) and L2 scopes between RFID tag and reader. An RFID tag works as a data storage and transmits stored data to an RFID reader via the wireless technology. Such a basic communication scope can be extended by inter-networking of a series of networks to support business and consumer applications. Thus RFID has been adopted for enterprise business purposes in the form of Business-to-Business (B2B) RFID applications in retail, logistics, supply chain management, pharmaceutical industries, etc. Nowadays an RFID reader is being equipped in a cell phone, which enables network-based consumer-purposes RFID applications called B2C (Business-to-Customer). Additionally a business partnership may integrate B2B with B2C applications into B2B2C applications. Consumer applications are provided as services to consumers. Such B2B, B2C and B2B2C applications must be based on network and communication among functional entities distributed in a closed enterprise network or an open, public network like Internet. When RFID stayed in limited environments with limited purposes, development and standardization issues were not too many. But applying RFID to those new application areas requires consideration of L1 to L7 issues and expands the development and standardization scopes of RFID into higher layer scopes. Each RFID application type may produce new challenges with different characteristics and different requirements. This chapter identifies a new business opportunity by integration of RFID with mobile telecommunication networks to enable consumer RFID applications and services, describes its development models in terms of communication model, functional configuration, message exchange procedure, and case studies, and then summarizes relevant activities of standardization in ISO/IEC, ITU-T and NFC Forum.