An RFID Cure for the Checked Bag Blues?

Da Silva points to the case of a woman convicted of smuggling marijuana from Australia to Bali. The suspect claimed she had not packed the marijuana into her bag, that luggage handlers in Australia must have placed it there and that their cohorts in Bali must not have removed the drugs, as planned, before the bag went through the Bali airport security screening. If the luggage had been closed with a Secure Tag, however, the only way anyone could have hidden drugs inside the main cavity of a piece of luggage would have been by breaking the Secure Tag's strap.

Furthermore, only TSA officials—or, in the case of a non-U.S. airport, officials from its security administration—would have access to the approved straps to reseal the tag after the original strap had been cut to inspect the bag. Because the security strap can't be removed from the tag once it's in place, nefarious baggage handlers intent on stealing goods from bags or supplanting them with contraband would somehow need to obtain security straps from the TSA and also divert bags from the TSA's security inspection process, then reintroduce them with the rest of the bags bound for a flight. If they did this, however, and if the drugs or missing items were later discovered, security officials would have a leg up on finding the criminal parties since the data trail of Secure Tag reads would not track. That's because TSA officials would be taking reads of the tag embedded in the Secure Tags at the time of inspection.

The airline industry has carried out a number of tests using RFID inlays, embedded into paper bag tag stickers, to identify bags and link them to their owners, while the International Air Transport Association (IATA) has recently endorsed the use of UHF passive RFID devices compliant with ISO standards for such applications (see IATA Approves UHF for Bag Tags). A trial run by the TSA this year showed that UHF tags could be read in airports in Asia, North America and Europe, and with a higher success rate than the bar codes printed on bag tags (see EPC Bag Tagging Takes Wing).

Still, Da Silva asserts that because the RFID inlay inside the Secure Tag is protected by an impact- and static-resistant housing, it is more protected from shock and static than are the inlays embedded in bag tags. The Secure Tag, however, is more expensive than the paper alternative. Da Silva estimates that once his company is producing Secure Tags in volume, it will be able to offer the devices to airlines or airport authorities for roughly 38 cents each, while paper RFID bag tags would cost around 15 cents apiece.

D&D Secure Tag claims its devices represent a possible new revenue stream for airlines that paper-based tags cannot offer. Da Silva says airlines could generate this revenue by increasing the security surcharge for each ticket. "The cost of the tag is less than a postage stamp, but the airlines could increase the security surcharge by, say, $1," he says.

Because use of the Secure Tags would assure passengers their bags have not been tampered with or opened by anyone other than the TSA, he claims, they would willingly pay this surcharge.

The Secure Tag, says Da Silva, would also provide airlines with all the other benefits RFID bag tags can offer—namely, fewer lost or mishandled bags, which would translate into considerable operational savings and happier customers.

D&D Secure Tag has created prototypes of its device with UHF EPC Class 1 Gen 1 inlays from Alien Technology. The two companies are currently looking for an airline with which to partner on a proof-of-concept field trial, though in this case, each Secure Tag device would contain an Alien EPC Class 1 Gen 2 inlay instead of the Gen 1 inlay now being used for the prototype.

Bob McKinley, vice president of transportation business development for Alien Technologies, says he has not seen any other RFID devices similar to the Secure Tag, and that Alien is working to organize various stakeholders that can provide RFID-based luggage tracking solutions. "We want to take advantage of partnerships with companies like Secure Tag that are developing smart solutions," he says.