What Is the Purpose of Permalocking an RFID Tag?

And what are the risks of not doing so?

—Muneeb

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Muneeb,

There are a variety of reasons why companies might want the memory on their RFID tags to be locked. A tag with locked user memory will always respond to interrogation from an authorized source, only with the data initially encoded on it. This prevents potential counterfeiters from altering tags to fool retailers or buyers. There is considerable concern about fraudulent RFID tags on products, and permalocking the data makes the tags more secure. The permalock status of a tag also can mean that parties cannot write or alter data on a product's tag—for instance, in the supply chain. One note: the tag identification (TID) memory bank typically comes permalocked by the manufacturer. The other memory banks for EPC and user data can be both write- and read-locked to achieve the status mentioned above.

Claire Swedberg
Senior Editor
RFID Journal