Groceries, Pets, Baggage May Soon Be Infected with Computer Viruses

Groceries, Pets, Baggage May Soon be Infected With Computer Viruses

March 2006 By News Staff

According to researchers at Vrije University in Amsterdam, radio frequency identification tags (RFID) -- often implanted in pets and grocery items for quick identification -- are susceptible to computer viruses.

According to a release from Vrije University, Melanie Rieback and her supervisor Prof. Andrew Tanenbaum have found a way of placing a computer virus onto a RFID tag. This was previously considered impossible because of the limited memory capacity of the tags. Rieback gave a demonstration of her discovery on Wednesday 15 March at the annual IEEE Conference on Pervasive Computing and Communications in Pisa.

According to the release, one infected RFID tag is capable of disrupting an entire system with disastrous consequences. In May, 2006, for example, Las Vegas airport will attach RFID tags to speed baggage handling. If someone intentionally attaches an infected RFID tag to a case, the entire system could be thrown into disarray. As soon as the case is scanned, the infected tag will be able to invade the airport's