RFID is short for Radio-frequency Identification. It’s an identification technology that uses electromagnetic fields to automatically identify and track tags attached to objects. As we all know, it is not the extremely high end technology, and it’s not even a currently occurred product. But to be honest, it’s one of those precious inventions that remain their force and efficiency even when time flies by. You might not notice, but the RFID technology has been utilized in many aspects and many areas in our daily lives. RFID cabinet lock, RFID tagged golf balls, RFID bee populations tracking, even Walmart, Vatican Library and NASA use RFID technology to finish the identification and tracking processes.

One of the fun facts about the RFID technology is that it was invented by Harry Stockman, who is said to be a soviet spy back in the 40s. Around almost three decades after that, Mario Cardullo demonstrated his new RFID device to New York Port Authority in 1971, the RFID technology gained its public recognition and then widely utilized and applied in many different situations. One of the few positive sides of wars is probably that many new technologies created within wartimes could actually produce some good for humanity later.

As we have mentioned above, the RFID as identification technology, so it naturally comes with two parts normally, the RFID tag and the reader. The tags are attached to the would-be identified objects, then the readers and the tags exchange information. And of course, as we are talking about the tags and readers, there’re multiple different types of them, to fit in different situations and solves different problems.

There are actually two types of RFID tags out the markets. The active one and the passive one. The passive one contains no battery inside and doesn’t transmit signal. The active one contains battery on board, it periodically sends the identification signal to the reader.