From Barcodes to RFID

Aug 1, 2005 12:00 PM, By Jacqueline Emigh

An airplane engine, a cell phone, a Microsoft Word software package and an aluminum shipping container filled with cereal boxes. All have something in common: Each can be seen as an “asset,” and can be protected through computer technology.

While assets obviously vary in size and value, many need to be protected.

“Mobile assets” and “IT (information technology) assets” can pose an especially tough security job. Computer-based tools can come in particularly handy in these situations.

“IT assets” are computer hardware and software items that can be installed on — and, conversely, uninstalled from — a corporate computer network. A number of vendors, including household names like Microsoft Corp. and Intel Corp., produce asset management systems for the IT arena.

“Mobile assets,” on the other hand, consist of objects that can be transported to various places in the physical world. Examples range from delivery trucks to cardboard cartons, heavy-duty reusable shipping containers and big machines such as X-ray devices and airplane engines.

Certain items — including cell phones and laptop PCs — show characteristics of both IT assets and mobile assets. As some see it, many companies should be doing a lot more to safeguard these mobile IT devices, as well as the valuable company information they frequently contain.

“Many organizations have more protections in place for printing paper than for mobile devices,” says Jason Jaynes, director of product management at Credant Technologies, Dallas. “But cell phones, PDAs and laptops are assets that can be easily stolen — or left on a bus — whenever they roam outside the corporate network.”

Credant makes software for preventing unauthorized access to data stored on these mobile IT assets. Features include encryption (or “scrambling”) of data on the hard drive, along with the ability to prevent synchronization between a mobile device and computers situated on the corporate network.

Other companies in the mobile asset arena focus more on tracking the locations of these assets.

Out with the old, in with the new

Whether protecting cartons of food or shipments of military rifles, the current trend involves moving from older barcode tracking systems to newer RFID technology, which uses tags embedded with wireless sensors.

“RFID is the only technology for collecting data (about objects) that does not rely on physical contact, operator intervention and direct line of sight,” says Cliff Horowitz, president and CEO of SAMSys Technologies Inc., Toronto.

RFID tags also store more detailed information than other asset tracking systems, and RFID can track multiple objects simultaneously.

What kinds of problems can RFID help to thwart? In the United Kingdom, the brewing industry has turned to RFID-enabled beer kegs in hopes of curbing beer-related crimes. “‘Gray market’ beer is quite an issue there,” says David Adams, senior VP for corporate strategy and technology at TrenStar, Greenwood Village, Colo. “Somebody will steal a keg that's sitting outside a pub, for instance. They don't fill the keg with beer that's entirely ‘fake.’ Instead, they fill it with a non-premium beer, and then try to sell it as a premium beer,” Adams says.

In North America, retail chains such as Wal-Mart and Target are testing RFID for purposes that will ultimately include inventory management and theft reduction in department stores and distribution centers.

Product distributors and RFID vendors are also pitching in on the retail RFID tests. SAMsys, for example, is working with bicycle maker Pacific Cycle in a Wal-Mart pilot.

What about the traditional IT-oriented asset management systems used on corporate networks? These play a number of roles, but one of them is to be able to detect software installed by employees without permission, either innocently or with malicious intent.

Often, organizations use these systems to detect unlicensed software packages, thereby fending off the possibility of software piracy charges, Horowitz says.

Meanwhile, due to factors ranging from terrorism fears to regulatory pressures, asset protection is taking some interesting new turns.

TrenStar, for example, is running its entire business around outsourcing mobile asset management functions within certain selected industries.

Beyond attaching RFID or barcode tags to shipping containers, TrenStar creates physical distribution networks aimed at helping companies to gain economies of scale by sharing a “pool” of containers.

Using special software known as a “decision support system,” TrenStar reaches conclusions about which containers need to be repaired, and which should be sent to long-term storage, for example.

In the United Kingdom, TrenStar works with brewers that include Carlsberg, Coors, and Scottish Newcastle. “One of our customers has an entity in Scotland. Before we came on the scene, if this company sent a shipment to London, the keg needed to return to Scotland for it to be used again. Now, the same keg can be quickly reused by another customer of ours, located 20 or 30 miles outside of London,” Adams says.

Other TrenStar customers run the gamut from synthetic rubber manufacturers such as Exxon, Mobil and Firestone to food makers such as Kraft and Kellogg's. The food companies are sharing RFID-enabled aluminum shipping containers.

At the same time, vendors such as Cobalt, Manassas, Va., are starting to combine RFID with additional sensors to detect radiation, anthrax poisoning and other terrorist ploys.

IT-based asset protection

IT-oriented asset management systems are being integrated with other IT software to help information security professionals get a better handle on the myriad components sitting somewhere on the corporate network. For instance, Newport, Calif.-based LiveTime has already interfaced its help desk software to asset management systems that include Microsoft's SMS (Systems Management Server), Intel's LanDesk and Novell's ZenWorks, for instance.

“Eventually, we're going to attach our product to just about every (IT) asset management system in existence,” says Dr. Darren Williams, LiveTime's CEO.

Why? Many large organizations are running different IT asset management systems in various pockets of their corporate networks.

Companies are using LiveTime's software to bring together information about their IT assets into a central place. Williams views this feature as particularly important in light of emerging regulations such as the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which can hold company officers responsible for white-collar crimes committed by other employees.

LiveTime's software is also designed to be helpful in identifying and solving technical problems on the corporate network. Customers range from People's Bank to the City of Prescott, Ariz. and the University of Northern British Columbia in Canada.

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ABOUT THE COMPANIES

For information, circle the Reader Service Card number (listed below) or visit securitysolutions.com

Cobalt	45
Credant Technologies	46
LiveTime	47
SAMSys Technologies Inc.	48
Trenstar	49

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© 2008 Penton Media Inc.

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