D7.7: RFID, Profiling, and AmI

Title: ABBREVIATIONS & GLOSSARY

AI* – artificial intelligence 

DRM* – digital rights management 

EPC*- electronic product code 

HCI* – human computer interaction 

MITM* – man-in-the-middle attack 

MRTD – machine readable travel documents 

PET* – privacy enhancing technology 

RFID – radio frequency identification 

SCM – supply chain management 

TET* – transparency enhancing technology 

actuator - the mechanism by which an agent acts upon an environment. The agent can be either an artificial intelligent agent or any other autonomous being (human, other animal, etc). (wikpedia April 2006)

artificial intelligence (AI) - intelligence exhibited by an artificial entity. Such a system is generally assumed to be a computer; also a branch of computer science; also a scientific discipline, focused on providing solutions to real life problems (in medicine, engineering, the military). (wikipedia April 2006)

digital rights management (DRM) - umbrella term referring to any of several technologies used to enforce pre-defined policies controlling access to software, music, movies, or other digital data and hardware. In more technical terms, DRM* handles the description, layering, analysis, valuation, trading and monitoring of the rights held over a digital work. In the widest possible sense, the term refers to any such management. [wikipedia April 2006]

distributive group profile – a group profile with distributive properties, which means that the ‘properties are valid for each individual member of the group’ (Custers 2005:61), this is for instance the case for the group of members of the group of bachelors, who share the property of not being married. Most group profiles generated in the process of data mining are non-distributive.

electronic product code (EPC) - a code electronically recorded on an RFID tag* [wikipedia April 2006]

human computer interaction (HCI) - the refers to how people (the users) interact with a particular machine, device, computer program or other complex tool (the system). An important aspect of HCI research is the development and optimisation of user interfaces.

man-in-the-middle attack (MITM) – (in cryptology) an attack in which an attacker is able to read, insert and modify at will, messages between two parties without either party knowing that the link between them has been compromised

non-distributive group profile - a group profile with non-distributive properties, which means that the ‘property is valid for the group and for individuals as members of the group, though not for those individuals as such’ (Custers 2005:61), this is for instance the case for members of the group of smokers, who have a specific chance to develop long cancer, but depending on their age, gender and life-style this chance may vary.

personalised profiles – a personalised profile is a profile that is highly specific to a particular person, either based on data collected from this person and/or based on group profiles that may have been combined for a specific context to allow customised servicing of an individual customer or very specific knowledge about a person with regard to potential criminal or security risks. See FIDIS deliverable 7.2, section 3.3.

PETs – are defined as “a coherent system of ICT measures that protects privacy […] by eliminating or reducing personal data or by preventing unnecessary and/or undesired processing of personal data; all without losing the functionality of the data system.” (Borking 1996, translation taken from Borking, Raab 2001).

RFID system - may consist of several components: tags, tag readers*, edge servers, middleware, and application software. The purpose of an RFID system is to enable data to be transmitted by a mobile device, called a tag, which is read by an RFID reader* and processed according to the needs of a particular application. The data transmitted by the tag may provide identification or location information, or specifics about the product tagged, such as price, color, date of purchase, etc. [wikipedia April 2006]

RFID tag - a small object that can be attached to or incorporated into a product, animal, or person. RFID tags contain silicon chips and antennas to enable them to receive and respond to radio-frequency queries from an RFID transceiver* [wikipedia April 2006]

reader – see transceiver*

sensor - a physical device or biological organ that detects, or senses, a signal or physical condition and chemical compounds; an electronic sensor is a type of transducer* [wikipedia April 2006]

TETs* – transparency enhancing technologies, which have not been developed yet. Their function is not the history management of the data of a data subject, but the anticipation of profiles that may be applied to this a particular data subject. This concerns personalised profiles* as well as distributive* or non-distributive group profiles*, possibly constructed out of anonymous data. The point would be to have some idea of the selection mechanisms (application of profiles) that may be applied, allowing a person adequate anticipation. To be able to achieve this the data subject needs access - in addition to his own personal data and a profiling / reporting tool - to additional external data sources, allowing some insight in the activities of the data controller. Based on this additional information the data subject could perform a kind of counterprofiling. TETs* will be further discussed in deliverable 7.9.

transceiver - a device that has a transmitter and a receiver which are combined [wikipedia April 2006]

transducer - a device, usually electrical or electronic, that converts one type of energy to another for the purpose of measurement or information transfer. Most transducers are either sensors* or actuators [wikipedia April 2006]

transponder - a receiver-transmitter* that will generate a reply signal upon proper electronic interrogation. [wikipedia April 2006]

ubiquitous computing - the method of enhancing computer use by making many computers available throughout the physical environment, but making them effectively invisible to the user [Mark Weiser 1993, available at: www.ubiq.com/hypertext/weiser/UbiCACM.html]