The Applications of RFID's Impact on Privacy

• Main Authors: chia-Jung Chang, 張家榮
• Other Authors: Ruey-Hsing Chang
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2009
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/60581674650195007832

碩士 === 南台科技大學 === 財經法律研究所 === 97 === Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) is one of the most important inventions in this century. The right to privacy is a new right originated from the personality rights during its development process. When the newly emerging technology creates impacts on this new right, what we can do to reconcile the two from the perspective of techniques and the legal system becomes the core we tend to bring up for discussions in this paper. Two major points, RFID and the right to privacy, were introduced in the beginning of this paper. Then, discussions on the conflicts between the two were made. Afterwards, we studied on how we could technically and legally prevent the right to privacy from being infringed by RFID. RFID not only is one of the most important inventions in this century but also has become a part of our daily lives. On the other hand, the right to privacy has gradually been valued by the public in Taiwan due to technological development and the reports covered by the media in recent years though the development of the legal protection system for the right to privacy moves more slowly than the western countries. The doubts of the infringement on the right to privacy arise immediately upon the applications of RFID. RFID features contactless and long-distance transmission, which leads to the possibility of illegal access to the information at the same time. The location of a person can be tracked by reading RFID tag. Therefore, the core which this paper tends to explore is how the right to privacy should be protected under the above mentioned condition. The right to privacy is one of the essential rights which a human being should possess for survival. It is also an essential right for maintaining a democratic and legal system. When our basic rights are affected by technology, we should carefully consider what we could do to respond. If legislation excessively limits new technologies, the related development would be confined and such technology may decline followed by the fall of related industries. However, if technology is developed without any limitation and no proper control is placed, the basic human rights may be jeopardized. This becomes a difficulty and requires wisdom for the authorities to reach a balance between technology and basic human rights. This paper will observe how advanced countries in Europe and America respond to newly emerging technologies in protecting the right to privacy under the impact brought by RFID. In addition, this paper will discuss whether or not the laws and regulations for protecting the right to privacy under the current legal system in Taiwan are sufficient to deal with the impacts brought by RFID. Finally, several suggestions are made in responding to the impacts on the protection of the right to privacy brought by the applications of RFID.