Electronic “Tagging” of Air Travelers Set For Trial in Hungary

First came the news that passports will soon be embedded with radio-frequency identification (RFID) chips. Now comes word about “Optag,” an experimental tagging project at University College London that will assign RFID chips to all passengers at Hungary’s Debrecen Airport. “The basic idea is that airports could be fitted with a network of combined panoramic cameras and RFID (radio frequency ID) tag readers, which would monitor the movements of people around the various terminal buildings,” Project leader Paul Brennan told the BBC. He says tagging passengers would aid airport security. Needless to say, privacy issues are also a concern. If the tests are successful in Hungary, Brennan says the technology could be deployed in airports elsewhere in the world “within two years.”

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