Evan Schuman

Gift cards are quickly becoming an extremely popular retail payment option, but the traditional analog cards suffer from a lack of security when used for e-commerce. The card itself becomes virtually irrelevant, with the number—which can be guessed or hacked into—the only means of identifying the card. Customers who purchase cards that have already been […]

A Washington-based IP development company is talking up a patented method it says will allow low-cost passive RFID tags to monitor temperatures just as active tags do, but for less than one-twentieth the cost. A statement from Gentag describes the patented offering as “an ultra-linear, low-power, single-calibration temperature-sensor circuit that can be directly integrated on […]

A French court of appeals on June 28 sided with leather goods manufacturer Louis Vuitton and ruled that Google had violated trademark, unfair competition and advertising laws by showing ads for Vuitton rivals when people searched for Vuitton. The closely watched case—which involves Google having to pay a fine of about $250,000—has huge implications for […]

American consumers—especially frequent fliers—are becoming quite comfortable with self-checkout systems, to the tune of a projected $475 billion in self-checkout purchases this year, according to a new study from IHL Consulting Group. Thats a 47 percent increase over what IHL recorded last year, and the consulting company is predicting the sharp increases will continue, with […]

Even CIOs at billion-dollar retailers have to put their jeans on one upgrade at a time. But Guess CIO Michael Relich found himself in an especially difficult position when Web analytics told him that 60 percent of his e-commerce sites search results were delivering “not found” responses to prospects. Guess site search was a legacy […]

The commissioner for Information and Privacy in Ontario unveiled June 19 a series of tips and guidelines for using RFID within her part of Canada. First of all, the fact that a major Canadian province even has an information and privacy commissioner makes me look longingly to the North. But I believe bacon should be […]

In theory, a smart phone can bring into the store the depth of data possible on the Web, merged with enough site- and user-specific data to make even the stodgiest CRM system blush. But can it work in the real world? NeoMedia is arguing that it can. NeoMedia is pushing its offering dubbed iPOS (Interactive […]

A Los Altos, Calif., technology vendor called SmartTools thinks that customers should stop lollygagging around in the cashier checkout lanes. While waiting, they should be scanning their own items and saving the cashiers time. If you find this idea attractive, we need to chat. (Hint: This is not an especially good career-advancement purchase.) The tradition […]

Few companies have come to represent the RFID space—warts and all—so clearly as has Alien Technology. So when the company announced plans to seek an IPO, it was Wall Streets first big shot at evaluating the RFID market. Aliens S-1 SEC filing delivers few surprises beyond the required candid lawsuit-avoiding language so popular in SEC […]

For years, RFID proponents have pointed to item-level tagging as the Holy Grail, the ultimate payoff when all of the RFID pieces fell into place. Thats when full ROI would happen, out-of-stocks would become an age-old memory and smartcarts would become what the Jetsons had always intended. As the industry joke went, the timetable for […]

The IEEE has started work on a new protocol—a standard called IEEE 1902.1 also known as RuBee—that is expected to give retailers and manufacturers an attractive alternative to RFID for many applications, especially item-level efforts. Officials say they expect products based on the protocol to be available within 12 to 18 months. The initial backers […]

More than a quarter of a million Hotels.com customers are now at high risk for credit card theft after a password-protected laptop computer containing their credit card information was stolen from an Ernst & Young auditors locked car in what appears to be a “random petty theft,” a Hotels.com spokesperson was quoted as telling the […]