$20 US Bills have RFID tags in them

[David Prahl]

http://www.prisonplanet.com/022904rfidtagsexplode.html

:worried: Suddenly I like quarters and dimes. Old ones.

I know the site is a bit "out there", but it's an iteresting idea. I'm tempted to microwave the new 20 I have...

Does anyone have access to X-RAY equipment? Wouldn't a tag show up?

[PetiteFlower]

I think this is mainly to thwart thieves rather then to track people's purchases. There's still nothing that connects a particular bill to an individual person, and as wasteful as the government is, I still don't think they're paying people to sit around and watch money change hands all day. If you're a bank robber this will probably hurt you but if you are an ordinary law abiding citizen I don't think you have to worry about big brother watching you spend cash.

[c38b2]

Someone with an RFID scanner can scan you and find out exactly how much cash you're carrying. :worried:

[c38b2]

Does anyone have access to X-RAY equipment? Wouldn't a tag show up?
The tags are the size of a grain of sand - I don't think that ordinary xray equiptment can pick it up. Furthermore, it could cause the chip to explode, so... 8O

[JackTheTripper]

Just cut his eye out and throw it away. ;) A bill is still good as long as you have more than 50% of it and a full serial number

[JustinGTP]

Is there anyting similar in Canadian money?

[Pat Logsdon]

I call Urban Legend on this one.

A) All new $20 bills have a strip of metal foil in them, and if I remember correctly, it runs right through Jackson's eye. Remember what happens when you microwave metal? :mrgreen:

B) RFID is just now starting to be used for commercial applications. Wal-Mart is set to start using it (http://www.cioinsight.com/article2/0,3959,1265594,00.asp) in 2005 for their supply chain, but only for crates and pallets, meaning the tags are probably large. This leads to two additional problems: First, that it's very expensive, or you'd see it used much more widely, and b) if this rumor was true, it would mean that the U.S. government moved faster than industry. :!:

C) As far as I can tell, the chip that is small enough to actually fit in Jackson's eye was just released by Hitachi (http://www.infoworld.com/article/03/09/02/HNhitachirfid_1.html) in September 2003. Meaning that it will be expensive. The only reported "wide" usage of that new chip is for tickets to a fair in Japan in 2005.

There's a thread on Slashdot (http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=98942&cid=8437731) that talks about this, too.

[David Prahl]

Any way to tell if it's an RFID tag or a strip of metal?

[Pat Logsdon]

You know, I think I fell for a bit of rumor myself. :oops:

Looks like the strip in the 20 is plastic, and is farther left. Ah well.

You could probably still get the effect shown in the photos by putting a small piece of metal on over A.J.'s eye... :wink:

[foldedspace]

It's kind of funny that the foil now goes over the money, rather than on the top of the head.

[David Prahl]

So is it an urban legend? Anyone? :?:

[GoldKey]

So is it an urban legend? Anyone? :?:

I'd say yes. According to this site http://www.mountainviewsystems.net/RFID%20tag%20forecast.htm
tags cost about $0.47 each.

According to this site http://www.wisdomportal.com/Currency/USCurrency.html
there are approximately 4,397,669,724 $20 bills in circulation. Assuming they would want to eventually replace all of these bills eventually and even assuming they could get much lower costs in bulk, this could easily cost over a billion dollars to do.

Plus, if it were real, I would expect a more through examination then just blowing them up in a microwave. I would think a quick pop under the microscope would probably clear it up.

[c38b2]

It wasn't because they were microwaved that people concluded there was an RFID chip inside - they were messing up an RFID scanner which is why they were microwaved and eventually exploded.

[Kevin C. Tofel]

There's still nothing that connects a particular bill to an individual person.

You're right of course...but I thought this site (http://www.wheresgeorge.com/) was appropriate to add to this thread. By entering the serial numbers of your bills, you can potentially track where your bill has recently been....assuming that the person who has it next enters the serial number also.....interesting and funny....

KCT