PUBLIC DOMAIN 128

Press release

US RFID expert and consumer protection activist Katherine Albrecht from Boston coming to lecture at FoeBuD e.V.

Visit to Future Store of German METRO group

The chairwoman of the US-American consumer protection organisation CASPIAN, Katherine Albrecht, will be coming to Germany to hold a lecture on RFID at the German organisation FoeBuD e.V. Both organisations have been committed to consumer- and data-protection for years (e.g. "loyalty" cards) and will be cooperating more closely in the future. Katherine Albrecht finds it especially interesting that Germany has come further with respect to RFID than the USA: Germany has obviously been chosen as the testing area for the introduction of RFID on the consumer level.

RFID is the abbreviation of "radio frequency identification" with the help of tiny electrical devices. These chips, when held to a reading device, send out an identification number. According to the wishes of the big companies, they are supposed to replace bar codes. But they can do a lot more than them. Through the connection of RFID technology with data bases, customer privacy can be annihilated.

Katherine Albrecht will visit the METRO "Future Store" at Rheinberg on Saturday, January 31. Together with Rena Tangens and padeluun from FoeBuD e.V. she will be received by Dr Gerd Wolfram, project manager of the METRO Group Future Store Initiative, and press officer Albrecht von Truchsess.

By invitation through FoeBuD e.V, she will also be holding a lecture on RFID in FoeBud's lecture series "Public Domain" on Sunday, February 1, 03:00 p.m., at the Bunker Ulmenwall in Bielefeld. On Monday, Katherine Albrecht will be available for press interviews by appointment.

Katherine Albrecht had a leading role in the formulation of the critical RFID position statement (http://www.spychips.com/jointrfid_position_paper.htm). FoeBuD e.V. was one of the first endorsers of this statement and translated it into German (http://www.foebud.org/texte/aktion/rfid). In this statement the endorsers call for, among other things, a moratorium on the introduction of RFID. Another of their demands is that the moratorium must be financed by the big companies.

Schedule

Sunday, January 31st:
Arrival at Duesseldorf airport
Visit to METRO Group's "Future Store" at Rheinberg
Departure to Bielefeld

Sunday, February 1st:
03.00 p.m. (to ca. 07:00 p.m.) "Public Domain" lecture:
"Spy chips in the yoghurt cup - coming soon!"

Monday, February 2nd:
Individual interviews by appointment

Tuesday, February 3rd:
Departure from Duesseldorf airport

Links:

Information on CASPIAN:
www.nocards.org
www.spychips.com

Information on FoeBuD e.V.:
www.foebud.org
www.bigbrotherawards.de

Position statement on RFID:
www.spychips.com/jointrfid_position_paper.htm (English)
www.foebud.org/texte/aktion/rfid (German)

Big-Brother-Awards-Eulogy on METRO Group Future Store Initiative:
www.bigbrotherawards.de/2003/.cop

Location of lecture:
www.bunker-ulmenwall.de

Coordination:
Rena Tangens and padeluun, FoeBuD e.V.
Phone: +49-(0)-521-175254
Fax: +49-(0)-521-61172
E-mail: presse@foebud.org