The RFID industry on Monday moved to quiet concerns about the potential for misuse of the technology’s tracking and surveillance capabilities by introducing a kind of manifesto designed to increase consumers’ comfort level with the technology.

A diverse coalition including watchdog groups such as the National Consumers League and the Center for Democracy & Technology; tech companies such as IBM, Microsoft, and Intel; and corporate users such as Procter & Gamble and Visa USA had some input in the best practices manifesto.

The manifesto and the diversity of its authors may be unprecedented in the annals of computer technology, particularly since RFID (radio frequency identification) is generally not a technology sold directly to consumers.

Even corporate email, which at its emergence had massive potential for surveillance, did not raise the level of concern that RFID has, despite the fact that the technology is widely used in highway toll booths, the shipping industry, livestock tracking, and the tracking of pets.

“We learned from applications such as email what privacy issues can be raised,” said Kevin Ashton, vice president of marketing for ThingMagic, a Cambridge, Massachusetts-based designer of reading devices for RFID systems.

“It’s good that these problems are being worked out before the technology emerges,” he added. “We are getting more proactive at thinking these things through before problems arise.”

Human Surveillance

RFID’s potential for the surveillance of unsuspecting humans has saddled the technology with a public relations problem. The problem revolves around the technology’s retail applications, where stores can embed RFID tags in products.

RFID is a set of technologies that allow users to track and identify physical items using radio waves. RFID “tags” carry a limited amount of information that can be read from a distance.

The best practices introduced on Monday at an industry trade show outline how consumers should be notified about RFID data collection, along with what choice they should have with regard to their own personal information.

It also outlines how that information should be treated by the companies that collect it.

No Customer Offense

“As an industry we have been at this since 2001,” said Mr. Ashton. “We commissioned consumer research to understand what the reaction to the technology would be. It is that study that forms the basis of today’s best practices.”

Proponents of the technology have been challenged from a number of areas, and some vocal sectors of that constituency have monitored the technology very closely.

“There are always going to be extremists on the fringes, but the fringe is not the constituency we are trying to convince,” said Mr. Ashton. “It’s the other 99 percent of the population that we are focusing on. It’s not good business to offend your customers.”

The solutions to the technology’s problems are fairly simple, according to Mr. Ashton.

“People want to know whether what they are buying has an RFID tag or not, and they want a way to turn those tags off,” he said. “They want to know what information is being collected and how they can get access to it. People need choice and access.”

The best practices document, which can be found here, does not lay out penalties for companies that don’t live up to these claims, but according to Mr. Ashton, the “teeth” lie in the oversight of the Federal Trade Commission.

“If a company lays out its privacy policy publicly, it is liable for fines and prosecution by the FTC for deceptive trade practices if they don’t live up to those policies,” he said. “Businesses are social entities and if the leaders in a market set up guidelines, there is pressure on everyone else to meet those standards.”