Talk:Electronic article surveillance

Acousto-magnetic systems
Here are some references:

Herzer, G., “Magnetic materials for electronic article surveillance”, Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials, 254-255, p598-602, 2003.

HowStuffWorks.com, “How Anti-shoplifting Devices Work”, , accessed 18/2/2008.

there are some other patents which describe the design of them as well.

--Oosacker (talk) 10:39, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Bias?
I think this article needs to be a bit more rounded. In the second half, when discussing "limitations", the wording suggests ways to defeat an EAS system and implies that the article's purpose is consumer advocacy. The external links continue this trend. A more balanced approach would also discuss the issue of theft from the retailer's point of view, provide technical information on the EAS gates and not just the EAS tags, and treat "limitations" from a theft-prevention perspective in addition to a theft-how-to perspective.

I also had difficulty understanding some of the text due to missing words(?) or other issues. For example, "...coupled to a microwave and an electrostatic antenna" is missing a noun after microwave. Is it a microwave emitter? Antenna? Transponder? Another example: "However sticking a powerful magnet will bias disposable magnetic tags..." What does "sticking" mean in this context?

Regardless of the bias issue, I would like to see this article edited for clarity by someone familiar with the technologies involved. Deviantgoods 17:30, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

Bias...
Well I didn't intially write anything about the merchant's point of view since I'm more familiar with the technical stuff. I added a small paragraph about the benefits of the EAS system. Someone should do a little research on the cost-benefit analysis (data for which should be readily available on the sites of EAS manufacturers). --Congruence 18:24, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

Can we remove the bias tag now ?
Especially since the external links, being dead, have been removed. --Congruence 18:21, 20 October 2005 (UTC)
 * It is not there anymore. --Chealer (talk) 16:09, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

False alarms
I think something does need to be said about false alarms. That's a problem that's been around as long as these machines have existed, and it's a major fustration all around. JesseG 05:45, 22 January 2006 (UTC)
 * I added an example of Cat5 cable vs. RF system, a generalized personal experience a few years ago. I still have that cable (5 meters of UTP, crimped crossover, manufacturer unknown) and still carry it mostly in its original form (a coil of about 15 cm in diameter). The thing itself was setting off almost every alarm in the mall, and even the clerk who sold it to me wasn't able to "deactivate" it (he actually was trying to fry the usual RF label on the package). Those "resistant" alarms probably were less sensitive, or at different frequency, or of different type altogether. Since then I was thinking, what a coincidence! However everything looks well in theory (cable length determines its capacitance which is significant due to lots of parallel conductors, and bending radius adjusts the inductance) -- and perhaps seems trivial to a skilled radio amateur. Sadly, I don't have access to a dipmeter, or at least HF generator and HF voltmeter, to make a few experiments. --saimhe (talk) 20:17, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Detecting jamming ?
Someone at 69.113.144.68 wrote:

Jamming can usually be detected by an attentive retailer who will notice false alarming or phantoming by his or her electronic article surveillance system.

I know this to be false at least for acousto-magnetic systems. Please include more specific details about this. --Congruence 20:52, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

Pictures from the german version
The german article on this subject has nice pictures. Can someone more familiar with wiki include them on this page ? --Congruence 00:52, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

Necessary information
The article should include more information about the methods used for breaking this sistems, which will be really helpful for shopkeepers.

Sensormatic acousto-magnetic tag
Examining inside a Sensormatic AM tag, I found 3 metal strips similar to those in this picture, i.e., one inside a separate transparent compartment and two slightly longer ones outside. I wonder which strip is ferromagnetic (i.e., bias magnet) and which strip is magnetostrictive. Also, I wonder specifically what kind of ferromagnetic and magnetostrictive materials are used in Sensormatic tags. Thanks, Warut (talk) 10:45, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

I think the strip that has a grainy look is the magnetostrictive one. It is made of an alloy called "metglas" (see the references). I would guess the bias strip is made of magnetized steel. --Congruence (talk) 11:33, 8 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Thanks a lot for your answer, Congruence! :) Warut (talk) 13:49, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

The two strips in the compartment together are the magnetostrive ones. The other strip is the bias material. "Metglas, Inc." is a manufacturer of amorphous metals. See their web site for specific alloy information. 2826mb3 (talk) 20:38, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Great article...

... helping wannabe shoplifters to become professional shoplifters...Honestly, you guys should work on this article, for the normal Wikipedia user (and shopowners) it is absolutely sufficient to know that these systems can be circumventet with special methods employed by professional shoplifters, which concludes that additional surveillance is still required . Howver it is NOT necessary to know how exactly it is done!

Nobody needs to know how many layers of foil are needed to shield an AM tag, that dummy antennas can be detected by the use of certain audio devices and so on.

I truly hate this "everybody needs to know everything" attitude many people live out today, if bad things are explained in too much detail, bad people will take advantage of it for the disfavor of everybody.

A very good example for the right attitude is a Professor from Bochum University, Germany. He broke a widely used high security rfid access control system (KeeLoq), let the puplic and the manufacturer know that criminals can do the same he did, if they put enough effort in it, but he didnt put a f****** manual into the internet for every criminals joy...

So please think about editing certain parts of the article... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.50.49.197 (talk) 22:06, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

i have added some clarification and more references to various sections - i think these are now sufficient, so i also removed the citation-needed template from the article.  — M3TA  info  @  02:14, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

External links modified
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Explanation of my edits
Hello, I am a brand new editor, so please excuse if I'm breaking any protocols or accidentally doing something untoward. I made changes to the Introduction portion of the page because I discovered it was lifted verbatim from a commercial web site that had a copy write notification protecting content. https://uaeintegrationsolutions.com/electronic-article-surveillance-eas/ I tried to keep the original author's content intact while improving readability. I made significant changes to the History section as I discovered this section too came from a commercial web site that had no citations to back up its claims. https://www.securitytags.com/history-security-tags/ While it is widely cited that Arthur Minasy created his invention in 1966 I can find no reputable source for this information. I found Minasy's original patent https://image-ppubs.uspto.gov/dirsearch-public/print/downloadPdf/3493955 showing the application date of March 5, 1965 and grant date of February 3, 1970. I therefore changed the history section to reflect only citable sources. Finally, I felt these edits to more reliable sources are in keeping with Wikipedia's own guidelines which state "Material published by a trading organisation is a view of how that organisation looks on itself however it will also have a marketing component and may lack neutrality. If this material is used it should carry a caveat to indicate this risk and should be corroborated with independent reporting if possible. "DoktorScience (talk) 06:06, 19 January 2023 (UTC)DoktorScience (talk) 21:12, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

RFID Transmission frequency
This article suggests that supermarket type RFID interrogator's transmit at 8.2Mz. The Wikipedia article Radio-frequency identification suggests ISO/IEC standard 18000-3 uses ISM band HF 13.56 MHz. Is one of them is wrong? Or is one of them the frequency the tag transmits back to the interrogator (if so, which is which)? Thanks. FreeFlow99 (talk) 10:33, 11 December 2023 (UTC)