Radio-frequency Identification

Known of for some time, Radio-frequency identification, or RFID became reality in 2054. With the development of the Mega Cities across the face of the globe, Housing and overpopulation in geographically smaller areas of land became a growing issue. RFID chips were implanted with a simple injection beneath the skin of every person that was accounted for, making most of the population chipped. Those that were not were heavily fined for delinquency, and after 2065 all those without RFID were outside the system, and therefore criminals in their own right.

RFID Chips standardized immunizations against all known diseases, it stored social security information, tax information, medical records, and various other forms of information about the individual. All this information was accessed by special scanning information, that would only allow for certain information to be gained from the scan. Security clearances prohibited just anyone from accessing all the information on any individual chip. A Doctor accessing medical information, could not access tax information or criminal history because the scan he was using can only obtain information that matches the specific scanning instrument.

Of course this caused much issue among the population, especially when criminal elements, namely the Hacker Elite learned how to exploit security loopholes in the chips. The Governments of the world, in one of the oddly united fronts, made RFID chipping standardized. They forced this issue by making only those that are chipped able to access the larger cornerstones of civilization, namely health care and financial institutions. To be unchipped meant not getting that required Healthcare, and having no access to the economic markets.

Not long after the establishment of the RFID system, the shadow community laying beneath the surface developed fake RFID. These held all the required information, only counterfeit and false. An alias was assumed and bought from any number of places, the better the fake, the higher the price.