IT (Information Technology) has become a primary focus area for RFID. IT assets' intrinsic value are often dwarfed by the value of the information residing on them. RFID enables you to track your most valuable assets.
The everpresent fear of losing sensitive information has led to new regulations mandating better tracking of IT assets. Sarbanes-Oxley stipulates specific internal controls of IT assets for publically traded companies. In response, the Financial Services Technology Consortium (FTSC) has sponsored collaborative research projects and benchmark studies covering the standardization and implementation of IT asset tracking in the financial services arena.
Many IT assets (laptops, servers) present particular tagging issues for RFID. While most such assets do not have an outer metal casing, they often have in internal conductive shield wall. This makes it a bit more difficult to tag with standard metal-mount options. The situation is neither true metal-mount nor true free-space. MetaltagTM Slim has been specifically designed for this "grey area" of IT asset tagging.
Using passive RFID technology to track IT assets offers many advantages when compared to traditional barcode methods:
- Better traceability
- Better data retention
- Line of site not necessary
- Automation of the tracking process
- Reduction of labor
- Real-time reporting
Overall, the use of RFID technology in data centers will offer improvement to traditional asset management and tracking capabilities, in turn, providing better operational efficiency, risk mitigation and regulatory compliance. In ECMP's experience, it is not unusual to achieve short term ROI’s, often 12-18 months or less. If the information contained on a laptop or server is truly sensitive, the cost of an RFID implementation can be balanced by the liabilities and fines associated with only one loss-event.