physical security in server farms

[Christopher Browne]

On Mon, Dec 20, 2010 at 2:23 PM, Dave Cramer <davec-zxk95TxsVYDyHADnj0MGvQC/G2K4zDHf at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> The company I work for can RFID a server. We can put the chip inside
> the server and read it from the outside. Can anyone see a rational
> benefit to doing this other than physical security such as being able
> to tell that someone is walking out the door with a server ?

It's a meaningful "physical security" measure if you're running some
sort of "active polling" of RFID tags throughout the environment, so
that you detect any movement of the tag within that environment.

Thus, if there are RFID scanners:
 - In each rack
 - In the door to the server room
 - At each exit to the building

then, if you're actively scanning the tags, you can notice any time
the tag, and hence the device attached to it, transitions from
location to location.

It's obviously not perfect security - someone might deactivate
scanners, or remove tags from devices.

More importantly, you need to have active scanning going on
continually, and if the server room belongs to someone else, they're
liable to refuse to allow that.
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