Everything You Need To Know About EAS Security Systems
The basics
EAS stands for electronic article surveillance. It involves the attachment of tags that emit some sort of signal to products and then installing a system to monitor it. The goal is to improve your inventory management and prevent losses due to product misplacement, fraud or theft.
EAS systems come in four basic configurations: electro-magnetic, acousto-magnetic, radio frequency and microwave. Let’s take a look at each one below:
Electro-magnetic
Also called magneto-harmonic, electro-magnetic systems use tags made with some form of metallic glass. In most cases, these tags are permanent fixtures so they also come with a ferromagnetic strip that can be activated or deactivated using demagnetization and magnetization respectively.
Over the years, this system has been slowly replaced by non-permanent alternatives in retail, food and other similar establishments. It is still quite popular in libraries, however, because they constantly deactivate and reactivate tags whenever books are borrowed and returned.
Acousto-magnetic
Sometimes called magnetostrictive, acousto-magnetic systems, on the other hand, rely on sound waves to work. The tag used is practically the same as in electro-magnetic systems, but instead of using magnetic responses for detection, the detector emits tonal bursts that cause the tags to vibrate at a certain frequency. Also, unlike electro-magnetic tags, acousto-magnetic tags are activated using magnetization and deactivated by demagnetization.
Radio frequency
More commonly known as RFID, the third item on our list uses tags that have a specific resonance peak and detectors that look out for dips in the specified frequencies. Deactivation of these tags can be done using strong magnetic forces and detuners or by physically punching a hole through them.
Microwave
Finally, we have microwave systems. They work by coupling a diode with one electrostatic and one microwave antenna. The electrostatic antenna creates a low-frequency field, while the microwave antenna creates a microwave field. The tag then reads and remixes these fields to come up with its own unique signal that then gets read by a detector.
This system has also dwindled in popularity because not only does it use permanent tags, it’s also more costly than the other alternatives on this list.
At the end of the day, all EAS systems are designed to do the same thing: prevent losses. The only considerations are the total cost and intended application.