The Australian's Ben Woodhead reports that IBM had to stop an RFID demo at the Australian Tennis Open after the tech was found to be blocking signals from a nearby Vodafone tower.

"The incident confirmed long-running concerns that the readers used to scan radio frequency identification tags could disrupt towers in Vodafone's mobile phone network because of overlaps in the frequencies used by the two systems," Woodhead writes. "It also prompted claims that possible interference from RFID readers was slowing the uptake of the technology in Australian supply chains."

IBM spokeswoman Leah Sneddon was reluctant to provide much information on the incident. "We can confirm there was an issue with a piece of non-IBM equipment that affected a Vodafone tower at the Australian Open," she said. "Once we became aware of the issue, we took steps to avoid further disruption."