Veratag, a New York-based start-up, says that a decades-old technology used in atomic microscopes can be adapted to establish a new level of security for RFID application.

Micro electromechanical systems (MEMS) have been used for about 20 years by scientists measuring molecular structures. Now a new technology based on them, MEMSflakes, could replace traditional RFID tags. The appeal of the new tech is its security level; each MEMSflake creates such a unique and complex signal that Veratag claims the odds of cloning a MEMSflake are as high as one in a trillion trillion (that’s a 1 followed by 24 zeroes).

Veratag believes MEMSflakes can be used in tandem with traditional RFID tags or alone to authenticate products and protect electronic passports and payment cards. The catch? MEMSflakes can be produced with today’s chip fabrication equipment, but cannot be read by the RFID readers currently on the market.