Tracking and tracing

In logistics, tracking and tracing, concerns a process starting with determining the current and past locations and other status of property in transit. Tracking and tracing is the completion of this process with uniformly building a track of such property that are forwarded to, processed for, applied in or disposed of usage.

Usually this concept is supported by means of reckoning and reporting of the position of the vehicles that are transporting containers with the property of concern in real-time. This approach leaves the task to compose a coherent depiction of the subsequent status reports.

Another approach is to report the arrival or departure of the object and recording the identification of the object, the location where observed, the time, and the status, e.g. on damage or loading. This approach leaves the task to verify the reports regarding consistency and completeness. An example of this method might be the package tracking provided by shippers, such as United Parcel Service or FedEx.

The international standards organization EPCglobal under GS1 has ratified the EPCglobal Network standards (esp. the EPC Information Services EPCIS standard) which codify the syntax and semantics for supply chain events and the secure method for selectively sharing supply chain events with trading partners. Theses standards for tracking and tracing have been used in successful deployments in many industries and there are now a wide range of products that are certified as being compatible with these standards.