The EPCglobal Network is a computer network used to share product data between trading partners. It was created by EPCglobal. The basis for the information flow in the network is the Electronic Product Code (EPC), which is a universally unique identifier for any physical object anywhere in the world, for all time. The EPC may be encoded in a Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tag but is not designed exclusively for use with RFID data carriers. For example, EPCs can also be constructed based on the reading of optical data carriers, such as linear barcodes.