apologies if this is a repost.
j
Begin forwarded message:
From: lkl <lukasz at wildlifeanalysis.org> Date: July 31, 2004 1:13:12 PM CDT To: nettime-l at bbs.thing.net Subject: <nettime> Chip implanted in Mexico security workers Reply-To: lkl <lukasz at wildlifeanalysis.org>
Hello Nettimers. This article might be old news to some of you
but for the ones who have not read it, it makes for an interesting
read. While the United States and the rest of the Global market place
discuss RFID chips as solely as an item for consumer goods, the
Mexican government simply implemented RFID chips to their most
efficient potential, the security and access of individuals, by
embedding RFID chips into government officials and workers. The recent
unofficial leak of official US documents in Mexico might make this
unprecedented step a 'logically' proper one but I am sure it also
makes some Sam Walton executives turn green. Finally, the technology
is a simple upgrade to a chip developed by a livestock tracking
company with the moniker straight out of a modern Hollywood Sci-Fi
Revelations update, DigitalArial Angel Corp.
http://www.salon.com/tech/wire/2004/07/14/chip/
Salon.com
Chip implanted in Mexico security workers
- - - - - - - - - - By Will Weissert July 14, 2004 | MEXICO CITY
(AP) -- Security has reached the subcutaneous level for Mexico's
attorney general and at least 160 people in his office -- they have
been implanted with microchips that get them access to secure areas of
their headquarters. It's a pioneering application of a technology that
is widely used in animals but not in humans. Mexico's top federal
prosecutors and investigators began receiving chip implants in their
arms in November in order to get access to restricted areas inside the
attorney general's headquarters, said Antonio Aceves, general director
of Solusat, the company that distributes the microchips in Mexico.
Attorney General Rafael Macedo de la Concha and 160 of his employees
were implanted at a cost to taxpayers of $150 for each rice
grain-sized chip. More are scheduled to get tagged" in coming months,
and key members of the Mexican military, the police and the office of
President Vicente Fox might follow suit, Aceves said. Fox's office did
not immediately return a call seeking comment. A spokeswoman for
Macedo de la Concha's office said she could not comment on Aceves'
statements, citing security concerns. But Macedo himself mentioned the
chip program to reporters Monday, saying he had received an implant in
his arm. He said the chips were required to enter a new federal
anti-crime information center. It's only for access, for security," he
said. The chips also could provide more certainty about who accessed
sensitive data at any given time. In the past, the biggest security
problem for Mexican law enforcement has been corruption by officials
themselves. Aceves said his company eventually hopes to provide
Mexican officials with implantable devices that can track their
physical location at any given time, but that technology is still
under development. The chips that have been implanted are manufactured
by VeriChip Corp., a subsidiary of Applied Digital Solutions Inc. of
Palm Beach, Fla. They lie dormant under the skin until read by an
electromagnetic scanner, which uses a technology known as radio
frequency identification, or RFID, that's now getting hot in the
inventory and supply chain businesses. Scott Silverman, Applied
Digital Solutions' chief executive, said each of his company's
implantable chips has a special identification number that would foil
an impostor. The technology is out there to duplicate (a chip)," he
said. What can't be stolen is the unique identification number and the
information that is tied to that number." Erik Michielsen, director of
RFID analysis at ABI Research Inc., said that in theory the chips
could be as secure as existing RFID-based access control systems such
as the contactless employee badges widely used in corporate and
government facilities. However, while those systems often employ
encryption, Applied Digital's implantable chips do not as yet.
Silverman said his company's system is nevertheless save because its
chips can only be read by the company's proprietary scanners. In
addition to the chips sold to the Mexican government, more than 1,000
Mexicans have implanted them for medical reasons, Aceves said.
Hospital officials can use a scanning device to download a chip's
serial number, which they then use to access a patient's blood type,
name and other information on a computer. The Food and Drug
Administration has yet to approve microchips as medical devices in the
United States. Still, Silverman said that his company has sold 7,000
chips to distributors worldwide and that more than 1,000 of those had
likely been inserted into customers, mostly for security or
identification reasons. In 2002, a Florida couple and their teenage
son had Applied Digital Solutions chips implanted in their arms. The
family hoped to someday be able to automatically relay their medical
information to emergency room staffers. The chip originally was
developed to track livestock and wildlife and to let pet owners
identify runaway animals. The technology was created by Digital Angel
Corp., which was acquired by Applied Digital Solutions in 1999.
Because the Applied Digital chips cannot be easily removed -- and are
housed in glass capsules designed to break and be unusable if taken
out -- they could be even more popular someday if they eventually can
incorporate locator capabilities. Already, global positioning system
chips have become common accouterments on jewelry or clothing in
Mexico. In fact, in March, Mexican authorities broke up a ring of
used-car salesmen turned kidnappers who were known as Los Chips"
because they searched their victims to detect whether they were
carrying the chips to help them be located.
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