The
U.S. military wants to plant nanosensors in soldiers to monitor health
on future battlefields and immediately respond to needs, but a privacy
expert warns the step is just one more down the road to computer chips
for all.
“It’s never going to happen that the government at gunpoint says,
‘You’re going to have a tracking chip,’” said Katherine Albrecht, who
with Liz McIntyre authored
“Spychips,” a book that warns of the threat to privacy posed by Radio Frequency Identification.
“It’s always in incremental steps. If you can put a microchip in
someone that doesn’t track them … everybody looks and says, ‘Come on,’”
she said. “It’ll be interesting seeing where we go.”
According to a report at Mobiledia,
the U.S. military’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has
confirmed plans to create nanosensors to monitor the health of soldiers
on battlefields.
The devices also would report data to doctors. But privacy analysts
have expressed concern that the implants could be used not just to
monitor health but to keep track of and possibly control people.
DARPA describes the technology on which it is working as “a truly
disruptive innovation,” which would diagnose, monitor vital states and
“even deliver medicine into the bloodstream.”
According to LiveScience.com,
“Solving the problem of sickness could have a huge impact on the number
of soldiers ready to fight, because far more have historically died due
to illness rather than combat.”
The report suggested that for special forces, “the practical
realization of implantable nanosensors capable of monitoring multiple
indicators of physiological state could be a truly disruptive
innovation.”
Already being researched is the concept of nanosensors diagnosing disease.
DARPA expects to launch a second effort focused on treatment later this year.
Albrecht said the move is another step in the trip down the road of
having every person implanted with a chip that might very well monitor
health but also other areas of life.
Microchipping, she said, already is “par for the course” for pets in
many parts of the nation, and that acceptance will make it easier to
require it for people.
She
said it was expected that captive audiences, such as prisoners and
troops, would be the first subjected to the requirement, which would
make it easier for the general populace to accept it as well.
“It’s interesting,” she said. “I’m stunned how this younger
generation is OK. They don’t see the problem. …
‘Why wouldn’t everyone
want to be tracked?’”
But she said Americans will have to decide to say no to incremental
advances, or by the time officials finally roll out the idea of chips
for all, whether they want them or not, it will be too late to decide.
“The analogy that I draw is [that of a train], and if I’m in
California and I do not want to wind up in New City, every stop brings
me closer,” she said. “At some point I have to get off the train.”
Albrecht also has helped develop and launch a new project called
StartPage, which now is handling some 2 million search requests per day.
The benefit of the page is its privacy. The site explains that every
time a person uses a typical search program such as Google, “your search
data is recorded.”
“Then they store that information in a giant database,” she explains.
As a result, corporate America and the government have access to “a
shocking amount of personal information about you, such as your
interests, family circumstances, political leanings, medical conditions
and more.
WND reported previously that owners of pets have reported cancer in their animals after microchipping. The report documented how a dog developed a highly aggressive cancer right at the point where a chip was embedded.
Albrecht told the story of another dog, a 5-year-old Yorkshire
terrier named Scotty that was diagnosed with cancer in Memphis, Tenn.
Scotty developed a tumor between his shoulder blades, in the same
location where the microchip had been implanted. The tumor the size of a
small balloon – described as malignant lymphoma – was removed. Scotty’s
microchip was embedded inside the tumor.
Verichip, a major manufacturer of the microchip implants, touts the
technology’s capability to identify a lost pet and enable its return
home, while dismissing potential health risks.
“Over the last 15 years,” stated the VeriChip website, “millions of
dogs and cats have safely received an implantable microchip with limited
or no reports of adverse health reactions from this life-saving
product, which was recently endorsed by the USDA. These chips are a
well-accepted and well-respected means of global identification for pets
in the veterinary community.”
WND also reported there
were warnings about a radio chip plan that would allow identification of
individuals by government agents simply by walking through an assembly.
The proposal, which was supported by Janet Napolitano, the chief of
the Department of Homeland Security, would embed radio chips in driver’s
licenses, or “enhanced driver’s licenses.”
“Enhanced driver’s licenses give confidence that the person holding
the card is the person who is supposed to be holding the card, and it’s
less elaborate than REAL ID,” Napolitano said in a Washington Times
report.
REAL ID was a plan for a federal identification system standardized
across the nation that so alarmed governors many states have adopted
formal plans to oppose it. However, a privacy advocate today told WND
that the EDLs are many times worse.
WND also previously has reported on such chips when hospitals used them to identify newborns, a company
desired to embed immigrants with the electronic devices, a government health event
showcased them and when
Wal-Mart used microchips to track customers.
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