Transactions via microchip under your skin
RIVER FALLS, Wisconsin: The bearded body piercer with tattooed forearms tells Sam Bengtson to take a deep breath, and then he plunges in the needle, implanting a microchip into the software engineer’s hand.
“That was nothing,” Bengston says, as the piercer smooths a bandage onto his skin.
The radio-frequency identification tag now lodged between his index finger and thumb will allow Bengtson to open doors and log onto his computer at work with a wave.
His employer paid for the device, which costs about US$300 (RM1,290), and threw a “chip party” for employees at its headquarters this week, handing out blue T-shirts that say: “I got chipped.”
About 50 employees agreed to be implanted with the devices.
Three Square Market, which designs software for vending machine, hopes to soon launch a global microchip-reader business, marketing the technology to other firms.
But first they have to conquer US reservations about the devices.
Patrick McMullan, the chief operating officer, said he and another executive learned about Biohax, the Swedish startup that produces the implants, about six months ago during a business trip to Europe.
The microchips are about as big as a grain of rice, and enable the wearer to perform various tasks such as entering a building or making a payment.
The company already uses similar proximity readers in its vending machines. Shoppers can tap a credit card and walk away with a soft drink.
With microchips, McMullan said, the company could take their products to the next level of convenience - and beyond the vending industry.
“If we’re going to work on this, we need to know how it works,” he said. “I can’t go research technology that we’re not willing to use ourselves.”
As of today, implants are practically useless in the United States. But Three Square Market is betting that will soon change. People in Sweden can already use the chips as train tickets, the company said.
Bengston, the engineer, said he doesn’t feel like a guinea pig. His information is encrypted, he said, which means it’s more secure in his hand than on, say, a cell phone.
He plans to build an application that will enable him to start his Toyota Tundra with a touch. If the program works, he said, the company could sell it.
“I want to have that in about a week,” he said with a grin.
Sixteen years ago, Applied Digital Solutions, a company in Delray Beach, Florida, introduced a microchip that could be implanted in human arms to store medical records.
Doctors said at the time that they hoped to trace a patient’s history with a hand scanner - a useful ability, the company asserted, if someone is unconscious or confused.
But while VeriChip won approval from the Food and Drug Administration in 2004, the device never caught on with consumers. Some people expressed privacy concerns: Could they be tracked?
By 2008, the company stopped making the device, citing low sales.
However, VeriChip motivated
Often what appears to be simple technologies, shift into becoming infrastructures of surveillance used for purposes far beyond what was originally intended. — Michael Zimmer, professor of information studies at the University of Wisconsin
states to consider the legal quandaries a future with microchips could present.
After the device hit the market, Wisconsin outlawed mandatory implants.
Michael Zimmer, a professor of information studies at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, said it’s hard to predict how hackers could evolve to exploit seemingly impenetrable devices.
“Often what appears to be simple technologies,” he said, “shift into becoming infrastructures of surveillance used for purposes far beyond what was originally intended.” — Washington Post