Da M.O.B
- Thread starter FoeTwin
- Start date
OPINION: Will Microchip Implants = 666?
Test Marketing the Mark of the Beast!
A prototype of an implantable biometric chip capable of marking an individual's precise location and of monitoring him or her for life is gaining support.
It was named Best in Show of 170 International Science Exhibitors last year, and released in its "First Phase" wristwatch format called Guardian Angel soon after. Most recently millions of Today Show viewers watched an American family get "chipped" with ADS's VeriChip™ live from a doctor's office in Boca Raton. Recent acts of terrorism have many calling for mandatory implementation of the implantable technology...more below.
Applied Digital Solutions (ADS) received patent rights to Digital Angel (TM) technology on December 10, 1999. What set Digital Angel apart from the competition was the innovative design--a miniature digital transceiver specifically created for human implantation.
According to information released last year the implantable transceiver "sends and receives data and can be continuously tracked by GPS (Global Positioning Satellite) technology. The transceiver's power supply and actuation system are unlike anything ever created. When implanted within a body, the device is powered electromechanically through the movement of muscles, and it can be activated either by the 'wearer' or by the monitoring facility."
An Information Technology report recently verified plans to study implantable chips as a method of tracking terrorists. After first pulling back from the implantable version of its Digital Angel, ADS foresees a unique use of its product in the wake of terrorist attacks in New York and Washington.
"We've changed out thinking since September 11," a company spokesman said, "Now there's more of a need to monitor evil activities."
ADS also claims the Digital Angel has a variety of other uses, such as "providing a tamper-proof means of identification for enhanced e-business security, animal tracking, locating lost or missing individuals, tracking the location of valuable property and monitoring the medical conditions of at-risk patients."
Following the Internet World Wireless 2001 award for "Best of Show: Client Services," Mercedes Walton, President and COO of Applied Digital Solutions, said: ``We have always had high expectations for the Digital Angel products. This award is truly a validation of our faith in Digital Angel's ability to capture the imagination of the public. Consumer anticipation has translated into accelerated interest from potential partners and allies. We are eager to bring Digital Angel to the marketplace in a very timely manner...."
To further advocate Digital Angel technology, Applied Digital Solutions launched a website http://www.digitalangel.net where viewers can peruse diagrams and read summary information.
Other manufacturers of sub-skin implants have quietly field-tested similar devices over the past few years. The London Times reported in October 1998, "Film stars and the children of millionaires are among 45 people, including several Britons, who have been fitted with the chips (called the Sky Eye) in secret tests."
Due to civil liberty and privacy issues, the ACLU announced opposition to mandatory microchip implantation when applied to humans. The ACLU is certain to be a strange bedfellow of Christians and conservatives concerning this issue.
Test Marketing the Mark of the Beast!
A prototype of an implantable biometric chip capable of marking an individual's precise location and of monitoring him or her for life is gaining support.
It was named Best in Show of 170 International Science Exhibitors last year, and released in its "First Phase" wristwatch format called Guardian Angel soon after. Most recently millions of Today Show viewers watched an American family get "chipped" with ADS's VeriChip™ live from a doctor's office in Boca Raton. Recent acts of terrorism have many calling for mandatory implementation of the implantable technology...more below.
Applied Digital Solutions (ADS) received patent rights to Digital Angel (TM) technology on December 10, 1999. What set Digital Angel apart from the competition was the innovative design--a miniature digital transceiver specifically created for human implantation.
According to information released last year the implantable transceiver "sends and receives data and can be continuously tracked by GPS (Global Positioning Satellite) technology. The transceiver's power supply and actuation system are unlike anything ever created. When implanted within a body, the device is powered electromechanically through the movement of muscles, and it can be activated either by the 'wearer' or by the monitoring facility."
An Information Technology report recently verified plans to study implantable chips as a method of tracking terrorists. After first pulling back from the implantable version of its Digital Angel, ADS foresees a unique use of its product in the wake of terrorist attacks in New York and Washington.
"We've changed out thinking since September 11," a company spokesman said, "Now there's more of a need to monitor evil activities."
ADS also claims the Digital Angel has a variety of other uses, such as "providing a tamper-proof means of identification for enhanced e-business security, animal tracking, locating lost or missing individuals, tracking the location of valuable property and monitoring the medical conditions of at-risk patients."
Following the Internet World Wireless 2001 award for "Best of Show: Client Services," Mercedes Walton, President and COO of Applied Digital Solutions, said: ``We have always had high expectations for the Digital Angel products. This award is truly a validation of our faith in Digital Angel's ability to capture the imagination of the public. Consumer anticipation has translated into accelerated interest from potential partners and allies. We are eager to bring Digital Angel to the marketplace in a very timely manner...."
To further advocate Digital Angel technology, Applied Digital Solutions launched a website http://www.digitalangel.net where viewers can peruse diagrams and read summary information.
Other manufacturers of sub-skin implants have quietly field-tested similar devices over the past few years. The London Times reported in October 1998, "Film stars and the children of millionaires are among 45 people, including several Britons, who have been fitted with the chips (called the Sky Eye) in secret tests."
Due to civil liberty and privacy issues, the ACLU announced opposition to mandatory microchip implantation when applied to humans. The ACLU is certain to be a strange bedfellow of Christians and conservatives concerning this issue.
THE FULFILLMENT OF PROPHECY?
Many Christians believe that, before long, an antichrist system will appear. It will be a New World Order, under which national boundaries dissolve, and ethnic groups, ideologies, religions, and economics from around the world, orchestrate a single and dominant sovereignty. The system will supposedly be free of religious and political extremes, and membership will tolerate the philosophical and cultural differences of its constituents. Except for minor nonconformities, war, terrorism, and hunger will be a thing of the past.
According to popular Biblical interpretation, a single personality will surface at the head of the utopian administration. He will appear as a man of distinguished character, but will ultimately become "a king of fierce countenance" (Dan. 8:23).
With imperious decree the Antichrist will facilitate the one-world government, universal religion, and globally monitored socialism. Those who refuse his New World Order will inevitably be imprisoned or destroyed, until at last he exalts himself "above all that is called God, or that is worshiped, so that he, as God, sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God" (2 Thess. 2:4).
The Antichrist's widespread power will be derived at the expense of individual human liberties. He will force "all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six [666]" (Rev. 13:16-18).
For many years the idea that humans could somehow succumb to little more than branded cattle, and that rugged individualism would thereafter be sacrificed for an anesthetized universal harmony, was repudiated by America’s greatest minds.
Then, in the 1970’s, things began to change. Following a call by Nelson Rockefeller for the creation of a "New World Order," presidential candidate Jimmy Carter campaigned, saying, "We must replace balance of power politics with world order politics."
During the 1980's President George Bush continued the one-world dirge, announcing over national television that "a New World Order" had arrived. Following the initial broadcast, President Bush addressed the Congress, saying,
What is at stake is more than one small country [Kuwait], it is a big idea--a new world order, where diverse nations are drawn together in common cause to achieve the universal aspirations of mankind: peace and security, freedom, and the rule of law. Such is a world worthy of our struggle, and worthy of our children’s future!
Ever since the President's astonishing newscast, a parade of political and religious leaders have discharged a profusion of rhetoric aimed at implementing the goals of a New World Order.
Developers of biometric implant chips employ similar language in announcing compatible global technologies, and many Americans consider electronically marking humans or implanting a series of digital equations under the skin to be the natural progress of advancing and necessary technologies.
Many Christians believe that, before long, an antichrist system will appear. It will be a New World Order, under which national boundaries dissolve, and ethnic groups, ideologies, religions, and economics from around the world, orchestrate a single and dominant sovereignty. The system will supposedly be free of religious and political extremes, and membership will tolerate the philosophical and cultural differences of its constituents. Except for minor nonconformities, war, terrorism, and hunger will be a thing of the past.
According to popular Biblical interpretation, a single personality will surface at the head of the utopian administration. He will appear as a man of distinguished character, but will ultimately become "a king of fierce countenance" (Dan. 8:23).
With imperious decree the Antichrist will facilitate the one-world government, universal religion, and globally monitored socialism. Those who refuse his New World Order will inevitably be imprisoned or destroyed, until at last he exalts himself "above all that is called God, or that is worshiped, so that he, as God, sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God" (2 Thess. 2:4).
The Antichrist's widespread power will be derived at the expense of individual human liberties. He will force "all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six [666]" (Rev. 13:16-18).
For many years the idea that humans could somehow succumb to little more than branded cattle, and that rugged individualism would thereafter be sacrificed for an anesthetized universal harmony, was repudiated by America’s greatest minds.
Then, in the 1970’s, things began to change. Following a call by Nelson Rockefeller for the creation of a "New World Order," presidential candidate Jimmy Carter campaigned, saying, "We must replace balance of power politics with world order politics."
During the 1980's President George Bush continued the one-world dirge, announcing over national television that "a New World Order" had arrived. Following the initial broadcast, President Bush addressed the Congress, saying,
What is at stake is more than one small country [Kuwait], it is a big idea--a new world order, where diverse nations are drawn together in common cause to achieve the universal aspirations of mankind: peace and security, freedom, and the rule of law. Such is a world worthy of our struggle, and worthy of our children’s future!
Ever since the President's astonishing newscast, a parade of political and religious leaders have discharged a profusion of rhetoric aimed at implementing the goals of a New World Order.
Developers of biometric implant chips employ similar language in announcing compatible global technologies, and many Americans consider electronically marking humans or implanting a series of digital equations under the skin to be the natural progress of advancing and necessary technologies.
IT SHOULD COME AS NO SURPRISE
Some people believe implantable microchips will be the Biblical Mark of the Beast. These claim that acts of terrorism such as the ones in New York and Washington, encourage microchipping humans for identification purposes.
But even before the New York and Pentagon tragedies, a push was being made to brand and monitor humanity. Consider the following:
As far back as 1973, Senior Scholastics introduced school age children to the concept of buying and selling using numbers inserted in the forehead. In the September 20, 1973 feature "Who Is Watching You?" the secular high school journal speculated:
"All buying and selling in the program will be done by computer. No currency, no change, no checks. In the program, people would receive a number that had been assigned them tattooed in their wrist or forehead. The number is put on by laser beam and cannot be felt. The number in the body is not seen with the naked eye and is as permanent as your fingerprints. All items of consumer goods will be marked with a computer mark. The computer outlet in the store which picks up the number on the items at the checkstand will also pick up the number in the person's body and automatically total the price and deduct the amount from the person's 'Special Drawing Rights' account."
In the 1974 article "The Specter of Eugenics," Charles Frankel pointed out Linus Pauling's (Nobel Prize winner) suggestions that a mark be tattooed on the foot or forehead of every young person. Pauling envisioned a mark denoting genotype.
In 1980, U.S. News and World Report continued the warning, pointing out that the Federal Government was contemplating "National Identity Cards," without which nobody could work or conduct business.
The Denver Post Sun followed up in 1981, claiming that chip implants could someday replace I.D. cards. The June 21, 1981 story read in part, "The chip is placed in a needle which is affixed to a simple syringe containing an anti-bacterial solution. The needle is capped and ready to forever identify something--or somebody."
The May 7, 1996 Chicago Tribune questioned the technology, wondering aloud if we could trust Big Brother under our skin?
Then in 1997 applications for patents of subcutaneous implant devices for "a person or an animal" were applied for.
On April 27, 1998, Time Magazine ran the story, The Big Bank Theory And What It Says About The Future OF Money, in which they opined "Your daughter can store the money any way she wants--on her laptop, on a debit card, even (in the not too distant future) on a chip implanted under her skin."
In August 1998 the BBC covered the first known human microchip implantation. (see documentation)
That same month the Sunday Oregonian warned that proposed medical identifiers might erode privacy rights by tracking individuals through alphanumeric health identifier technologies. The startling Oregonian feature depicted humans with barcodes in their foreheads.
Senator Robb (Virginia) felt it necessary to add the MARC (multi-technology automated reader card) Card Amendment to the FY97 DOD Authorization Bill.
One can only speculate why bionics is attempting to create organisms that contain linked organic (human cells) material with biometric chips for human implantation (documentation site) Also see here (second story)
Recently millions of Today Show viewers watched an American family get "chipped" with ADS's VeriChip™ live from a doctor's office in Boca Raton.
Meanwhile, it's the year 2002. Terrorism has many people in the mood to sacrifice human liberties, and Digital Angel has opened its first mass production factory in Palm Beach, Florida.
Some people believe implantable microchips will be the Biblical Mark of the Beast. These claim that acts of terrorism such as the ones in New York and Washington, encourage microchipping humans for identification purposes.
But even before the New York and Pentagon tragedies, a push was being made to brand and monitor humanity. Consider the following:
As far back as 1973, Senior Scholastics introduced school age children to the concept of buying and selling using numbers inserted in the forehead. In the September 20, 1973 feature "Who Is Watching You?" the secular high school journal speculated:
"All buying and selling in the program will be done by computer. No currency, no change, no checks. In the program, people would receive a number that had been assigned them tattooed in their wrist or forehead. The number is put on by laser beam and cannot be felt. The number in the body is not seen with the naked eye and is as permanent as your fingerprints. All items of consumer goods will be marked with a computer mark. The computer outlet in the store which picks up the number on the items at the checkstand will also pick up the number in the person's body and automatically total the price and deduct the amount from the person's 'Special Drawing Rights' account."
In the 1974 article "The Specter of Eugenics," Charles Frankel pointed out Linus Pauling's (Nobel Prize winner) suggestions that a mark be tattooed on the foot or forehead of every young person. Pauling envisioned a mark denoting genotype.
In 1980, U.S. News and World Report continued the warning, pointing out that the Federal Government was contemplating "National Identity Cards," without which nobody could work or conduct business.
The Denver Post Sun followed up in 1981, claiming that chip implants could someday replace I.D. cards. The June 21, 1981 story read in part, "The chip is placed in a needle which is affixed to a simple syringe containing an anti-bacterial solution. The needle is capped and ready to forever identify something--or somebody."
The May 7, 1996 Chicago Tribune questioned the technology, wondering aloud if we could trust Big Brother under our skin?
Then in 1997 applications for patents of subcutaneous implant devices for "a person or an animal" were applied for.
On April 27, 1998, Time Magazine ran the story, The Big Bank Theory And What It Says About The Future OF Money, in which they opined "Your daughter can store the money any way she wants--on her laptop, on a debit card, even (in the not too distant future) on a chip implanted under her skin."
In August 1998 the BBC covered the first known human microchip implantation. (see documentation)
That same month the Sunday Oregonian warned that proposed medical identifiers might erode privacy rights by tracking individuals through alphanumeric health identifier technologies. The startling Oregonian feature depicted humans with barcodes in their foreheads.
Senator Robb (Virginia) felt it necessary to add the MARC (multi-technology automated reader card) Card Amendment to the FY97 DOD Authorization Bill.
One can only speculate why bionics is attempting to create organisms that contain linked organic (human cells) material with biometric chips for human implantation (documentation site) Also see here (second story)
Recently millions of Today Show viewers watched an American family get "chipped" with ADS's VeriChip™ live from a doctor's office in Boca Raton.
Meanwhile, it's the year 2002. Terrorism has many people in the mood to sacrifice human liberties, and Digital Angel has opened its first mass production factory in Palm Beach, Florida.
WILL DIGITAL "MARKS" SOON BE MANDATORY?
Makers of implantable microchips claim the proceedure will be voluntary at first. But a report written by Elaine M. Ramish for the Franklin Pierce Law Center says:
"A [mandatory] national identification system via microchip implants could be achieved in two stages: Upon introduction as a voluntary system, the microchip implantation will appear to be palatable. After there is a familiarity with the procedure and a knowledge of its benefits, implantation would be mandatory."
George Getz, the communications director for the Libertarian Party agrees, saying:
After all, the government has never forced anyone to have a driver license, [but] try getting along without one, when everyone from your local banker to the car rental man to the hotel operator to the grocery store requires one in order for you to take advantage of their services, that amounts to a de facto mandate. If the government can force you to surrender your fingerprints to get a drivers license, why can't it force you to get a computer chip implant?
People like Mr. Getz are correct. Conservatives and liberals alike need to contact state and federal representatives and demand laws preserving individual rights before Digital Angel and similar forces lead humanity down a high-tech path of no return.
Just as Social Security numbers were first voluntary, then mandatory, biometric chip implants will eventually become mandatory unless citizens rise up in immediate and national opposition. Even Applied Digital Solution's chief executive officer Richard Sullivan envisions a scenario where ``people [are] required to be chipped or [have] some combination of a device requiring them to be scanned and monitored at all times.'' [1]
Note what the prophet said!
And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor,free and bond, to receive a mark [charagma; from Greek charax meaning to stake down into or "stick into"] in their right hand, or in their foreheads....Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six (Rev. 13:16-18)
Did the prophet foresee a hypodermic needle injecting something beneath the skin? Probably.
A temporary victory was won against such ideas following the original news story by Raiders News Update concerning ADS's implantable microchip intentions in 1999. News services across the web ran our story resulting in an inundation by concerned readers. ADS's shares droped on the Nasdaq from $5.00 to .50 each. ADS then released this statement: "We are not pursuing any applications for embedded chips and we have moved away from that for a couple of reasons....There are a number of privacy concerns and religious implications -- fundamentalist Christian groups regard it [implanting computer chips] as the Devil's work."
More recently however an Independent news story claimed that if the Palm Beach testing center's wristwatch version of Digital Angel is successful, ADS "will start implanting them inside humans between the muscle and the skin on the forearm next year."
Now terrorism has people thinking that everything from face scanning to implantable chips is not only inevitable, but perhaps a good idea. These are differences in degree, not in kind, and mandates an immediate response from level headed people to lawmakers. It also forecast a prediction made long ago:
And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name. (Rev. 14:9-11)
Copyright © 2002 Raiders News Update
Makers of implantable microchips claim the proceedure will be voluntary at first. But a report written by Elaine M. Ramish for the Franklin Pierce Law Center says:
"A [mandatory] national identification system via microchip implants could be achieved in two stages: Upon introduction as a voluntary system, the microchip implantation will appear to be palatable. After there is a familiarity with the procedure and a knowledge of its benefits, implantation would be mandatory."
George Getz, the communications director for the Libertarian Party agrees, saying:
After all, the government has never forced anyone to have a driver license, [but] try getting along without one, when everyone from your local banker to the car rental man to the hotel operator to the grocery store requires one in order for you to take advantage of their services, that amounts to a de facto mandate. If the government can force you to surrender your fingerprints to get a drivers license, why can't it force you to get a computer chip implant?
People like Mr. Getz are correct. Conservatives and liberals alike need to contact state and federal representatives and demand laws preserving individual rights before Digital Angel and similar forces lead humanity down a high-tech path of no return.
Just as Social Security numbers were first voluntary, then mandatory, biometric chip implants will eventually become mandatory unless citizens rise up in immediate and national opposition. Even Applied Digital Solution's chief executive officer Richard Sullivan envisions a scenario where ``people [are] required to be chipped or [have] some combination of a device requiring them to be scanned and monitored at all times.'' [1]
Note what the prophet said!
And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor,free and bond, to receive a mark [charagma; from Greek charax meaning to stake down into or "stick into"] in their right hand, or in their foreheads....Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six (Rev. 13:16-18)
Did the prophet foresee a hypodermic needle injecting something beneath the skin? Probably.
A temporary victory was won against such ideas following the original news story by Raiders News Update concerning ADS's implantable microchip intentions in 1999. News services across the web ran our story resulting in an inundation by concerned readers. ADS's shares droped on the Nasdaq from $5.00 to .50 each. ADS then released this statement: "We are not pursuing any applications for embedded chips and we have moved away from that for a couple of reasons....There are a number of privacy concerns and religious implications -- fundamentalist Christian groups regard it [implanting computer chips] as the Devil's work."
More recently however an Independent news story claimed that if the Palm Beach testing center's wristwatch version of Digital Angel is successful, ADS "will start implanting them inside humans between the muscle and the skin on the forearm next year."
Now terrorism has people thinking that everything from face scanning to implantable chips is not only inevitable, but perhaps a good idea. These are differences in degree, not in kind, and mandates an immediate response from level headed people to lawmakers. It also forecast a prediction made long ago:
And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name. (Rev. 14:9-11)
Copyright © 2002 Raiders News Update
http://corpuschristionline.com/st2000/stories/finger02.html
Wednesday, Feb. 10, 1999
Looking ahead: Don't lift a finger, just think about it
By JENNY STRASBURG
Staff Writer
Future Person climbs out of bed and, without hitting a button or speaking, sends brainwaves to the coffee maker to start the morning brew.
Future Person has awakened rested and secure that his diabetes is under control. A computer chip embedded in his body makes sure of it.
When Future Person wants to leave for his five-hour work day, he climbs in his solar-powered car, which chooses the best route to the office.
Such a scenario isn't far-fetched, suggest local scientists and enterprising thinkers asked by the Caller-Times to look ahead a few years.
Tomorrow looks like a fast-paced web of semiconductors and ever-shrinking computers behaving less like machines and more like the human mind. Hand-held computers will hold entire libraries. Cars will run on renewable power cells. Medicine will be more precise. Plastics will dissolve away, not devour landfills.
"A hundred years from now, you may not have to do more than think; you may not even have to speak," says Gary Bleasdell, new business development manager for International Resistive Co. of Corpus Christi, which makes resistors for computer chips, automobile engines and cell phones.
"In the future there will be things like implantable devices in the human body for insulin injection," Bleasdell says. "Electronics will become more integrated into human functions."
Keyboards will vanish as computers learn to read speech and even brainwaves, he muses. Early versions of such technology are already here.
The future also looks foreboding, though. Environmental scientists see humans multiplying and vying for the same supply of air, space and water.
As wetlands disappear and fertilizers seep into rivers, South Texans must invent new ways to control waste and conserve water. Scientists predict new molecularly engineered plants and efforts to salvage water from dishwashers and washing machines, and reuse it for washing the solar-powered car and dousing the xeriscaped lawn.
We have water-saving shower heads now; soon we'll rethink our entire plumbing systems, perhaps routing wastewater through one network of pipes and reusable water through another, suggests John (Wes) Tunnell Jr., director of the Center for Coastal Studies at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi.
Transportation is bound to change, too, and experimental electric cars of today won't do, says Roy Lehman, Texas A&M-Corpus Christi environmental science program director.
We'll look to the sky for power, he says, maybe whirring along in dwarfish Beetle-like cars with solar panels in the roof.
Corpus Christi library Director Herb Canales proposes that even books will mutate into slick, portable computers. "I think you're going to see the electronic book emerge. We're in the early stages right now," he says.
Books as we know them will still exist, Canales believes; but the new breed will resemble electronic clipboards with computer screens. Library patrons will bring the "book" in and download the volumes of their choice, Canales theorizes.
A century ago, South Texas was sketching railroad and shipping routes. Today, it's trying to attract interstate highways and aerospace jobs, hoping to build and launch satellites and space shuttles.
No matter how radical computers become, people will still work, still ingest food as they have done for eons, Bleasdell says.
But he guesses technology will mean more time for play: "Probably we won't be working 40 hours a week."
Which means more good, old-fashioned leisure time.
Wednesday, Feb. 10, 1999
Looking ahead: Don't lift a finger, just think about it
By JENNY STRASBURG
Staff Writer
Future Person climbs out of bed and, without hitting a button or speaking, sends brainwaves to the coffee maker to start the morning brew.
Future Person has awakened rested and secure that his diabetes is under control. A computer chip embedded in his body makes sure of it.
When Future Person wants to leave for his five-hour work day, he climbs in his solar-powered car, which chooses the best route to the office.
Such a scenario isn't far-fetched, suggest local scientists and enterprising thinkers asked by the Caller-Times to look ahead a few years.
Tomorrow looks like a fast-paced web of semiconductors and ever-shrinking computers behaving less like machines and more like the human mind. Hand-held computers will hold entire libraries. Cars will run on renewable power cells. Medicine will be more precise. Plastics will dissolve away, not devour landfills.
"A hundred years from now, you may not have to do more than think; you may not even have to speak," says Gary Bleasdell, new business development manager for International Resistive Co. of Corpus Christi, which makes resistors for computer chips, automobile engines and cell phones.
"In the future there will be things like implantable devices in the human body for insulin injection," Bleasdell says. "Electronics will become more integrated into human functions."
Keyboards will vanish as computers learn to read speech and even brainwaves, he muses. Early versions of such technology are already here.
The future also looks foreboding, though. Environmental scientists see humans multiplying and vying for the same supply of air, space and water.
As wetlands disappear and fertilizers seep into rivers, South Texans must invent new ways to control waste and conserve water. Scientists predict new molecularly engineered plants and efforts to salvage water from dishwashers and washing machines, and reuse it for washing the solar-powered car and dousing the xeriscaped lawn.
We have water-saving shower heads now; soon we'll rethink our entire plumbing systems, perhaps routing wastewater through one network of pipes and reusable water through another, suggests John (Wes) Tunnell Jr., director of the Center for Coastal Studies at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi.
Transportation is bound to change, too, and experimental electric cars of today won't do, says Roy Lehman, Texas A&M-Corpus Christi environmental science program director.
We'll look to the sky for power, he says, maybe whirring along in dwarfish Beetle-like cars with solar panels in the roof.
Corpus Christi library Director Herb Canales proposes that even books will mutate into slick, portable computers. "I think you're going to see the electronic book emerge. We're in the early stages right now," he says.
Books as we know them will still exist, Canales believes; but the new breed will resemble electronic clipboards with computer screens. Library patrons will bring the "book" in and download the volumes of their choice, Canales theorizes.
A century ago, South Texas was sketching railroad and shipping routes. Today, it's trying to attract interstate highways and aerospace jobs, hoping to build and launch satellites and space shuttles.
No matter how radical computers become, people will still work, still ingest food as they have done for eons, Bleasdell says.
But he guesses technology will mean more time for play: "Probably we won't be working 40 hours a week."
Which means more good, old-fashioned leisure time.
Compaq to launch fingerprint ID module for PCs
http://www.cnn.com/TECH/computing/9807/01/fingerprint.idg/
July 1, 1998
Web posted at: 12:15 AM EDT
by Kristi Essick
(IDG) -- Compaq has released a small hardware module for use with desktop and notebook PCs that will allow users to log onto Windows-based machines using a scan of their fingerprint.
The device will come with software jointly developed by Compaq and Indenticator Technologies, said David Hall, strategic product manager for Compaq's PC products group in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Compaq joined up with several software and hardware vendors, including Microsoft and IBM, in April to form the BioAPI Consortium in order to develop standard biometric products and technologies, Hall said.
Identicator, which was the main partner on the project, has developed fingerprint identification software that is currently used in gateways in prisons and high-security office buildings. However, until Compaq and Identicator teamed up, the company had not developed this software for use in PCs, Hall said. Over the last 18 months, the two companies have worked together to rebuild the software for a networked PC environment, he said.
The fingerprint scanning device, which is about half the size of an ordinary mouse, works in conjunction with the software. Users first register their fingerprints by following the steps in a series of dialogue boxes, scanning their fingerprint and entering their existing network log-on passwords, Hall said.
The fingerprint stands in the place of the existing password, but does not replace it entirely. Instead, a certain fingerprint is tied to a specific password on the company's server (or on the computer's hard drive if the fingerprint device is used to log onto a stand-alone PC.) However, the actual fingerprint is not stored anywhere. What is stored is a series of "minutiae points" that are unique to the fingerprint, but which don't allow it to be recognized. In some countries, Hall explained, it is illegal to store people's fingerprints on a computer of any kind.
Once the fingerprint is scanned and attributed to a certain password, users can use their fingerprints to log onto the network or onto their PC. The reason a password must be retained is that Windows relies on a password system in identifying users on a network, Hall said. When the user scans his or her fingerprint, the password is functioning in the background, he explained.
The idea behind the Compaq fingerprint reader is to make networks more secure, Hall said. Passwords can easily be forgotten and/or shared among many users, while a fingerprint is unique to each user. In addition to the increased security factor, Compaq thinks the device will save companies money since network administrators won't have to spend hours reassigning lost passwords.
Compaq is targeting the fingerprint reader at users in high-security fields, such as medicine and finance, but also to regular companies that are concerned about secure access to their networks, Hall said.
By next year, Compaq may integrate the reader into notebook computers so that people can use their fingerprints to switch on their machines, Hall said. This way, a laptop could only be used by the person whose fingerprint was registered beforehand. Right now, the device connects to the desktop or laptop through the parallel port.
The device and software will retail for $99 and will be available in mid-August worldwide, Hall said. It works with any PC running Windows 95 or Windows NT 4.0, and any server running NT Server 4.0; they don't have to be Compaq machines. In the third quarter, Compaq expects to support Windows 98 PCs, as well as servers running Novell Inc. software, Hall said.
Looking forward, Compaq plans to continue developing more biometric technologies via its partnerships in the BioAPI consortium, including systems that can recognize users by their irises or even their body odor, Hall said. Whatever technologies Compaq comes up with, the company is hoping to deploy the systems or software at high volumes and low costs, he said. By being first to market with inexpensive biometric devices, and by working with the BioAPI forum to come up with standards, Compaq hopes to become a leader in this area, Hall said.
Don't forget to shower, your Deskpro may soon be sniffing you each morning.
Kristi Essick is a correspondent in the London Bureau of the IDG News Service.
http://www.cnn.com/TECH/computing/9807/01/fingerprint.idg/
July 1, 1998
Web posted at: 12:15 AM EDT
by Kristi Essick
(IDG) -- Compaq has released a small hardware module for use with desktop and notebook PCs that will allow users to log onto Windows-based machines using a scan of their fingerprint.
The device will come with software jointly developed by Compaq and Indenticator Technologies, said David Hall, strategic product manager for Compaq's PC products group in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Compaq joined up with several software and hardware vendors, including Microsoft and IBM, in April to form the BioAPI Consortium in order to develop standard biometric products and technologies, Hall said.
Identicator, which was the main partner on the project, has developed fingerprint identification software that is currently used in gateways in prisons and high-security office buildings. However, until Compaq and Identicator teamed up, the company had not developed this software for use in PCs, Hall said. Over the last 18 months, the two companies have worked together to rebuild the software for a networked PC environment, he said.
The fingerprint scanning device, which is about half the size of an ordinary mouse, works in conjunction with the software. Users first register their fingerprints by following the steps in a series of dialogue boxes, scanning their fingerprint and entering their existing network log-on passwords, Hall said.
The fingerprint stands in the place of the existing password, but does not replace it entirely. Instead, a certain fingerprint is tied to a specific password on the company's server (or on the computer's hard drive if the fingerprint device is used to log onto a stand-alone PC.) However, the actual fingerprint is not stored anywhere. What is stored is a series of "minutiae points" that are unique to the fingerprint, but which don't allow it to be recognized. In some countries, Hall explained, it is illegal to store people's fingerprints on a computer of any kind.
Once the fingerprint is scanned and attributed to a certain password, users can use their fingerprints to log onto the network or onto their PC. The reason a password must be retained is that Windows relies on a password system in identifying users on a network, Hall said. When the user scans his or her fingerprint, the password is functioning in the background, he explained.
The idea behind the Compaq fingerprint reader is to make networks more secure, Hall said. Passwords can easily be forgotten and/or shared among many users, while a fingerprint is unique to each user. In addition to the increased security factor, Compaq thinks the device will save companies money since network administrators won't have to spend hours reassigning lost passwords.
Compaq is targeting the fingerprint reader at users in high-security fields, such as medicine and finance, but also to regular companies that are concerned about secure access to their networks, Hall said.
By next year, Compaq may integrate the reader into notebook computers so that people can use their fingerprints to switch on their machines, Hall said. This way, a laptop could only be used by the person whose fingerprint was registered beforehand. Right now, the device connects to the desktop or laptop through the parallel port.
The device and software will retail for $99 and will be available in mid-August worldwide, Hall said. It works with any PC running Windows 95 or Windows NT 4.0, and any server running NT Server 4.0; they don't have to be Compaq machines. In the third quarter, Compaq expects to support Windows 98 PCs, as well as servers running Novell Inc. software, Hall said.
Looking forward, Compaq plans to continue developing more biometric technologies via its partnerships in the BioAPI consortium, including systems that can recognize users by their irises or even their body odor, Hall said. Whatever technologies Compaq comes up with, the company is hoping to deploy the systems or software at high volumes and low costs, he said. By being first to market with inexpensive biometric devices, and by working with the BioAPI forum to come up with standards, Compaq hopes to become a leader in this area, Hall said.
Don't forget to shower, your Deskpro may soon be sniffing you each morning.
Kristi Essick is a correspondent in the London Bureau of the IDG News Service.
Iris ID squares off against fingerprint and handprints
http://www.idg.net/go.cgi?id=18338
June 29, 1998
By Kristi Essick
Trials of biometric-based security with consumers, usually with automated teller machines (ATMs) and kiosks, will give corporate IT a look at what devices and parts of the body make sense for them.
A recently begun trial with a single Nationwide Building Society ATM in Swindon, England, is giving the public a view of how effective an iris scan can be for security.
To participate in the trial, customers of Nationwide Building Society bring their ATM card to the bank and have their eyes scanned, which takes a couple of minutes. They are then ready to use the machine, says Steve Blore, a representative at Nationwide.
Initial response from customers has been "extremely positive," Blore says.
Most people have several cards for different purposes these days, and this eliminates the need to remember another personal identification number, Blore says. But once the initial interest dies down, Nationwide will be able to do research to find out how customers like using the machine on an ongoing basis, he says.
The initial trial, which began in April, will last six months, and at the end of that time, Nationwide will decide if it will roll the project out on a larger basis.
The idea for iris recognition has been around since the 1950s, says John Daugman, a professor of computer science at Cambridge University, in Cambridge, England, who invented the software process technology involved in the iris-recognition system used in the Nationwide ATM.
Although scientists have realized for quite some time that no two irises are identical -- not even the two eyes of one person -- there wasn't any software capable of doing the search-and-match function, Daugman says.
In 1991, Daugman began working on iris-recognition software algorithms; he obtained a patent for the technology in 1994. Since then, 22 companies, including Sensar, British Telecommunications (BT), and OKI, in Japan, have licensed the technology, he says.
The ATM used in the Nationwide trial is manufactured by NCR and uses the iris-identification system from Sensar.
The technology is being used in several trials, but the Nationwide ATM trial is the first one with a public face, Daugman says. BT is using the technology in a trial of telephone kiosks that would let people pay for calls by looking at the phone instead of having to punch in a calling card number, he says. It has also been used in government offices, prisons, and high-security locales, such as nuclear power plants, in the past few years, he said.
"The important thing about iris recognition is that you don't have to make a claim about who you are first," Daugman says. With fingerprint or handprint identification, you must first say "I am John Doe," then the computer attempts to match your print with John Doe's, he says.
With iris recognition, a person doesn't have to identify himself first -- he just looks at the camera and the software does a search of several million irises a second to find the one that matches that person's, Daugman says.
So far, there hasn't been a false match in more than 30 million tries, Daugman says.
However, an out-of-focus camera, mirrored sunglasses, thick contacts, and other such barriers to recognition account for system failures about 1 percent of the time, Daugman says.
Daugman's next goal is to make the software more "forgiving" to allow for such outside circumstances, he says.
http://www.idg.net/go.cgi?id=18338
June 29, 1998
By Kristi Essick
Trials of biometric-based security with consumers, usually with automated teller machines (ATMs) and kiosks, will give corporate IT a look at what devices and parts of the body make sense for them.
A recently begun trial with a single Nationwide Building Society ATM in Swindon, England, is giving the public a view of how effective an iris scan can be for security.
To participate in the trial, customers of Nationwide Building Society bring their ATM card to the bank and have their eyes scanned, which takes a couple of minutes. They are then ready to use the machine, says Steve Blore, a representative at Nationwide.
Initial response from customers has been "extremely positive," Blore says.
Most people have several cards for different purposes these days, and this eliminates the need to remember another personal identification number, Blore says. But once the initial interest dies down, Nationwide will be able to do research to find out how customers like using the machine on an ongoing basis, he says.
The initial trial, which began in April, will last six months, and at the end of that time, Nationwide will decide if it will roll the project out on a larger basis.
The idea for iris recognition has been around since the 1950s, says John Daugman, a professor of computer science at Cambridge University, in Cambridge, England, who invented the software process technology involved in the iris-recognition system used in the Nationwide ATM.
Although scientists have realized for quite some time that no two irises are identical -- not even the two eyes of one person -- there wasn't any software capable of doing the search-and-match function, Daugman says.
In 1991, Daugman began working on iris-recognition software algorithms; he obtained a patent for the technology in 1994. Since then, 22 companies, including Sensar, British Telecommunications (BT), and OKI, in Japan, have licensed the technology, he says.
The ATM used in the Nationwide trial is manufactured by NCR and uses the iris-identification system from Sensar.
The technology is being used in several trials, but the Nationwide ATM trial is the first one with a public face, Daugman says. BT is using the technology in a trial of telephone kiosks that would let people pay for calls by looking at the phone instead of having to punch in a calling card number, he says. It has also been used in government offices, prisons, and high-security locales, such as nuclear power plants, in the past few years, he said.
"The important thing about iris recognition is that you don't have to make a claim about who you are first," Daugman says. With fingerprint or handprint identification, you must first say "I am John Doe," then the computer attempts to match your print with John Doe's, he says.
With iris recognition, a person doesn't have to identify himself first -- he just looks at the camera and the software does a search of several million irises a second to find the one that matches that person's, Daugman says.
So far, there hasn't been a false match in more than 30 million tries, Daugman says.
However, an out-of-focus camera, mirrored sunglasses, thick contacts, and other such barriers to recognition account for system failures about 1 percent of the time, Daugman says.
Daugman's next goal is to make the software more "forgiving" to allow for such outside circumstances, he says.
They've got you under your skin
http://archives.seattletimes.nwsour...eb/vortex/display?slug=idchip23&date=20011223
Sunday, December 23, 2001
By Robert O'Harrow Jr.
The Washington Post
A New Jersey surgeon has embedded under his skin tiny computer chips that can automatically transmit personal information to a scanner, a technology that his employer hopes will someday be widely used as a way to identify people.
The chip, developed by Applied Digital Solutions of Palm Beach, Fla., is similar to that implanted in more than a million dogs, cats and other pets in recent years to track and identify them.
The new chip, slightly smaller than a Tic Tac mint, has a miniature antenna that emits signals containing about two paragraphs' worth of data when scanned by a handheld reader.
The chips would need approval from the Food and Drug Administration, which Applied Digital says it expects to receive by mid-2002. The company says it has already secured permission from the Federal Communications Commission — necessary because the chips use radio frequencies.
Regulatory approval is not necessary overseas, however. Applied Digital expects to be selling chips in foreign countries in about 90 days. One potential market is kidnap targets, who could use these chips in combination with global-positioning-satellite devices.
Other potential applications would put the chips in the role of an ultimate ID, capable of performing many of the roles that are now performed by keys and ATM cards.
The surgeon, who said he implanted the devices in his hip and one arm in September, requested anonymity because he worries about the attention his initiative will draw.
Company officials said they hope to sell the device to patients with pacemakers, artificial hips and other implanted devices. The idea is that the chip will provide prompt and accurate medical information in an emergency, they said.
The signal can contain a name, telephone number and other information. Or it can send out a code that, when linked to a database, can call up records. The scanner can read it through clothes from up to 4 feet away, company officials said.
Applied Digital executives said its new product also could serve as a tamperproof form of identification. Corrections authorities have expressed interest in using the chips to better identify prisoners and parolees, officials said.
Some medical and technology specialists said the device raises new questions about the nexus of humans and computer technology. And it could pose ethical or privacy dilemmas if implanted against someone's wishes, or if it exposes personal information to prying eyes.
Although the system has been in development for a couple of years, company officials said they were uneasy about implanting the chips in people until recently, fearing a backlash from civil libertarians and others.
Copyright © 2003 The Seattle Times Company
http://archives.seattletimes.nwsour...eb/vortex/display?slug=idchip23&date=20011223
Sunday, December 23, 2001
By Robert O'Harrow Jr.
The Washington Post
A New Jersey surgeon has embedded under his skin tiny computer chips that can automatically transmit personal information to a scanner, a technology that his employer hopes will someday be widely used as a way to identify people.
The chip, developed by Applied Digital Solutions of Palm Beach, Fla., is similar to that implanted in more than a million dogs, cats and other pets in recent years to track and identify them.
The new chip, slightly smaller than a Tic Tac mint, has a miniature antenna that emits signals containing about two paragraphs' worth of data when scanned by a handheld reader.
The chips would need approval from the Food and Drug Administration, which Applied Digital says it expects to receive by mid-2002. The company says it has already secured permission from the Federal Communications Commission — necessary because the chips use radio frequencies.
Regulatory approval is not necessary overseas, however. Applied Digital expects to be selling chips in foreign countries in about 90 days. One potential market is kidnap targets, who could use these chips in combination with global-positioning-satellite devices.
Other potential applications would put the chips in the role of an ultimate ID, capable of performing many of the roles that are now performed by keys and ATM cards.
The surgeon, who said he implanted the devices in his hip and one arm in September, requested anonymity because he worries about the attention his initiative will draw.
Company officials said they hope to sell the device to patients with pacemakers, artificial hips and other implanted devices. The idea is that the chip will provide prompt and accurate medical information in an emergency, they said.
The signal can contain a name, telephone number and other information. Or it can send out a code that, when linked to a database, can call up records. The scanner can read it through clothes from up to 4 feet away, company officials said.
Applied Digital executives said its new product also could serve as a tamperproof form of identification. Corrections authorities have expressed interest in using the chips to better identify prisoners and parolees, officials said.
Some medical and technology specialists said the device raises new questions about the nexus of humans and computer technology. And it could pose ethical or privacy dilemmas if implanted against someone's wishes, or if it exposes personal information to prying eyes.
Although the system has been in development for a couple of years, company officials said they were uneasy about implanting the chips in people until recently, fearing a backlash from civil libertarians and others.
Copyright © 2003 The Seattle Times Company
First American Family Gets "Chipped" May 10
[Original headline: Global VeriChip Subscriber -GVS- Registry Ready for First-ever VeriChip ''Chipping'' Procedure On May 10th and Launch of VeriChip Into U.S. Market]
Secure database and 24/7 operations center will support VeriChip subscribers, affiliates and authorized centers
PALM BEACH, Fla.- Applied Digital Solutions, Inc. (Nasdaq: ADSX - news), an advanced technology development company, announced today that its Global VeriChip Subscriber (GVS) Registry service is ready for the first-ever VeriChip "chipping" procedure on May 10, 2002 and VeriChip's official market launch in the United States.
The GVS Registry service, first announced April 9, 2002, supports VeriChip subscribers, authorized VeriChip centers and VeriChip System Affiliates (such as hospitals, EMTs, search and rescue units, and urgent care clinics) by providing immediate access to vital subscriber information in an emergency.
Full-scale marketplace operation of the GVS Registry service will begin with the historic Jacobs family "chipping" procedure on May 10, 2002. The procedure will be followed by a press conference and an invitation-only brunch for business partners and community leaders. During the press conference and the business brunch, Applied Digital executives will unveil more details about VeriChip's rollout plans.
VeriChip is a miniaturized, implantable, radio frequency identification device (RFID) that can be used in a variety of security, emergency and healthcare applications. About the size of a grain of rice, each VeriChip is composed of FDA-accepted materials and contains a unique verification number that can seamlessly integrate to the GVS Registry via a proprietary VeriChip scanner. Instant access to such vital information as allergies to medications, medical device implants, pre-existing medical conditions and emergency contact numbers could save lives in an emergency and enhance the peace of mind of subscribers and their loved ones.
The new GVS Registry Service is hosted and maintained by Digital Angel Corporation's (Amex: DOC - news) state-of-the-art, FDA-compliant operations centers in Riverside, California and Owings, Maryland. Complementary, 24/7 call-center services are provided by a physician-supervised staff of support associates in Owings, Maryland.
The GVS Registry service will initially support VeriChip subscribers in South Florida who will be "chipped" during the company's initial product rollout beginning with the Jacobs family on May 10, 2002. Performed under the supervision of the company's first Authorized VeriChip Center in Palm Beach County, the rollout will feature the use of the first ChipMobile(TM) - a state of the art, medically equipped mobile unit that will deliver VeriChip to initial target markets such as elder care centers, critical care facilities and Generation Y events. The Palm Beach County rollout will last until June 30, 2002, at which time the company expects to move into other geographic markets and initiate nationwide distributor alliance programs.
Commenting on this announcement, Scott R. Silverman, President of Applied Digital Solutions, said: "As promised, the GVS Registry is now fully operational and is prepared to securely house subscriber information so it can be accessed by Authorized VeriChip Affiliates such as hospitals and EMS units. We're confident the GVS Registry's secure software and database will integrate seamlessly with the VeriChip product and proprietary scanners to provide our subscribers with instant access to potentially life-saving, accurate, complete emergency healthcare information stored in the Registry."
About VeriChip(TM)
VeriChip, first announced on December 19, 2001, is a miniaturized, implantable, radio frequency identification device (RFID) that can be used in a variety of security, emergency and healthcare applications. On April 4, 2002, the company announced that it had received written guidance that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) does not consider VeriChip's personal verification device to be a regulated medical device, enabling the company to begin sales, marketing and distribution of VeriChip in the United States. About the size of a grain of rice, each VeriChip is composed of FDA-accepted materials and contains a unique verification number. That number is captured by briefly passing a proprietary, external scanner over the VeriChip. A small amount of radio frequency energy passes through the skin energizing the dormant VeriChip, which then emits a radio frequency signal transmitting the verification number. The company believes its first-mover advantage will enable it to gain significant market share in the emergency information and verification market that is estimated to exceed $15 billion. VeriChip Corporation is a wholly owned subsidiary of Applied Digital Solutions.
About Digital Angel Corporation
Digital Angel Corporation (Amex: DOC - news) was formed on March 27, 2002, in a merger between Digital Angel Corporation and Medical Advisory Systems, a global leader in telemedicine that has operated a 24/7, physician-staffed call center in Owings, Maryland, for two decades. Prior to the merger, Digital Angel Corporation was a wholly owned subsidiary of Applied Digital Solutions. Applied Digital Solutions is the beneficial owner of 19.6 million shares of Digital Angel Corporation. Digital Angel(TM) technology represents the first-ever combination of advanced biosensors and Web-enabled wireless telecommunications linked to the Global Positioning System (GPS). By utilizing advanced biosensor capabilities, Digital Angel will be able to monitor key body functions - such as temperature and pulse - and transmit that data, along with accurate emergency location information, to a ground station or monitoring facility. For more information about Digital Angel, visit www.digitalangel.net.
About Applied Digital Solutions, Inc.
Applied Digital Solutions (Nasdaq: ADSX - news) is an advanced technology development company that focuses on a range of early warning alert, miniaturized power sources and security monitoring systems combined with the comprehensive data management services required to support them. Through its Advanced Technology Group, the company specializes in security-related data collection, value-added data intelligence and complex data delivery systems for a wide variety of end users including commercial operations, government agencies and consumers. For more information, visit the company's website at http://www.adsx.com.
Statements about the Company's future expectations, including future revenues and earnings, and all other statements in this press release other than historical facts are "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, and as that term is defined in the Private Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties and are subject to change at any time, and the Company's actual results could differ materially from expected results. The Company undertakes no obligation to update forward-looking statements to reflect subsequently occurring events or circumstances.
[Original headline: Global VeriChip Subscriber -GVS- Registry Ready for First-ever VeriChip ''Chipping'' Procedure On May 10th and Launch of VeriChip Into U.S. Market]
Secure database and 24/7 operations center will support VeriChip subscribers, affiliates and authorized centers
PALM BEACH, Fla.- Applied Digital Solutions, Inc. (Nasdaq: ADSX - news), an advanced technology development company, announced today that its Global VeriChip Subscriber (GVS) Registry service is ready for the first-ever VeriChip "chipping" procedure on May 10, 2002 and VeriChip's official market launch in the United States.
The GVS Registry service, first announced April 9, 2002, supports VeriChip subscribers, authorized VeriChip centers and VeriChip System Affiliates (such as hospitals, EMTs, search and rescue units, and urgent care clinics) by providing immediate access to vital subscriber information in an emergency.
Full-scale marketplace operation of the GVS Registry service will begin with the historic Jacobs family "chipping" procedure on May 10, 2002. The procedure will be followed by a press conference and an invitation-only brunch for business partners and community leaders. During the press conference and the business brunch, Applied Digital executives will unveil more details about VeriChip's rollout plans.
VeriChip is a miniaturized, implantable, radio frequency identification device (RFID) that can be used in a variety of security, emergency and healthcare applications. About the size of a grain of rice, each VeriChip is composed of FDA-accepted materials and contains a unique verification number that can seamlessly integrate to the GVS Registry via a proprietary VeriChip scanner. Instant access to such vital information as allergies to medications, medical device implants, pre-existing medical conditions and emergency contact numbers could save lives in an emergency and enhance the peace of mind of subscribers and their loved ones.
The new GVS Registry Service is hosted and maintained by Digital Angel Corporation's (Amex: DOC - news) state-of-the-art, FDA-compliant operations centers in Riverside, California and Owings, Maryland. Complementary, 24/7 call-center services are provided by a physician-supervised staff of support associates in Owings, Maryland.
The GVS Registry service will initially support VeriChip subscribers in South Florida who will be "chipped" during the company's initial product rollout beginning with the Jacobs family on May 10, 2002. Performed under the supervision of the company's first Authorized VeriChip Center in Palm Beach County, the rollout will feature the use of the first ChipMobile(TM) - a state of the art, medically equipped mobile unit that will deliver VeriChip to initial target markets such as elder care centers, critical care facilities and Generation Y events. The Palm Beach County rollout will last until June 30, 2002, at which time the company expects to move into other geographic markets and initiate nationwide distributor alliance programs.
Commenting on this announcement, Scott R. Silverman, President of Applied Digital Solutions, said: "As promised, the GVS Registry is now fully operational and is prepared to securely house subscriber information so it can be accessed by Authorized VeriChip Affiliates such as hospitals and EMS units. We're confident the GVS Registry's secure software and database will integrate seamlessly with the VeriChip product and proprietary scanners to provide our subscribers with instant access to potentially life-saving, accurate, complete emergency healthcare information stored in the Registry."
About VeriChip(TM)
VeriChip, first announced on December 19, 2001, is a miniaturized, implantable, radio frequency identification device (RFID) that can be used in a variety of security, emergency and healthcare applications. On April 4, 2002, the company announced that it had received written guidance that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) does not consider VeriChip's personal verification device to be a regulated medical device, enabling the company to begin sales, marketing and distribution of VeriChip in the United States. About the size of a grain of rice, each VeriChip is composed of FDA-accepted materials and contains a unique verification number. That number is captured by briefly passing a proprietary, external scanner over the VeriChip. A small amount of radio frequency energy passes through the skin energizing the dormant VeriChip, which then emits a radio frequency signal transmitting the verification number. The company believes its first-mover advantage will enable it to gain significant market share in the emergency information and verification market that is estimated to exceed $15 billion. VeriChip Corporation is a wholly owned subsidiary of Applied Digital Solutions.
About Digital Angel Corporation
Digital Angel Corporation (Amex: DOC - news) was formed on March 27, 2002, in a merger between Digital Angel Corporation and Medical Advisory Systems, a global leader in telemedicine that has operated a 24/7, physician-staffed call center in Owings, Maryland, for two decades. Prior to the merger, Digital Angel Corporation was a wholly owned subsidiary of Applied Digital Solutions. Applied Digital Solutions is the beneficial owner of 19.6 million shares of Digital Angel Corporation. Digital Angel(TM) technology represents the first-ever combination of advanced biosensors and Web-enabled wireless telecommunications linked to the Global Positioning System (GPS). By utilizing advanced biosensor capabilities, Digital Angel will be able to monitor key body functions - such as temperature and pulse - and transmit that data, along with accurate emergency location information, to a ground station or monitoring facility. For more information about Digital Angel, visit www.digitalangel.net.
About Applied Digital Solutions, Inc.
Applied Digital Solutions (Nasdaq: ADSX - news) is an advanced technology development company that focuses on a range of early warning alert, miniaturized power sources and security monitoring systems combined with the comprehensive data management services required to support them. Through its Advanced Technology Group, the company specializes in security-related data collection, value-added data intelligence and complex data delivery systems for a wide variety of end users including commercial operations, government agencies and consumers. For more information, visit the company's website at http://www.adsx.com.
Statements about the Company's future expectations, including future revenues and earnings, and all other statements in this press release other than historical facts are "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, and as that term is defined in the Private Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties and are subject to change at any time, and the Company's actual results could differ materially from expected results. The Company undertakes no obligation to update forward-looking statements to reflect subsequently occurring events or circumstances.
'Digital Angel' lands in China
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=26991
Will implantable tracking chips be used by totalitarian government?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted: March 28, 2002
By Sherrie Gossett
© 2002 WorldNetDaily.com
Making good on its promise to "achieve a global presence," Digital Angel Corporation – manufacturer and marketer of high-tech, implantable devices for tracking human beings – has opened a research and development facility in Shen Zhen, a special economic zone near Hong Kong, hoping to cash in on vast markets in China and the Far East.
As WorldNetDaily first reported, Digital Angel is a sophisticated, miniaturized tracking device intended by its manufacturer for subdermal implantation in large numbers of human beings. After heavy publicity, the manufacturer last year deflected criticism from privacy advocates and Christians concerned over biblical prophesy by removing all references to human implantation from its website and literature, only to re-introduce human implantation – with a product called VeriChip – after Sept. 11, due to the nation's new preoccupation with security.
Dr. S.G. Chen, with more than 15 years experience in high-level research and development, will lead the Chinese facility, which will be part of the Applied Digital Research Group. This new office will oversee production of Digital Angel products and carry out research and development of new products of the Applied Digital Research Group.
Also serving as a sales and marketing office, the facility will coordinate efforts in three northeast provinces of China.with joint-venture partner Shenyang Duouyuan Digital Communications Net Corporation.
"This new facility and the additional strengthening of our Research Group is a key move in furthering our position as the preeminent advanced digital technology development company," commented CEO Richard Sullivan on the new plant. "Dr. Chen and his team will have immediate access to our OEM partner in China for existing Digital Angel products and the development of new technologies as well."
Sullivan believes this direct access will ensure the partner meets "our aggressive production needs." The Shenyang Duouyan Digital Communications Net Corporation provides the main facility, equipment and working capital to manufacture, promote and distribute Digital Angel products in the three northeastern Chinese provinces.
The Chinese program will follow the company's usual Phase 1- Phase 2 approach. Phase 1 of the partnership will be deployed in the second quarter of 2002 and focus on Digital Angel applications for the shipping industry within the targeted geography.
Phase 2 will focus on people and medical applications of Digital Angel for the region, which comprises roughly 15 percent of China's 1.3 billion people.
"We are truly impressed with Digital Angel technology and look forward to this joint venture," said Shenyang Duouyuan's president, Chen Zhen. "We believe Phase 1 revenues from tracking and monitoring logistics for over 10 million shipping containers transported within our rapidly expanding industrial region, could potentially exceed $200 million annually within the first 2 years of deployment."
The emergence of Digital Angel has met with protests from civil libertarians in the United States who are concerned over potential involuntary applications of injectable tracking chips. But an area of even greater concern may be its use in China. After all, China currently has one of the world's worst human rights records. Over the years, human rights organizations like Amnesty International, Freedom House and the Laogai Research Foundation have documented widespread persecution in China of political dissidents and religious persons. Such persecution routinely includes surveillance and arrest of innocent persons who are then sent to slave labor camps, mental hospitals or "re-education" facilities.
Time will tell if the injectable chips will be used eventually to track the movements of dissidents, in order to round up friends, family members and locate secret meetings. Recent news reports have documented Christian believers using cell-phone codes to arrange secret prayer meetings, and the rural government officials committing protesters to psychiatric facilities where they are "treated."
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=26991
Will implantable tracking chips be used by totalitarian government?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted: March 28, 2002
By Sherrie Gossett
© 2002 WorldNetDaily.com
Making good on its promise to "achieve a global presence," Digital Angel Corporation – manufacturer and marketer of high-tech, implantable devices for tracking human beings – has opened a research and development facility in Shen Zhen, a special economic zone near Hong Kong, hoping to cash in on vast markets in China and the Far East.
As WorldNetDaily first reported, Digital Angel is a sophisticated, miniaturized tracking device intended by its manufacturer for subdermal implantation in large numbers of human beings. After heavy publicity, the manufacturer last year deflected criticism from privacy advocates and Christians concerned over biblical prophesy by removing all references to human implantation from its website and literature, only to re-introduce human implantation – with a product called VeriChip – after Sept. 11, due to the nation's new preoccupation with security.
Dr. S.G. Chen, with more than 15 years experience in high-level research and development, will lead the Chinese facility, which will be part of the Applied Digital Research Group. This new office will oversee production of Digital Angel products and carry out research and development of new products of the Applied Digital Research Group.
Also serving as a sales and marketing office, the facility will coordinate efforts in three northeast provinces of China.with joint-venture partner Shenyang Duouyuan Digital Communications Net Corporation.
"This new facility and the additional strengthening of our Research Group is a key move in furthering our position as the preeminent advanced digital technology development company," commented CEO Richard Sullivan on the new plant. "Dr. Chen and his team will have immediate access to our OEM partner in China for existing Digital Angel products and the development of new technologies as well."
Sullivan believes this direct access will ensure the partner meets "our aggressive production needs." The Shenyang Duouyan Digital Communications Net Corporation provides the main facility, equipment and working capital to manufacture, promote and distribute Digital Angel products in the three northeastern Chinese provinces.
The Chinese program will follow the company's usual Phase 1- Phase 2 approach. Phase 1 of the partnership will be deployed in the second quarter of 2002 and focus on Digital Angel applications for the shipping industry within the targeted geography.
Phase 2 will focus on people and medical applications of Digital Angel for the region, which comprises roughly 15 percent of China's 1.3 billion people.
"We are truly impressed with Digital Angel technology and look forward to this joint venture," said Shenyang Duouyuan's president, Chen Zhen. "We believe Phase 1 revenues from tracking and monitoring logistics for over 10 million shipping containers transported within our rapidly expanding industrial region, could potentially exceed $200 million annually within the first 2 years of deployment."
The emergence of Digital Angel has met with protests from civil libertarians in the United States who are concerned over potential involuntary applications of injectable tracking chips. But an area of even greater concern may be its use in China. After all, China currently has one of the world's worst human rights records. Over the years, human rights organizations like Amnesty International, Freedom House and the Laogai Research Foundation have documented widespread persecution in China of political dissidents and religious persons. Such persecution routinely includes surveillance and arrest of innocent persons who are then sent to slave labor camps, mental hospitals or "re-education" facilities.
Time will tell if the injectable chips will be used eventually to track the movements of dissidents, in order to round up friends, family members and locate secret meetings. Recent news reports have documented Christian believers using cell-phone codes to arrange secret prayer meetings, and the rural government officials committing protesters to psychiatric facilities where they are "treated."
Meet the 'Digital Angel' -- from Hell
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=14913
by Joseph Farrah
2/14/2000
'Twas Lord Byron who said it first, I believe: "'Tis strange but true; for truth is always strange; Stranger than fiction."
In the 21st century, I'm certain we will find that truth is even stranger than science fiction.
You had better sit down for this one, privacy fans. A company called Applied Digital Solutions has what sounds to me like the final solution. The NASDAQ-traded high-tech company is excited about its acquisition of the patent rights to a miniature digital transceiver -- which it nicknamed "Digital Angel (R)." Personally, I think it should be rated X -- or worse.
The product is billed as a versatile transceiver that can send and receive data -- and which can be implanted in humans.
It can provide a tamper-proof means of identification for enhanced business security, the company boasts. It can locate lost or missing individuals, say the proud owners. It can track and locate valuable property, they claim. It can monitor the medical conditions of at-risk patients. And it can slice, dice and destroy the last vestiges of personal privacy in an increasingly impersonal world.
The implantable transceiver's signals can be tracked continuously by global positioning satellites. When implanted in the body, the device is powered electromagnetically through the movement of muscles, and it can be activated either by the wearer or by the monitoring facility.
"While a number of other tracking and monitoring technologies have been patented and marketed in the past, they are all unsuitable for the widespread tracking, recovery and identification of people due to a variety of limitations, including unwieldy size, maintenance requirements, insufficient or inconvenient power-supply and activation difficulties," explains a company prospectus. "For the first time in the history of location and monitoring technology, Digital Angel(R) overcomes these limitations."
Oh, goody.
The company projects a global market for this technology in excess of $100 billion.
But the applications it discusses just don't add up to that kind of number. The math doesn't work for me. You decide. Here's what the company is talking about: business security, locating individuals, monitoring medical conditions, tracking and locating essential military and diplomatic personnel, tracking personal property.
The only way that adds up to a hundred billion in my calculator is if every human being on earth gets one of these implants. And maybe that's the idea.
On Jan. 31, APS accepted the special "Technology Pioneers" award from the World Economic Forum for the company's contributions to worldwide economic development and social progress through technology advancements.
And what is the World Economic Forum? It bills itself as an independent organization committed to improving the state of the world. It does this by "creating the foremost global partnerships of business, political, intellectual and other leaders of society to define and discuss key issues on the global agenda."
Now, I want you to use your imagination here, for a moment. Why would an organization committed to breaking down nationalist barriers and moving the world toward global government give a technology award to a company that just acquired the patent to a sophisticated, implantable identification device? Hmmmmm? And guess what one of the foremost goals of WEF is? You got it -- vaccinating every human being on the planet. How convenient! What a coincidence.
President Clinton recently addressed the WEF in Davos, Switzerland. He boasted about asking the Congress to give pharmaceutical conglomerates tax credits to make vaccines more widely available at low cost. He appealed for a similar effort from the World Bank, other nations and the corporate world to deliver the vaccines to the people who need them -- meaning everyone.
How could ADS ever hope to make $100 billion with this new technology? By implanting it in every human being in the world. And how could that be done? At vaccination time, of course.
Let's see now. The application is buying and selling. The technology is implantable. The plans are global.
This sounds remarkably like something I read in Revelation 13:16-18: "And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six."
Digital Angel? Sounds more like we could be entering the age of the Digital Devil.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=14913
by Joseph Farrah
2/14/2000
'Twas Lord Byron who said it first, I believe: "'Tis strange but true; for truth is always strange; Stranger than fiction."
In the 21st century, I'm certain we will find that truth is even stranger than science fiction.
You had better sit down for this one, privacy fans. A company called Applied Digital Solutions has what sounds to me like the final solution. The NASDAQ-traded high-tech company is excited about its acquisition of the patent rights to a miniature digital transceiver -- which it nicknamed "Digital Angel (R)." Personally, I think it should be rated X -- or worse.
The product is billed as a versatile transceiver that can send and receive data -- and which can be implanted in humans.
It can provide a tamper-proof means of identification for enhanced business security, the company boasts. It can locate lost or missing individuals, say the proud owners. It can track and locate valuable property, they claim. It can monitor the medical conditions of at-risk patients. And it can slice, dice and destroy the last vestiges of personal privacy in an increasingly impersonal world.
The implantable transceiver's signals can be tracked continuously by global positioning satellites. When implanted in the body, the device is powered electromagnetically through the movement of muscles, and it can be activated either by the wearer or by the monitoring facility.
"While a number of other tracking and monitoring technologies have been patented and marketed in the past, they are all unsuitable for the widespread tracking, recovery and identification of people due to a variety of limitations, including unwieldy size, maintenance requirements, insufficient or inconvenient power-supply and activation difficulties," explains a company prospectus. "For the first time in the history of location and monitoring technology, Digital Angel(R) overcomes these limitations."
Oh, goody.
The company projects a global market for this technology in excess of $100 billion.
But the applications it discusses just don't add up to that kind of number. The math doesn't work for me. You decide. Here's what the company is talking about: business security, locating individuals, monitoring medical conditions, tracking and locating essential military and diplomatic personnel, tracking personal property.
The only way that adds up to a hundred billion in my calculator is if every human being on earth gets one of these implants. And maybe that's the idea.
On Jan. 31, APS accepted the special "Technology Pioneers" award from the World Economic Forum for the company's contributions to worldwide economic development and social progress through technology advancements.
And what is the World Economic Forum? It bills itself as an independent organization committed to improving the state of the world. It does this by "creating the foremost global partnerships of business, political, intellectual and other leaders of society to define and discuss key issues on the global agenda."
Now, I want you to use your imagination here, for a moment. Why would an organization committed to breaking down nationalist barriers and moving the world toward global government give a technology award to a company that just acquired the patent to a sophisticated, implantable identification device? Hmmmmm? And guess what one of the foremost goals of WEF is? You got it -- vaccinating every human being on the planet. How convenient! What a coincidence.
President Clinton recently addressed the WEF in Davos, Switzerland. He boasted about asking the Congress to give pharmaceutical conglomerates tax credits to make vaccines more widely available at low cost. He appealed for a similar effort from the World Bank, other nations and the corporate world to deliver the vaccines to the people who need them -- meaning everyone.
How could ADS ever hope to make $100 billion with this new technology? By implanting it in every human being in the world. And how could that be done? At vaccination time, of course.
Let's see now. The application is buying and selling. The technology is implantable. The plans are global.
This sounds remarkably like something I read in Revelation 13:16-18: "And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six."
Digital Angel? Sounds more like we could be entering the age of the Digital Devil.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
YOUR PAPERS, PLEASE ...
Big Brother gets under your skin
Ultimate ID badge, transceiver implanted in humans monitored by GPS satellites
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By Julie Foster
© 2000 WorldNetDaily.com
New implant technology currently used to locate lost pets has been adapted for use in humans, allowing implant wearers to emit a homing beacon, have vital bodily functions monitored and confirm identity when making e-commerce transactions.
Applied Digital Solutions, an e-business to business solutions provider, acquired the patent rights to the miniature digital transceiver it has named "Digital Angel®." The company plans to market the device for a number of uses, including as a "tamper-proof means of identification for enhanced e-business security."
Digital Angel® sends and receives data and can be continuously tracked by global positioning satellite technology. When implanted within a body, the device is powered electromechanically through the movement of muscles and can be activated either by the "wearer" or by a monitoring facility.
"We believe its potential for improving individual and e-business security and enhancing the quality of life for millions of people is virtually limitless," said ADS Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Richard Sullivan. "Although we're in the early developmental phase, we expect to come forward with applications in many different areas, from medical monitoring to law enforcement. However, in keeping with our core strengths in the e-business to business arena, we plan to focus our initial development efforts on the growing field of e-commerce security and user ID verification."
Dr. Peter Zhou, chief scientist for development of the implant and president of DigitalAngel.net, Inc, a subsidiary of ADS, told WorldNetDaily the device will send a signal from the person wearing Digital Angel® to either his computer or the e-merchant with whom he is doing business in order to verify his identity.
In the future, said Zhou, computers may be programmed not to operate without such user identification. As previously reported in WND, user verification devices requiring a live fingerprint scan are already being sold by computer manufacturers. Digital Angel® takes such biometric technology a giant step further by physically joining human and machine.
But e-commerce is only one field to which Digital Angel® applies. The device's patent describes it as a rescue beacon for kidnapped children and missing persons. According to Zhou, the implant will save money by reducing resources used in rescue operations for athletes, including mountain climbers and skiers.
Law enforcement may employ the implant to keep track of criminals under house arrest, as well as reduce emergency response time by immediately locating individuals in distress.
The device also has the ability to monitor the user's heart rate, blood pressure and other vital functions.
"Your doctor will know the problem before you do," said Zhou, noting peace of mind is possible for at-risk patients who can rest in the knowledge that help will be on the way should anything go wrong.
Indeed, peace of mind is Digital Angel®'s main selling point.
"Ideally," the patent states, "the device will bring peace of mind and an increased quality of life for those who use it, and for their families, loved ones, and associates who depend on them critically."
Referring to the threat of kidnapping, the patent goes on to say, "Adults who are at risk due to their economic or political status, as well as their children who may be at risk of being kidnapped, will reap new freedoms in their everyday lives by employing the device."
Digital Angel®'s developer told WND demand for the implant has been tremendous since ADS announced its acquisition of the patent in December.
"We have received requests daily from around the world for the product," Zhou said, mentioning South America, Mexico and Spain as examples.
One inquirer was the U.S. Department of Defense, through a contractor, according to Zhou. American soldiers may be required to wear the implant so their whereabouts and health conditions can be accessed at all times, said the scientist.
As of yet, there is no central DigitalAngel.net facility that would do the job of monitoring users -- the task will most likely fall to the entities marketing the device, said Zhou. For example, if a medical group decides to market Digital Angel® to its patients, that group would set up its own monitoring station to check on its device-users.
Likewise, militaries employing the implant will want to maintain their own monitoring stations for security purposes.
But for critics, military use of the implant is not at the top of their list of objections to the new technology. ADS has received complaints from Christians and others who believe the implant could be the fulfillment of Biblical prophecy.
The Book of Revelation states all people will be required to "receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark." (Rev. 13: 16-17)
In an increasingly cashless society where identity verification is essential for financial transactions, some Christians view Digital Angel®'s ID and e-commerce applications as a form of the biblical "mark of the beast."
But Zhou dismisses such objections to the implant.
"I am a Christian, but I don't think [that argument] makes sense," he told WND. "The purpose of the device is to save your life and improve the quality of life. There's no connection to the Bible. There are different interpretations of the Bible. My interpretation is, anything to improve the quality of life is from God. The Bible says, 'I am the God of living people.' We not only live, we live well."
Sullivan, responding to religious objections to his product, told WorldNetDaily no one will be forced to wear Digital Angel®.
"We live in a voluntary society," he said. According to the CEO, individuals may choose not to take advantage of the technology.
Zhou alluded to some Christians' objection to medicine per se, adding such opposition wanes when the life-saving, life-improving benefits of technology are realized.
"A few years ago there may have been resistance, but not anymore," he continued. "People are getting used to having implants. New century, new trend."
Zhou compared Digital Angel® to pacemakers, which regulate a user's heart rate. Pacemakers used to be seen as bizarre, said Zhou, but now they are part of everyday life. Digital Angel® will be received the same way, he added.
Vaccines are another good comparison, said the scientist, who noted, "Both save your life. When vaccines came out, people were against them. But now we don't even think about it."
Digital Angel®, Zhou believes, could become as prevalent as a vaccine.
"Fifty years from now this will be very, very popular. Fifty years ago the thought of a cell phone, where you could walk around talking on the phone, was unimaginable. Now they are everywhere," Zhou explained.
Just like the cell phone, Digital Angel® "will be a connection from yourself to the electronic world. It will be your guardian, protector. It will bring good things to you."
"We will be a hybrid of electronic intelligence and our own soul," Zhou concluded.
In the process of merging with Destron Fearing Corp., a manufacturer and marketer of electronic and visual identification devices for animals, DigitalAngel.net is scheduled to complete a prototype of the dime-sized implant by year's end. Company executives hope to make the device affordable for individuals, though no cost projections have been made.
ADS, DigitalAngel.net's parent company, received a special "Technology Pioneers" award from the World Economic Forum for its contributions to "worldwide economic development and social progress through technology advancements."
The World Economic Forum, incorporated in 1971 with headquarters in Geneva, is an independent, not-for-profit organization "committed to improving the state of the world." WEF is currently preparing for its "China Business Summit" in Beijing next month for the purpose of forging new economic alliances with the communist nation.
Big Brother gets under your skin
Ultimate ID badge, transceiver implanted in humans monitored by GPS satellites
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By Julie Foster
© 2000 WorldNetDaily.com
New implant technology currently used to locate lost pets has been adapted for use in humans, allowing implant wearers to emit a homing beacon, have vital bodily functions monitored and confirm identity when making e-commerce transactions.
Applied Digital Solutions, an e-business to business solutions provider, acquired the patent rights to the miniature digital transceiver it has named "Digital Angel®." The company plans to market the device for a number of uses, including as a "tamper-proof means of identification for enhanced e-business security."
Digital Angel® sends and receives data and can be continuously tracked by global positioning satellite technology. When implanted within a body, the device is powered electromechanically through the movement of muscles and can be activated either by the "wearer" or by a monitoring facility.
"We believe its potential for improving individual and e-business security and enhancing the quality of life for millions of people is virtually limitless," said ADS Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Richard Sullivan. "Although we're in the early developmental phase, we expect to come forward with applications in many different areas, from medical monitoring to law enforcement. However, in keeping with our core strengths in the e-business to business arena, we plan to focus our initial development efforts on the growing field of e-commerce security and user ID verification."
Dr. Peter Zhou, chief scientist for development of the implant and president of DigitalAngel.net, Inc, a subsidiary of ADS, told WorldNetDaily the device will send a signal from the person wearing Digital Angel® to either his computer or the e-merchant with whom he is doing business in order to verify his identity.
In the future, said Zhou, computers may be programmed not to operate without such user identification. As previously reported in WND, user verification devices requiring a live fingerprint scan are already being sold by computer manufacturers. Digital Angel® takes such biometric technology a giant step further by physically joining human and machine.
But e-commerce is only one field to which Digital Angel® applies. The device's patent describes it as a rescue beacon for kidnapped children and missing persons. According to Zhou, the implant will save money by reducing resources used in rescue operations for athletes, including mountain climbers and skiers.
Law enforcement may employ the implant to keep track of criminals under house arrest, as well as reduce emergency response time by immediately locating individuals in distress.
The device also has the ability to monitor the user's heart rate, blood pressure and other vital functions.
"Your doctor will know the problem before you do," said Zhou, noting peace of mind is possible for at-risk patients who can rest in the knowledge that help will be on the way should anything go wrong.
Indeed, peace of mind is Digital Angel®'s main selling point.
"Ideally," the patent states, "the device will bring peace of mind and an increased quality of life for those who use it, and for their families, loved ones, and associates who depend on them critically."
Referring to the threat of kidnapping, the patent goes on to say, "Adults who are at risk due to their economic or political status, as well as their children who may be at risk of being kidnapped, will reap new freedoms in their everyday lives by employing the device."
Digital Angel®'s developer told WND demand for the implant has been tremendous since ADS announced its acquisition of the patent in December.
"We have received requests daily from around the world for the product," Zhou said, mentioning South America, Mexico and Spain as examples.
One inquirer was the U.S. Department of Defense, through a contractor, according to Zhou. American soldiers may be required to wear the implant so their whereabouts and health conditions can be accessed at all times, said the scientist.
As of yet, there is no central DigitalAngel.net facility that would do the job of monitoring users -- the task will most likely fall to the entities marketing the device, said Zhou. For example, if a medical group decides to market Digital Angel® to its patients, that group would set up its own monitoring station to check on its device-users.
Likewise, militaries employing the implant will want to maintain their own monitoring stations for security purposes.
But for critics, military use of the implant is not at the top of their list of objections to the new technology. ADS has received complaints from Christians and others who believe the implant could be the fulfillment of Biblical prophecy.
The Book of Revelation states all people will be required to "receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark." (Rev. 13: 16-17)
In an increasingly cashless society where identity verification is essential for financial transactions, some Christians view Digital Angel®'s ID and e-commerce applications as a form of the biblical "mark of the beast."
But Zhou dismisses such objections to the implant.
"I am a Christian, but I don't think [that argument] makes sense," he told WND. "The purpose of the device is to save your life and improve the quality of life. There's no connection to the Bible. There are different interpretations of the Bible. My interpretation is, anything to improve the quality of life is from God. The Bible says, 'I am the God of living people.' We not only live, we live well."
Sullivan, responding to religious objections to his product, told WorldNetDaily no one will be forced to wear Digital Angel®.
"We live in a voluntary society," he said. According to the CEO, individuals may choose not to take advantage of the technology.
Zhou alluded to some Christians' objection to medicine per se, adding such opposition wanes when the life-saving, life-improving benefits of technology are realized.
"A few years ago there may have been resistance, but not anymore," he continued. "People are getting used to having implants. New century, new trend."
Zhou compared Digital Angel® to pacemakers, which regulate a user's heart rate. Pacemakers used to be seen as bizarre, said Zhou, but now they are part of everyday life. Digital Angel® will be received the same way, he added.
Vaccines are another good comparison, said the scientist, who noted, "Both save your life. When vaccines came out, people were against them. But now we don't even think about it."
Digital Angel®, Zhou believes, could become as prevalent as a vaccine.
"Fifty years from now this will be very, very popular. Fifty years ago the thought of a cell phone, where you could walk around talking on the phone, was unimaginable. Now they are everywhere," Zhou explained.
Just like the cell phone, Digital Angel® "will be a connection from yourself to the electronic world. It will be your guardian, protector. It will bring good things to you."
"We will be a hybrid of electronic intelligence and our own soul," Zhou concluded.
In the process of merging with Destron Fearing Corp., a manufacturer and marketer of electronic and visual identification devices for animals, DigitalAngel.net is scheduled to complete a prototype of the dime-sized implant by year's end. Company executives hope to make the device affordable for individuals, though no cost projections have been made.
ADS, DigitalAngel.net's parent company, received a special "Technology Pioneers" award from the World Economic Forum for its contributions to "worldwide economic development and social progress through technology advancements."
The World Economic Forum, incorporated in 1971 with headquarters in Geneva, is an independent, not-for-profit organization "committed to improving the state of the world." WEF is currently preparing for its "China Business Summit" in Beijing next month for the purpose of forging new economic alliances with the communist nation.
Could these be your neighbors?
http://www.time.com/time/health/printout/0,8816,214099,00.html
Sunday, Mar. 03, 2002
Meet The Chipsons
Jeffrey, Leslie and their boy Derek will be America's first cyborg family. Are you ready to "Get Chipped"?
By LEV GROSSMAN
With his school uniform and his plump, pinchable cheeks, Derek Jacobs of Boca Raton, Fla., looks like an ordinary youngster. But looks can deceive. When he was 12, Microsoft certified Derek as a qualified systems engineer, one of the youngest ever. At 13 he was running his own computer-consulting company. Now he's 14, and what's Derek doing for an encore? He's becoming a cyborg--part man-child, part machine.
Derek, his mom Leslie and his dad Jeffrey are the first volunteer test subjects for a new, implantable computer device called VeriChip. Later this spring, pending Food and Drug Administration approval, doctors will load a wide-bore needle with a microchip containing a few kilobytes of silicon memory and a tiny radio transmitter and inject it under the skin of their left arms, where it will serve as a medical identification device. It sounds like science fiction. (Remember the Borg on Star Trek? Resistance is futile!) But VeriChip is quite real. The Jacobs family could be the first in a new generation of computer-enhanced human beings.
In some respects Derek is a regular eighth-grader. He's quiet and polite. He plays the drums. He used to be on the swim team before he quit to make time for his computer business. He remembers vividly when he first saw VeriChip on the Today show. "I thought it was great technology," he says. "I wanted to be a part of it." And when Derek sets his mind to a problem, he generally solves it. "Derek stood up and said to me, 'Mom, I want to be the first kid implanted with the chip,'" remembers Leslie Jacobs, an advertising executive at Florida Design magazine. "He kept bugging me to call the company until I finally broke down."
Leslie set up a lunch with Keith Bolton, vice president of Applied Digital Solutions, the company behind VeriChip. At first Bolton (who jokingly refers to the Jacobses as "the Chipsons") was skeptical. Since the first wave of VeriChip publicity, he has heard from roughly 2,500 would-be cyborgs. But the Jacobs family is particularly well suited to test VeriChip for use in medicine. If a patient with VeriChip were injured, the theory goes, a harried ER doc could quickly access the victim's medical background by scanning the chip with a device that looks like a Palm handheld computer.
In the case of the Jacobses, that could be a lifesaver. Derek has allergies to common antibiotics, and Jeffrey is weakened from years of treatment for Hodgkin's disease. A few years ago, he was in a serious car accident; and when he got to the hospital, he was in no shape to explain his condition to the staff. "The advantage of the chip is that the information is available at the time of need," Jeffrey explains. "It would speak for me, give me a voice when I don't have one."
The operation to insert the chip is simple. "It takes about seven seconds," says Dr. Richard Seelig, the company's medical-applications director, exaggerating only slightly. An antiseptic swab, a local anesthetic, an injection and a Band-Aid--that's all it takes. Once the skin heals, Seelig says, the chip is completely invisible, and the Jacobses will hardly know it's there. "The chip is fully biocompatible," Bolton says. "No body fluids can get in, and nothing can be loosened or come out."
Applied Digital Solutions--which is trademarking the phrase "Get Chipped!"--has big plans for its little device. In the next few years, it wants to add sensors that will read your vital signs--pulse, temperature, blood sugar and so on--and a satellite receiver that can track where you are. The company makes a pager-like gadget called Digital Angel that does both those things, and its engineers are doing their darnedest to cram Digital Angel's functions into a package small enough to implant. Once they do, VeriChip will be very powerful indeed. That's one of the reasons the Jacobses want to get involved. "There are endless possibilities," says Derek. "For me it's marvelous," says Leslie. "Every day I worry about my husband. We definitely feel it will make us all feel more secure."
Security is part of the VeriChip business plan. The company has already signed a deal with the California department of corrections to track the movements of parolees using Digital Angel. Seelig believes VeriChip could function as a theftproof, counterfeit-proof ID, like having a driver's license embedded under your skin. He suggests that airline crews could wear one to ensure that terrorists don't infiltrate the cockpit in disguise. "I travel quite a bit," he says, "and I want to make sure the pilots in that plane belong there."
Could the airlines or government really require pilots to get chipped? "I think we have a right to demand that," says Seelig. "Our lives are in their hands." It sounds extreme, but there are precedents. In the early '90s several states considered laws that would have required female child abusers and women on welfare to wear birth-control implants. The proposals were not very popular. "There's a feeling that technology has outpaced the policy process," says Steven Aftergood, a senior research analyst at the Federation of American Scientists. "We aren't in a position to apply these new devices with the wisdom and prudence that is needed."
Prudent or not, implant technology is racing ahead with bionic speed. Kevin Warwick, a professor of cybernetics at the University of Reading in England, is working on the next step. In a few weeks, he will receive an implant that will wirelessly connect the nerves in his arm to a PC. The computer will record the activity of his nervous system and stimulate the nerves to produce small movements and sensations; such an implant could eventually help a person suffering from paralysis to move parts of the body the brain can't reach. If all goes well, Warwick will put a companion chip in his wife Irena and let the two implants communicate with each other. "If I move my finger, she'll feel something," he explains. "We'll be closer than anybody's been before--nervous system to nervous system."
There are plenty of skeptics, but Jeffrey Jacobs is not one of them. "People have been worried about Big Brother for years," he says. "The three of us want to be part of not just this new technology but an evolution of humanity."
The FDA is expected to approve the Jacobses' implants within two months, and there are other ways to speed up the evolution. Two weeks ago, Applied Digital Solutions signed a deal to distribute VeriChips in Brazil, where kidnapping has become epidemic, especially among the rich and powerful. Government officials hope that VeriChips implanted in people considered at high risk could be used to track victims via satellite. "Here [in the U.S.] we're still dealing with FDA and privacy and civil-liberties issues," says Bolton. "But we're not stopping. We're going into South America right now!" Technology has a way of moving faster than legislation, and if it comes down to a race between cyborgs and Senators, guess who will win? Resistance is futile.
http://www.time.com/time/health/printout/0,8816,214099,00.html
Sunday, Mar. 03, 2002
Meet The Chipsons
Jeffrey, Leslie and their boy Derek will be America's first cyborg family. Are you ready to "Get Chipped"?
By LEV GROSSMAN
With his school uniform and his plump, pinchable cheeks, Derek Jacobs of Boca Raton, Fla., looks like an ordinary youngster. But looks can deceive. When he was 12, Microsoft certified Derek as a qualified systems engineer, one of the youngest ever. At 13 he was running his own computer-consulting company. Now he's 14, and what's Derek doing for an encore? He's becoming a cyborg--part man-child, part machine.
Derek, his mom Leslie and his dad Jeffrey are the first volunteer test subjects for a new, implantable computer device called VeriChip. Later this spring, pending Food and Drug Administration approval, doctors will load a wide-bore needle with a microchip containing a few kilobytes of silicon memory and a tiny radio transmitter and inject it under the skin of their left arms, where it will serve as a medical identification device. It sounds like science fiction. (Remember the Borg on Star Trek? Resistance is futile!) But VeriChip is quite real. The Jacobs family could be the first in a new generation of computer-enhanced human beings.
In some respects Derek is a regular eighth-grader. He's quiet and polite. He plays the drums. He used to be on the swim team before he quit to make time for his computer business. He remembers vividly when he first saw VeriChip on the Today show. "I thought it was great technology," he says. "I wanted to be a part of it." And when Derek sets his mind to a problem, he generally solves it. "Derek stood up and said to me, 'Mom, I want to be the first kid implanted with the chip,'" remembers Leslie Jacobs, an advertising executive at Florida Design magazine. "He kept bugging me to call the company until I finally broke down."
Leslie set up a lunch with Keith Bolton, vice president of Applied Digital Solutions, the company behind VeriChip. At first Bolton (who jokingly refers to the Jacobses as "the Chipsons") was skeptical. Since the first wave of VeriChip publicity, he has heard from roughly 2,500 would-be cyborgs. But the Jacobs family is particularly well suited to test VeriChip for use in medicine. If a patient with VeriChip were injured, the theory goes, a harried ER doc could quickly access the victim's medical background by scanning the chip with a device that looks like a Palm handheld computer.
In the case of the Jacobses, that could be a lifesaver. Derek has allergies to common antibiotics, and Jeffrey is weakened from years of treatment for Hodgkin's disease. A few years ago, he was in a serious car accident; and when he got to the hospital, he was in no shape to explain his condition to the staff. "The advantage of the chip is that the information is available at the time of need," Jeffrey explains. "It would speak for me, give me a voice when I don't have one."
The operation to insert the chip is simple. "It takes about seven seconds," says Dr. Richard Seelig, the company's medical-applications director, exaggerating only slightly. An antiseptic swab, a local anesthetic, an injection and a Band-Aid--that's all it takes. Once the skin heals, Seelig says, the chip is completely invisible, and the Jacobses will hardly know it's there. "The chip is fully biocompatible," Bolton says. "No body fluids can get in, and nothing can be loosened or come out."
Applied Digital Solutions--which is trademarking the phrase "Get Chipped!"--has big plans for its little device. In the next few years, it wants to add sensors that will read your vital signs--pulse, temperature, blood sugar and so on--and a satellite receiver that can track where you are. The company makes a pager-like gadget called Digital Angel that does both those things, and its engineers are doing their darnedest to cram Digital Angel's functions into a package small enough to implant. Once they do, VeriChip will be very powerful indeed. That's one of the reasons the Jacobses want to get involved. "There are endless possibilities," says Derek. "For me it's marvelous," says Leslie. "Every day I worry about my husband. We definitely feel it will make us all feel more secure."
Security is part of the VeriChip business plan. The company has already signed a deal with the California department of corrections to track the movements of parolees using Digital Angel. Seelig believes VeriChip could function as a theftproof, counterfeit-proof ID, like having a driver's license embedded under your skin. He suggests that airline crews could wear one to ensure that terrorists don't infiltrate the cockpit in disguise. "I travel quite a bit," he says, "and I want to make sure the pilots in that plane belong there."
Could the airlines or government really require pilots to get chipped? "I think we have a right to demand that," says Seelig. "Our lives are in their hands." It sounds extreme, but there are precedents. In the early '90s several states considered laws that would have required female child abusers and women on welfare to wear birth-control implants. The proposals were not very popular. "There's a feeling that technology has outpaced the policy process," says Steven Aftergood, a senior research analyst at the Federation of American Scientists. "We aren't in a position to apply these new devices with the wisdom and prudence that is needed."
Prudent or not, implant technology is racing ahead with bionic speed. Kevin Warwick, a professor of cybernetics at the University of Reading in England, is working on the next step. In a few weeks, he will receive an implant that will wirelessly connect the nerves in his arm to a PC. The computer will record the activity of his nervous system and stimulate the nerves to produce small movements and sensations; such an implant could eventually help a person suffering from paralysis to move parts of the body the brain can't reach. If all goes well, Warwick will put a companion chip in his wife Irena and let the two implants communicate with each other. "If I move my finger, she'll feel something," he explains. "We'll be closer than anybody's been before--nervous system to nervous system."
There are plenty of skeptics, but Jeffrey Jacobs is not one of them. "People have been worried about Big Brother for years," he says. "The three of us want to be part of not just this new technology but an evolution of humanity."
The FDA is expected to approve the Jacobses' implants within two months, and there are other ways to speed up the evolution. Two weeks ago, Applied Digital Solutions signed a deal to distribute VeriChips in Brazil, where kidnapping has become epidemic, especially among the rich and powerful. Government officials hope that VeriChips implanted in people considered at high risk could be used to track victims via satellite. "Here [in the U.S.] we're still dealing with FDA and privacy and civil-liberties issues," says Bolton. "But we're not stopping. We're going into South America right now!" Technology has a way of moving faster than legislation, and if it comes down to a race between cyborgs and Senators, guess who will win? Resistance is futile.
FOR GOD WHO COMMANDED THE LIGHT TO SHINE FROM THE DARKNESS, HATH SHINED IN OUR HEARTS, TO GIVE THE LIGHT OF THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE GLORY OF GOD IN THE FACE OF JESUS CHRIST. BUT WE HAVE THIS TREASURE IN EARTHEN VESSELS, THAT THE EXCELLENCY OF THE POWER MAY BE OF GOD AND NOT OF US. WE ARE TROUBLED ON EVERY SIDE, YET NOT DISTRESSED; WE ARE PERPLEXED, BUT NOT IN DISPAIR; PERSECUTED BUT NOT FORSAKEN; CAST DOWN, BUT NOT DESTROYED~ II CORINTHIANS 4:6-9
AND FEAR NOT THEM WHICH KILL THE BODY, BUT ARE NOT ABLE TO KILL THE SOUL: BUT RATHER FEAR HIM THAT IS ABLE TO DESTROY BOTH THE BODY AND SOUL IN HELL~ MATHEW 10:28
IF I PERISH, I PERISH~ ESTHER 4:16
AND FEAR NOT THEM WHICH KILL THE BODY, BUT ARE NOT ABLE TO KILL THE SOUL: BUT RATHER FEAR HIM THAT IS ABLE TO DESTROY BOTH THE BODY AND SOUL IN HELL~ MATHEW 10:28
IF I PERISH, I PERISH~ ESTHER 4:16
FDA Launches Investigation Into VeriChip
'Tech Live' Exclusive: Nasdaq halts trading in Applied Digital Solutions stock after feds claim company includes medical data in its controversial device.
By Jim Goldman, Tech Live Silicon Valley bureau chief
Updated 5/17: Nasdaq halted trading in shares of VeriChip-maker Applied Digital Solutions Friday morning, a day after TechTV reported that the Food and Drug Administration has launched a formal investigation into the company. Tune in tonight on "Tech Live" for more details on the controversy.
The stock exchange stopped Applied Digital Solutions trades at 9:25 a.m. Eastern, and trading will remain halted until the Florida-based company fully satisfies Nasdaq's request for additional information on the FDA probe into the implantable chip. The halt is related to TechTV's report about the federal investigation into the company and its VeriChip, a Nasdaq spokesman told reporters.
The probe centers on whether or not Applied Digital Solutions is marketing the controversial device as a "medical" lifesaver, or whether the chip is touted merely as an identification device, as the company assured FDA officials it would be.
"The agency is in the process of investigating the firm and documenting exactly what is being said, what is being printed, and what is being promoted," said Wally Pellerite, assistant to the director of the FDA Office of Compliance.
Reached late today, Applied Digital Solutions CEO Scott Silverman said, "We've received no formal notification that we're under investigation."
Silverman did say that Pellerite contacted the company last Friday, expressing concern over the way the chip and its capabilities were being portrayed by the media. Silverman said the company's consultants were working with "people much higher in the FDA" over these concerns, and continue to work with them today.
VeriChip's problem, according to Pellerite, is that the FDA was "very clear" in its response to an email from the company seeking FDA approval to sell its chip. At the time, the FDA responded -- informally according to Pellerite -- that as long as "no medical information" of any kind was encoded on the chip, and as long as the chip was not used to link to any kind of medical database, the company was free to go to market.
But instead, Pellerite said, Applied Digital Solutions issued statements saying that its chip had been given governmental approval and that the first implant would be scheduled for May 10.
The Jacobs family of Boca Raton, Florida, became the first family to receive the chip, an event covered by hordes of media from around the world.
Throughout the day, and indeed in the weeks leading up to the implant event, Applied Digital executives constantly reaffirmed the device's lifesaving capabilities since it was linked to a comprehensive database that could store megabytes of information. The implantable chip could essentially speak for a patient who may be unconscious or otherwise incapacitated by providing key medical information to doctors in an emergency situation.
During a demonstration after Leslie Jacobs was implanted, Applied Digital Solutions CTO Keith Bolton ran a scanner over her arm and the scanner displayed her name, her telephone number, and a condition known as "mitral valve prolapse," a heart murmur. This was information, Bolton said, that could be helpful to medical professionals "in the event that she can't speak, to save her life."
Bolton also scanned the arm of Derek Jacobs, Leslie's 14-year-old son, and the display showed Derek's medicine allergies.
According to Pellerite, "It would strongly suggest that [Applied Digital] has something that needs to be required to be regulated as a medical device."
Additionally, Pellerite told TechTV that Applied Digital may have violated the law when Bolton claimed, "There's more information that can be pulled out of the FDA-compliant database."
Pellerite said, "The firm made reference to using an FDA-compliant [database]. It is a violation of the law to use the FDA in such a way that it would be used to endorse your particular product."
The penalties for those violations can be stiff: up to $15,000 for each violation and up to $1 million for the company, as well as for each individual officer of the company.
"Once an identification number is retrieved from the chip, the user can use it to access any information -- without making the product a medical device," said David Hughes, vice president of Technology Sourcing International, a consultant to Applied Digital Solutions helping the company navigate the FDA approval process.
Upon hearing that the FDA expressed concerns about the chip being tied to a medical database, Hughes said, "That is contrary to my conversations with staff members at the FDA. Until we have an opportunity to discuss it with them more, I can't give you any information. The storing of medical data does not make it a medically regulated device."
Applied Digital's problems don't end there. The company has delayed the release of its quarterly financial results after the company's auditor, Grant Thornton, abruptly resigned Wednesday over an accounting dispute. Just three weeks ago, Applied Digital fired another accountant, PricewaterhouseCoopers.
The dispute with its latest auditor is significant since it dealt with a charge the auditor told the company it would have to take in the current quarter. That charge would lead to a quarterly loss that could be devastating to the company.
If Applied reports the charge, it will translate into a loss on the quarter. If Applied reports red ink on the quarter, it violates one of the terms of its restructured credit agreement with IBM Credit, which loaned the company $82.3 million. Applied Digital had violated the requirements of its IBM Credit loan last year.
According to the Miami Herald, Applied has since renegotiated terms and they are tough on the company. Its new IBM credit line carries a 17 percent annual interest rate. Applied must repay 40 percent of the loan plus about $14.45 million in interest on February 28, 2003. Interest and principal payments are suspended until then. If these amounts aren't repaid, the interest rates jump to 25 percent and then to 35 percent in 2004.
The new agreement doesn't allow Applied Digital to borrow from other lenders, and IBM won't advance more funds. If the terms are violated, IBM can demand immediate repayment, which will drive the company into bankruptcy. Applied Digital has not made a profit since the stock began trading publicly in 1996.
Since last Friday's implant, Applied Digital stock has lost 50 percent of its value.
'Tech Live' Exclusive: Nasdaq halts trading in Applied Digital Solutions stock after feds claim company includes medical data in its controversial device.
By Jim Goldman, Tech Live Silicon Valley bureau chief
Updated 5/17: Nasdaq halted trading in shares of VeriChip-maker Applied Digital Solutions Friday morning, a day after TechTV reported that the Food and Drug Administration has launched a formal investigation into the company. Tune in tonight on "Tech Live" for more details on the controversy.
The stock exchange stopped Applied Digital Solutions trades at 9:25 a.m. Eastern, and trading will remain halted until the Florida-based company fully satisfies Nasdaq's request for additional information on the FDA probe into the implantable chip. The halt is related to TechTV's report about the federal investigation into the company and its VeriChip, a Nasdaq spokesman told reporters.
The probe centers on whether or not Applied Digital Solutions is marketing the controversial device as a "medical" lifesaver, or whether the chip is touted merely as an identification device, as the company assured FDA officials it would be.
"The agency is in the process of investigating the firm and documenting exactly what is being said, what is being printed, and what is being promoted," said Wally Pellerite, assistant to the director of the FDA Office of Compliance.
Reached late today, Applied Digital Solutions CEO Scott Silverman said, "We've received no formal notification that we're under investigation."
Silverman did say that Pellerite contacted the company last Friday, expressing concern over the way the chip and its capabilities were being portrayed by the media. Silverman said the company's consultants were working with "people much higher in the FDA" over these concerns, and continue to work with them today.
VeriChip's problem, according to Pellerite, is that the FDA was "very clear" in its response to an email from the company seeking FDA approval to sell its chip. At the time, the FDA responded -- informally according to Pellerite -- that as long as "no medical information" of any kind was encoded on the chip, and as long as the chip was not used to link to any kind of medical database, the company was free to go to market.
But instead, Pellerite said, Applied Digital Solutions issued statements saying that its chip had been given governmental approval and that the first implant would be scheduled for May 10.
The Jacobs family of Boca Raton, Florida, became the first family to receive the chip, an event covered by hordes of media from around the world.
Throughout the day, and indeed in the weeks leading up to the implant event, Applied Digital executives constantly reaffirmed the device's lifesaving capabilities since it was linked to a comprehensive database that could store megabytes of information. The implantable chip could essentially speak for a patient who may be unconscious or otherwise incapacitated by providing key medical information to doctors in an emergency situation.
During a demonstration after Leslie Jacobs was implanted, Applied Digital Solutions CTO Keith Bolton ran a scanner over her arm and the scanner displayed her name, her telephone number, and a condition known as "mitral valve prolapse," a heart murmur. This was information, Bolton said, that could be helpful to medical professionals "in the event that she can't speak, to save her life."
Bolton also scanned the arm of Derek Jacobs, Leslie's 14-year-old son, and the display showed Derek's medicine allergies.
According to Pellerite, "It would strongly suggest that [Applied Digital] has something that needs to be required to be regulated as a medical device."
Additionally, Pellerite told TechTV that Applied Digital may have violated the law when Bolton claimed, "There's more information that can be pulled out of the FDA-compliant database."
Pellerite said, "The firm made reference to using an FDA-compliant [database]. It is a violation of the law to use the FDA in such a way that it would be used to endorse your particular product."
The penalties for those violations can be stiff: up to $15,000 for each violation and up to $1 million for the company, as well as for each individual officer of the company.
"Once an identification number is retrieved from the chip, the user can use it to access any information -- without making the product a medical device," said David Hughes, vice president of Technology Sourcing International, a consultant to Applied Digital Solutions helping the company navigate the FDA approval process.
Upon hearing that the FDA expressed concerns about the chip being tied to a medical database, Hughes said, "That is contrary to my conversations with staff members at the FDA. Until we have an opportunity to discuss it with them more, I can't give you any information. The storing of medical data does not make it a medically regulated device."
Applied Digital's problems don't end there. The company has delayed the release of its quarterly financial results after the company's auditor, Grant Thornton, abruptly resigned Wednesday over an accounting dispute. Just three weeks ago, Applied Digital fired another accountant, PricewaterhouseCoopers.
The dispute with its latest auditor is significant since it dealt with a charge the auditor told the company it would have to take in the current quarter. That charge would lead to a quarterly loss that could be devastating to the company.
If Applied reports the charge, it will translate into a loss on the quarter. If Applied reports red ink on the quarter, it violates one of the terms of its restructured credit agreement with IBM Credit, which loaned the company $82.3 million. Applied Digital had violated the requirements of its IBM Credit loan last year.
According to the Miami Herald, Applied has since renegotiated terms and they are tough on the company. Its new IBM credit line carries a 17 percent annual interest rate. Applied must repay 40 percent of the loan plus about $14.45 million in interest on February 28, 2003. Interest and principal payments are suspended until then. If these amounts aren't repaid, the interest rates jump to 25 percent and then to 35 percent in 2004.
The new agreement doesn't allow Applied Digital to borrow from other lenders, and IBM won't advance more funds. If the terms are violated, IBM can demand immediate repayment, which will drive the company into bankruptcy. Applied Digital has not made a profit since the stock began trading publicly in 1996.
Since last Friday's implant, Applied Digital stock has lost 50 percent of its value.
A Microchip Makes Its Mark: VeriChip & the Beast
By Dale Hurd
CBN News Senior Reporter
http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/news/020131a.asp
Mark of the Beast or marvel of technology?
CBN.com - PALM BEACH, FL — Imagine having a microchip inside your body that would store your identity and important medical information, and might even tell people where you are. Is it a sign of the end times or simply a sign of progress?
Microchip technology is no longer just for Palm Pilots and cell phones, now people can store important information about themselves right beneath their skin. A chip about the size of a Tic Tac can carry up to six lines of text, readable with a scanner.
Science fiction has become reality. A Florida company plans to bring their new VeriChip to the market this year. It's a product that excites a lot of people, but worries many others.
"The VeriChip is an advanced, digital identification technology," explained Doctor Keith Bolton, the vice president and chief technology officer at Applied Digital Systems in Palm Beach, Florida. It will be the first company in the world to offer the microchip for insertion into humans.
"The first component is a very small microchip. The other component is a proprietary, patented, handheld scanner, that reads the information from the chip," Bolton said.
The initial use of the VeriChip will be to store personal identification or medical information, such as details about any implanted medical devices like pacemakers or artificial limbs, or any allergies to medication. In an emergency, it could save a life. Dr. Richard Seelig, medical advisor at Applied Digital, implanted a chip in his arm and his hip area a few months ago.
"Yes, it’s in my right forearm and there is no bump or anything that you can really see, and if you just gently pass your finger over it it's right in this area right here," Seelig demonstrated. "The technique just involves a little bit of local anesthetic into the skin, and just a slight amount of pressure... it takes about seven seconds to do, and that was that — wear a band-aid, that was the end of it."
The Jacobs family in Coral Springs, Florida would like to be the first family to receive the VeriChip. "I was watching the news with Derrick and there was a segment on the VeriChip, and he was so intrigued with the VeriChip. After it was over he stood up and said, ‘I want to be the first kid to have that chip implanted in me,’" said Leslie Jacobs.
"Everybody uses computers in their everyday life, and as people get more and more close to computers, people can't even live without computers for one day," Derrick said. "So I think it’s just another step closer in the evolution of man and technology."
But for Derrick’s dad, Jeff, who suffers from a number of medical challenges, the VeriChip could be a lifesaver. "They would know who to contact, they would know what medications I'm on, and it’s quite a few. They would know what I'm allergic to, what kind of operations I've had and where there might be problems. I can't wait to get it because it will make me feel so much more secure," Jeff said.
Future versions of embedded microchips could carry a person's full identification in place of I.D. cards that can be lost or stolen. That could put a dent in the growing problem of identity theft, and make the world a little safer.
"We would like to know for sure as best we can that the people in that cockpit of that airplane belong there and they are the right people, that people who work at nuclear power plants are the right people and they should be there," Seelig said.
Still more advanced versions of the microchip someday might be able to track a person’s location through a global positioning system [GPS].
Right now Applied Digital Solutions sells a separate system for tracking and monitoring called Digital Angel, which consists of a device similar to a wrist-watch and a module worn on the belt. It is marketed to the families of Alzheimer's patients because, as Bolton demonstrates, it can locate loved ones anywhere in the world, from any P.C. in the world.
"Pete is outside and he has the Digital Angel monitor on, and we're going to monitor his position from this Internet access P.C.," Bolton illustrated. "What we're showing here is he is on the corner of Coconut Grove and Royal Palm Way." And that is exactly where Pete was.
A GPS tracking device is currently too large to fit into the tiny VeriChip, but miniaturization is probably only a matter of time. Some believe a tracking device inside the body could deter kidnapping. "We've had six Latin American countries in here in just the last two weeks, and they are begging us to create an embedded integrated technology," Bolton said.
But the thought of being tracked and carrying vital information in the body makes a lot of people’s skin crawl. And it reminds some of a frightening prophecy in the Bible about the mark of the Beast.
Revelation 13 says the Beast will force everyone "to receive a mark on his right hand or forehead, so that no one could buy or sell unless he had the mark, which is the name of the Beast or the number of his name... His number is 666."
Applied Digital has been attacked by some Christians for making what some fear is a prototype mark of the Beast. So does this chip, as it is now, have any relationship to the prophecy in the book of Revelation? CBN News asked Regent University professor Doctor Joseph Kickasola.
"My judgement is, no they do not," Kickasola said. "I think it's both illogical and unfair to make that assertion, and let me tell you why. I think the Bible clearly says the mark of the Beast is for buying and selling and that it is also coerced, it's government enforced. On the face of it, these microchips are for good purposes, like for medical records, like for lost children. They're not for buying or selling, as is described in the book of Revelation."
And Bolton stresses the VeriChip is voluntary. "We live in a free society," he said. "You can either elect to smoke [or not]. You can elect to have the VeriChip. So it’s a freedom of choice technology."
But what about a future in which everyone must take an embedded chip if they want to drive or work in secure environments? Kickasola stresses that any government coercion would collide with the First Amendment.
"Government cannot coerce us to speak," he said. "And a microchip speaks a lot, it has a lot of information in it. The one threshold in the Bible we must not pass is the threshold of coercion, whereby we have a state or federally enforced form of identification in our body."
The tiny VeriChip would seem to contain more than electronics: hope, fear, opportunity, some politics and perhaps a dash of theology. But it is another piece of technology that will likely become a part of everyday life.
Since we first published this story in late January, the controversy over this microchip has only increased. Applied Digital wants government permission to market the chip to be used for ID purposes in airports, nuclear power plants and other high security facilities.
The idea of such an ID chip has many supporters. But it also has its critics, especially among privacy advocates. One attorney for a privacy group pointed out that new technologies are always used for good purposes at first. But he warned, "The problem is that you always have to think about what the device will be used for tomorrow."
By Dale Hurd
CBN News Senior Reporter
http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/news/020131a.asp
Mark of the Beast or marvel of technology?
CBN.com - PALM BEACH, FL — Imagine having a microchip inside your body that would store your identity and important medical information, and might even tell people where you are. Is it a sign of the end times or simply a sign of progress?
Microchip technology is no longer just for Palm Pilots and cell phones, now people can store important information about themselves right beneath their skin. A chip about the size of a Tic Tac can carry up to six lines of text, readable with a scanner.
Science fiction has become reality. A Florida company plans to bring their new VeriChip to the market this year. It's a product that excites a lot of people, but worries many others.
"The VeriChip is an advanced, digital identification technology," explained Doctor Keith Bolton, the vice president and chief technology officer at Applied Digital Systems in Palm Beach, Florida. It will be the first company in the world to offer the microchip for insertion into humans.
"The first component is a very small microchip. The other component is a proprietary, patented, handheld scanner, that reads the information from the chip," Bolton said.
The initial use of the VeriChip will be to store personal identification or medical information, such as details about any implanted medical devices like pacemakers or artificial limbs, or any allergies to medication. In an emergency, it could save a life. Dr. Richard Seelig, medical advisor at Applied Digital, implanted a chip in his arm and his hip area a few months ago.
"Yes, it’s in my right forearm and there is no bump or anything that you can really see, and if you just gently pass your finger over it it's right in this area right here," Seelig demonstrated. "The technique just involves a little bit of local anesthetic into the skin, and just a slight amount of pressure... it takes about seven seconds to do, and that was that — wear a band-aid, that was the end of it."
The Jacobs family in Coral Springs, Florida would like to be the first family to receive the VeriChip. "I was watching the news with Derrick and there was a segment on the VeriChip, and he was so intrigued with the VeriChip. After it was over he stood up and said, ‘I want to be the first kid to have that chip implanted in me,’" said Leslie Jacobs.
"Everybody uses computers in their everyday life, and as people get more and more close to computers, people can't even live without computers for one day," Derrick said. "So I think it’s just another step closer in the evolution of man and technology."
But for Derrick’s dad, Jeff, who suffers from a number of medical challenges, the VeriChip could be a lifesaver. "They would know who to contact, they would know what medications I'm on, and it’s quite a few. They would know what I'm allergic to, what kind of operations I've had and where there might be problems. I can't wait to get it because it will make me feel so much more secure," Jeff said.
Future versions of embedded microchips could carry a person's full identification in place of I.D. cards that can be lost or stolen. That could put a dent in the growing problem of identity theft, and make the world a little safer.
"We would like to know for sure as best we can that the people in that cockpit of that airplane belong there and they are the right people, that people who work at nuclear power plants are the right people and they should be there," Seelig said.
Still more advanced versions of the microchip someday might be able to track a person’s location through a global positioning system [GPS].
Right now Applied Digital Solutions sells a separate system for tracking and monitoring called Digital Angel, which consists of a device similar to a wrist-watch and a module worn on the belt. It is marketed to the families of Alzheimer's patients because, as Bolton demonstrates, it can locate loved ones anywhere in the world, from any P.C. in the world.
"Pete is outside and he has the Digital Angel monitor on, and we're going to monitor his position from this Internet access P.C.," Bolton illustrated. "What we're showing here is he is on the corner of Coconut Grove and Royal Palm Way." And that is exactly where Pete was.
A GPS tracking device is currently too large to fit into the tiny VeriChip, but miniaturization is probably only a matter of time. Some believe a tracking device inside the body could deter kidnapping. "We've had six Latin American countries in here in just the last two weeks, and they are begging us to create an embedded integrated technology," Bolton said.
But the thought of being tracked and carrying vital information in the body makes a lot of people’s skin crawl. And it reminds some of a frightening prophecy in the Bible about the mark of the Beast.
Revelation 13 says the Beast will force everyone "to receive a mark on his right hand or forehead, so that no one could buy or sell unless he had the mark, which is the name of the Beast or the number of his name... His number is 666."
Applied Digital has been attacked by some Christians for making what some fear is a prototype mark of the Beast. So does this chip, as it is now, have any relationship to the prophecy in the book of Revelation? CBN News asked Regent University professor Doctor Joseph Kickasola.
"My judgement is, no they do not," Kickasola said. "I think it's both illogical and unfair to make that assertion, and let me tell you why. I think the Bible clearly says the mark of the Beast is for buying and selling and that it is also coerced, it's government enforced. On the face of it, these microchips are for good purposes, like for medical records, like for lost children. They're not for buying or selling, as is described in the book of Revelation."
And Bolton stresses the VeriChip is voluntary. "We live in a free society," he said. "You can either elect to smoke [or not]. You can elect to have the VeriChip. So it’s a freedom of choice technology."
But what about a future in which everyone must take an embedded chip if they want to drive or work in secure environments? Kickasola stresses that any government coercion would collide with the First Amendment.
"Government cannot coerce us to speak," he said. "And a microchip speaks a lot, it has a lot of information in it. The one threshold in the Bible we must not pass is the threshold of coercion, whereby we have a state or federally enforced form of identification in our body."
The tiny VeriChip would seem to contain more than electronics: hope, fear, opportunity, some politics and perhaps a dash of theology. But it is another piece of technology that will likely become a part of everyday life.
Since we first published this story in late January, the controversy over this microchip has only increased. Applied Digital wants government permission to market the chip to be used for ID purposes in airports, nuclear power plants and other high security facilities.
The idea of such an ID chip has many supporters. But it also has its critics, especially among privacy advocates. One attorney for a privacy group pointed out that new technologies are always used for good purposes at first. But he warned, "The problem is that you always have to think about what the device will be used for tomorrow."
Implantable Chip, On Sale Now
http://www.wired.com/news/privacy/0,1848,55999,00.html
02:00 AM Oct. 25, 2002 PT
The maker of an implantable human ID chip has launched a national campaign to promote the device, offering $50 discounts to the first 100,000 people who register to get embedded with the microchip.
Applied Digital Solutions has coined the tagline "Get Chipped" to market its product, VeriChip.
The rice-size device costs $200. Those implanted must also pay for the doctor's injection fee and a monthly $10 database maintenance charge, said ADS spokesman Matthew Cossolotto.
The VeriChip emits a 125-kilohertz radio frequency signal that transmits its unique ID number to a scanner. The number then accesses a computer database containing the client's file. Customers fill out a form detailing the information they want linked to their chip when they undergo the procedure, Cossolotto said.
Earlier this week, ADS announced that the FDA had ruled that the VeriChip was not a regulated device when used for "security, financial and personal identification/safety applications."
The agency's sudden approval of the microchip came despite an FDA investigator's concern about the potential health effects of the device in humans. (Microchips have been used to track animals for years.)
The company is marketing the device for a variety of security applications, including:
* Controlling access to physical structures, such as government or private sector offices or nuclear power plants. Instead of swiping a smart card, employees could swipe the arm containing the chip.
* Reducing financial fraud. In this scenario, people could use their chip to withdraw money from ATMs; their accounts could not be accessed unless they were physically present.
* Decreasing identity theft. People could use the chip as a password to access their computer at home, for example.
Cossolotto said ADS has gotten "hundreds" of inquiries from people interested in being implanted.
Meanwhile, privacy advocates are wondering about the specter of forced chippings.
"(ID chips) are a form of electronic leashes, a form of digital control," said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. "What happens if an employer makes it a condition of employment for a person to be implanted with the chip? It could easily become a condition of release for parolees or a requirement for welfare."
Rotenberg said EPIC has filed a Freedom of Information Request to learn more details about the FDA's sudden approval of VeriChip.
The chip has also alarmed some Christians, who fear it is the biblical "Mark of the Beast"; dozens of websites allude to the Satanic implications of the technology.
The company has consistently tried to allay such fears since the chip debuted in December 2001.
"It's a voluntary device that we think has enormous utility," Cossolotto said. "This is intended for good purposes."
ADS said seven health-care facilities, located in Arizona, Texas, Florida and Virginia, have signed up to distribute the chip, in addition to mobilizing a large bus the company has outfitted as a mobile "chipping station." Would-be customers can also register online.
The company plans to develop a prototype for an implantable GPS ID chip by the end of the year.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Digital Angel anyone?
:dead:
http://www.wired.com/news/privacy/0,1848,55999,00.html
02:00 AM Oct. 25, 2002 PT
The maker of an implantable human ID chip has launched a national campaign to promote the device, offering $50 discounts to the first 100,000 people who register to get embedded with the microchip.
Applied Digital Solutions has coined the tagline "Get Chipped" to market its product, VeriChip.
The rice-size device costs $200. Those implanted must also pay for the doctor's injection fee and a monthly $10 database maintenance charge, said ADS spokesman Matthew Cossolotto.
The VeriChip emits a 125-kilohertz radio frequency signal that transmits its unique ID number to a scanner. The number then accesses a computer database containing the client's file. Customers fill out a form detailing the information they want linked to their chip when they undergo the procedure, Cossolotto said.
Earlier this week, ADS announced that the FDA had ruled that the VeriChip was not a regulated device when used for "security, financial and personal identification/safety applications."
The agency's sudden approval of the microchip came despite an FDA investigator's concern about the potential health effects of the device in humans. (Microchips have been used to track animals for years.)
The company is marketing the device for a variety of security applications, including:
* Controlling access to physical structures, such as government or private sector offices or nuclear power plants. Instead of swiping a smart card, employees could swipe the arm containing the chip.
* Reducing financial fraud. In this scenario, people could use their chip to withdraw money from ATMs; their accounts could not be accessed unless they were physically present.
* Decreasing identity theft. People could use the chip as a password to access their computer at home, for example.
Cossolotto said ADS has gotten "hundreds" of inquiries from people interested in being implanted.
Meanwhile, privacy advocates are wondering about the specter of forced chippings.
"(ID chips) are a form of electronic leashes, a form of digital control," said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. "What happens if an employer makes it a condition of employment for a person to be implanted with the chip? It could easily become a condition of release for parolees or a requirement for welfare."
Rotenberg said EPIC has filed a Freedom of Information Request to learn more details about the FDA's sudden approval of VeriChip.
The chip has also alarmed some Christians, who fear it is the biblical "Mark of the Beast"; dozens of websites allude to the Satanic implications of the technology.
The company has consistently tried to allay such fears since the chip debuted in December 2001.
"It's a voluntary device that we think has enormous utility," Cossolotto said. "This is intended for good purposes."
ADS said seven health-care facilities, located in Arizona, Texas, Florida and Virginia, have signed up to distribute the chip, in addition to mobilizing a large bus the company has outfitted as a mobile "chipping station." Would-be customers can also register online.
The company plans to develop a prototype for an implantable GPS ID chip by the end of the year.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Digital Angel anyone?
:dead: