Saturday, April 09, 2005

One such organisation is the Consumers Against Supermarket Privacy Invasion and Numbering organisation or CASPIAN. Originally set up to oppose supermarket invasion of obtaining information about shoppers through club cards etc. they now are focusing on the next big boom, RFID chips in both in items such as clothing and in our bodies. They argue that due to the shear simplicity and quietness of how the RFID chips work the owner will have no idea when he or she is transmitting information about him or herself. They offer no choice to the user of when he or she can give information to someone. They also offer no choice to where he or she is being scanned as the scanner readers can be placed anywhere and cover a vast area. Finally and probably most shockingly, although in such things as clubs and shops they offer more initial freedom in the long run they create a transparent prison of glass windows and see through doors. They say this because they argue that just like the way the clubs and shops can monitor where a “RFIDed individual” is on their premises so can the government but on a much wider scale. They would be able to see everything that individual does as the chip would be used has a homing beacon, he or she wouldn’t be able to go to such things as rallies, protests of even the cinemas without the government knowing. They ask you, are you comfortable with someone else knowing your every whereabouts?

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