Replying to a message of George Pope to Steve Asher:

 GP> Posting this in this echo implies you don't believe there can be ANY
 GP> benign or positive application of this technology. . .

 GP> Is that so?

Not WRT people.  Those who need or want to carry such ID can do so on a chain
around their neck.  I have a major problem with chipping infants (and that's what's
coming) shortly after birth and using that chip to keep track of them
throughout their
life.  Right now it's voluntary.  Before much more time passes it will become 
mandatory as the government encourages employers and businesses (especially banks,
which are directly under federal supervision) to use them to ID employees and
customers.

Right now the technology exists - and is used - to ID every single product item in
commerce, down to individual cans of vegetables or soda pop.  Not just the 
ubiquitous bar code that identifies the manufacturer and the product but a chip that
identifies the specific item - even if there are millions of them made.

A bank robber in Omaha was recently caught using this RFID technology.  Seems he
wrote his note on a scrap of a cardboard product box and left it at the bank.  That
scrap had the tiny spy chip in it and the police used it to find (a) the
manufacturer,
(b) when and where it was manufactured and where it went from the maker, and (c)
the store the item was sold in.  Then they went to the store, reviewed its computer
records and found the specific date and time - to the second - that the product
was sold and on which register.  From there they reviewed the store's security camera
records and got a picture of the robber, which the bank tellers were able
to recognize
despite the diguise he'd used at the bank.  The whole process took only a
couple of hours.
Had he used a check or credit card to pay for the merchandise they could have been
waiting at his house for him to come home.

--- FleetStreet 1.19+