In The Internet of Things, YOU Will Be The Key

By Nicholas West

The move to give everyone a global unique ID that can be verified across nearly all human activity has been in the works for some time. As you can see by the image below, defense contractor, Lockheed Martin, is now a global leader in biometric identification. Comforting.

Lockheed Martin

Naturally, the fear of identity theft and cyber-banking crime of all stripes has been the sales pitch to accept identity tech such as facial recognition, iris scans, and fingerprinting, as well as their attendant databases.

Digital sign-in services, smart cards and a range of biometrics have all been offered as perfect solutions that are starting to enter the market at many levels. Moreover, there is an ongoing cooperative effort between global banks and corporations to ensure that there will be standardized, centralized entry into the consumer/internet/banking matrix of the future. Couple this with the (hackable) “Internet of Things” entering our homes whether we approve or not and we are finding ourselves at the threshold of a new reality.

Capitalizing on the holes in security that we continue to see revealed in our “smart” devices — as well as seeking to find a solution for all of those pesky passwords each of us must deal with — tech startup, Bionym, is one company offering its solution. Their bracelet uses your unique heartbeat signature to unlock smart devices, access ATMs, engage in online activity, and permit access to any location using a reader (shown in the video below). The company claims that its system is more accurate than facial recognition.

However, as one commenter points out:

So what happens if my heart-rate suddenly increases? Does that mean I can’t unlock anything?

Imagine a senior citizen using this, now imagine them having a heart attack and trying to unlock their phone to call for help but the phone won’t unlock because their ECG patterns are way off. (Source)

That’s one reasonable concern among many.

Canadian Business picked up on the story when reporting on a tech demo that took place recently in Toronto. Apparently, even those in the trade can imagine this system going awry:

“The powers that be could start to control access based on persistent identity,” says Erlich (a Toronto-based consultant who specializes in wearables). “In a dystopian future, I’m not allowed to enter a Pizza Hut because my identity says I’m overweight, and there’s some kind of overweight tax. Or, because I’m online and they know all my health data, my insurance premiums could go up.” (Source)

In fact, this is already beginning to happen. The medical field is indeed quickly merging with this type of wearable gadgetry to combine with millions of existing sensors in order to track vital signs in real time. Through the promise of both personal health attainment and medical threat alerts, people are embracing this tech in droves. But, naturally, when one thinks of medical – insurance can’t be far behind, which makes the above dystopian scenario more than plausible.

Another example would be Neuro Cars that are driven by mood and emotion. Again, in the name of safety, people will relinquish their vital signs to an algorithm that supposedly will determine your level of driving fitness. All manner of abuses are imaginable.

The fact is, that when your human form has been completely digitized and databased – YOU will become the password. At that point, it will be virtually impossible to interact at any level of mainstream society without the matrix of databases and algorithms deciding to permit your entry. An array of embedded sensors and artificial intelligence will track all consumer preferences, vital signs, and mental state in an ever-expanding predictive behavior model that aims to know you better than you know yourself … or permit anyone with access to your information to know you better – like the police, insurance companies, governments, banks, data brokers and hackers.

This is an agenda that we need to become quickly aware of as, at this point, we are being persuaded to buy into our own digital slavery – literally selling our bodies to tech companies who seem content to open doors that can lead to uncertain consequences. That “persuasion” can become a heavy-handed push in an instant if the prevailing bureaucratic technocracy takes full effect.

Final Note: To see a current dystopia playing out in real-time, please read the following three articles which show how the current initiative to database every single citizen of Afghanistan is trickling down to local police in America. Then imagine this tech being integrated into drones.

• The war inside the war in Afghanistan
• Real-Time Facial Recognition Offered to Police in New Program
• Database Your Face: Drones to Employ Facial Recognition, Ending Anonymity