It may not be Halloween yet but I’d like to tell a ghoulish tale. A tale about a spectre that will haunt you where ever you hide; a vampire that will suck the life from every freedom you hold dear; a monster whose creation we mistook for scientific genius, realizing too late what we had unleashed upon the world. The moon sheds a sliver of light on a tombstone that reads: “RFID.” Radio Frequency Identification is the technology of using computer chips that track items at a distance.

Katherine Albrecht, co-author of Spy Chips writes, “If the master planners have their way, every object - from shoes to cars - will carry one of these hidden, dot-sized computer chips.” There is no law requiring a label indicating that an RFID chip is in a product. Able to be embedded into anything from bank notes to plane tickets, they interact with reader devices to spy on you. Albrecht says that scanners hidden in walls, displays, and floors will, for example, frisk chips in your clothes to obtain private consumer information, your whereabouts or your habits. Paired with global positioning technology, the chips could allow your whereabouts to be pinpointed, she says, claiming “Wal-Mart has mandated that its top 100 suppliers fix RFID tags to all their products.” Thousands of other companies are now “scrambling” to follow suit, she adds.

Under the “Read ID Act” all US citizens must have a driver’s licenses or an ID card with RFID, and scanning check points are being set up across the country. Those who refuse will be banned from driving, boarding a plane or Amtrak train, opening a bank account or entering a Federal building. US passports now contain RFID chips. The U.S. Postal Service plans to chip stamps, enabling point-to-point tracking. The Food and Drug Administration wants RFID on all prescription drugs - the makers of Oxycontin and Viagra have already begun to comply. The departments of Defense, Homeland Security and Social Security, and NATO, are all implementing RFID.

The Pentagon has stated that: “a massive database monitoring every American citizen’s purchases is a necessary tool in the war against terror.” Some schools are requiring students to wear spy-chipped ID badges. The next generation of workers are already being conditioned to obediently accept surveillance through forced early exposure. Uniform companies like AmeriPride and Cintas are embedding tracking tags into their clothes. Your insurance company could remotely monitor your food consumption and set rates accordingly. Attorneys could subpoena your home activity records for use against you in court. The civil rights breaches are endless.

According to the RFID market analysis firm IDTechEx, the digital inventory tracking and personal ID systems markets will expand to as much as $26 billion a year by 2016. RFID chips are being embedded into world currencies, including dollars, Yen and Euros. Banks argue that RFID will prevent money-laundering, make it possible to track illegal transactions, enable quick cash counts and thwart kidnappers demanding unmarked bills. It will also create a money audit trail, taking away all the autonomy of cash and potentially substituting it with one world economy, tracked and monitored. A French blogger, David, wrote that a wad of $20 bills set off an alarm at an American restaurant while he was on vacation. He experimented by microwaving a bill and was shocked to discover an exploding chip on every $20 bill, in Jackson’s left eye.

Chipping inanimate objects is just the start. Following implanted chips in livestock and pets, in 2004 the Food and Drug Administration approved human implants. Placed in a ricesized glass capsule, the VeriChip, created by Digital Angel Corporation contains a unique 16-digit number that, when scanned, accesses health information from a database. It is implanted in the fatty part of a person’s arm or injected into the back of his/her hands. Since approved, VeriChip, under a program called VeriMed, has been targeted at diabetic and Alzheimer’s patients. To date, over 500 hospitals have agreed to adopt it. Apart from VeriMed, employees in the Mexican Attorney General’s Office, workers in a U.S. security firm, and trendy club-goers in Europe are among people who have been chipped. There are health risks associated with the chips - migration of the implanted transponder, adverse tissue reaction, and burning by electromagnetic interference. Some studies have also shown links with cancer in lab animals.

Despite all this, Scott Silverman, VeriChip Corp’s chairman and CEO, insists that its device is safe and hopes to see them implanted in 45 million Americans. It is a “security measure that all Americans need,” he said. This is a false security, however, because thieves could scan your VeriChip ID as you walk past them and then clone it - accessing information about you. Most commercial RFID tags don’t include encrypted security features, such as those found in passports or documents, because it costs about five times more than an unencrypted chip which can be easily hacked and altered, even by amateurs.

Not only activist groups like Spy- Chips.com, Caspia, wethepeoplewillnotbechipped. com, and the Electronic Privacy Information Center are generating consumer awareness, but opposition is coming from fervent Christians who have likened RFID implants to the Book of Revelation’s “mark of the Beast.” Spy Chips warns that everything you do could be tied into a single chip, including financial transactions, rendering cash obsolete. You would become a non-citizen if the electronic impulses to your chip were stopped. “The ultimate goal is for everyone to be chipped. “Step out of line and they will simply turn off your chip.” The idea of being chipped for 24/7 surveillance is perhaps still inconceivable to the average person, but it’s certainly got me spooked.